DRAMA

Drama comes from the greek word, “dran” means “to do” or “to act”. Drama is a fiction
written to be performed, although it is traditionally written in verse, through actors on a stage
before an audience. This genre places an emphasis on dialogue and stage direction. Drama is also
a type of a play written for theater, television, radio, and film.
In simple words, a drama is a composition in verse or prose presenting a story in pantomime or
dialogue. It contains conflict of characters, particularly the ones who perform in front of
audience on the stage. The person who writes drama for stage directions is known as a
“dramatist” or “playwright.”

ELEMENTS OF DRAMA

PLOT

Plot refers to the basic storyline of the play, is the structure of a play which tells what happens
as the story goes. The plot structure can be divided into six stages: exposition, inciting incident,
rising action, climax, falling action, and denouement.
  The exposition is simply an introductory part that provides the background information
needed to properly understand the story.
 The conflict, is the event that sets the action of the play in motion. It is what gets the
story going.
 The rising action is a series of events, including complications and discoveries, which
follow the inciting incident and create the dramatic climax of a plot.
 The climax is the turning point, or the peak, of a plot which holds an utmost emotional
intensity of the play.
 The falling action is a series of events following the climax that leads to the solution of
the conflicts.
 The denouement serves as the conclusion of the plot in which the conflicts are
unraveled. It is the ending scene of the drama.

CHARACTER

Characters are the people, or sometimes animals, subjected in the drama, and are portrayed by
the actors and actresses in the play. They are one of the main components that move the action of
the play forward. Characters can be categorized into three types according to the roles they play.
The main character of the play is known as the protagonist. The antagonist is the character who
opposes the protagonist. The other characters that are neither the protagonist nor the antagonist
are called the secondary characters. They may have a major part or a minor involvement in the
drama.

SETTING

The setting is the place, together with other conditions, such as time and the environment,
involved in which the events occur. The setting in the drama can be presented through the visual
element deals with the scenes, costumes and special effects used in it. The setting can as well be
enhanced by using viewable elements, sound effects, and music.
SET – Construction on the stage that shows time/place. Set means the scenery and
furniture onstage.

THEME

The theme refers to the message that is intended to be expressed through the story. In other
word, it is the main idea or the lesson to be learned from the play. 

GENRE

Genre is the type of play. The examples of genre in which the play can be classified include
tragedy, comedy, romantic, mystery, and historical play.  

AUDIENCE
 Audience is a group of people who watch the play. Audience can be said to be the most
important element of drama to be considered about, since it is the audience that determine
whether the play is successful or not. Also, many playwrights write the plot of the drama with a
great concern regarding to their groups of audience rather than their own interests. 

SCRIPT
A script is a piece of writing in the form of drama. the written pages of a play. A script consists
of dialogue (what the characters say to each other), stage directions and instructions to the actors
and director. Scripts are divided into Acts and Scenes.

 ACTS- long sections of a play, made up of multiple scenes, usually designed to separate
the play into its main parts and to give the audience a “break” from the performance.
 SCENES- shorter sections of a play, usually each scene occurs in one location at a
specific time. Multiple scenes make up an act.

DIALOGUE

The lines spoken by the actors; in the script preceded by the name of the character that is to
speak the words. The story of a play is taken forward by means of dialogs. The story is narrated
to the audiences through the interaction between the play’s characters, which is in the form of
dialogs. The contents of the dialogs and the quality of their delivery have a major role to play in
the impact that the play has on the audiences. It is through the dialogs between characters that the
story can be understood. They are important in revealing the personalities of the characters.
Here are two types of dialogue in literature:

a. INNER DIALOGUE
In inner dialogue, the characters speak to themselves and reveal their
personalities.
MONOLOGUE – To use inner dialogue, writers employ literary techniques like
stream of consciousness
SOLILOQUY – one person speaking their thoughts out loud for the audience
b. OUTER DIALOGUE
Outer dialogue is a simple conversation between two characters, used in almost
all types of fictional works.

STAGE DIRECTION

The definition of a stage direction is an instruction written in the script of a play that gives
direction to the actors or information about the scenery. Describe scenery, action, and how
characters speak. The definition of a stage direction is an instruction written in the script of a
play that gives direction to the actors or information about the scenery. Found in brackets [ ] or
parenthesis ( ).

PROPS – Props are the items held or used by actors onstage to make the action more realistic. Items
used onstage by actors.

TYPES OF DRAMA
COMEDY – Comedies are lighter in tone than ordinary works, and provide a happy ending
conclusion. The intention of dramatists in comedies is to make their audience laugh. Hence, they
use quaint circumstances, unusual characters, and witty remarks.
The purpose of comedy is to amuse the audience, while it also portrays social institutions and
persons as corrupt, and ridicules them through satirizing, parodying, and poking fun at their
vices. By doing this, authors expose foibles and follies of individuals and society by using comic
elements.

TYPES OF COMEDY

There are five types of comedy in literature:

ROMANTIC COMEDY

Romantic comedy involves a theme of love leading to a happy conclusion. We find romantic
comedy in Shakespearean plays and some Elizabethan contemporaries. These plays are
concerned with idealized love affairs. It is a fact that true love never runs smoothly; however,
love overcomes difficulties and ends in a happy union.

COMEDY OF HUMORS

Ben Johnson is the first dramatist who conceived and popularized this dramatic genre during the
late sixteenth century. The term humor derives from the Latin word humor, which means
“liquid.” It comes from a theory that the human body has four liquids, or humors, which include
phelgm, blood, yellow bile, and black bile. It explains that, when human beings have a balance
of these humors in their bodies, they remain healthy.

COMEDY OF MANNERS
This form of dramatic genre deals with intrigues and relations of ladies and gentlemen living in a
sophisticated society. This form relies upon high comedy, derived from sparkle and wit of
dialogues, violations of social traditions, and good manners, by nonsense characters like jealous
husbands, wives, and foppish dandies. We find its use in Restoration dramatists, particularly in
the works of Wycherley and Congreve.

SENTIMENTAL COMEDY
Sentimental drama contains both comedy and sentimental tragedy. It appears in literary circles
due to reaction of the middle class against obscenity and indecency of Restoration Comedy of
Manners. This form, which incorporates scenes with extreme emotions evoking excessive pity,
gained popularity among the middle-class audiences in the eighteenth century.

TRAGICOMEDY
This dramatic genre contains both tragic and comedic elements. It blends both elements to
lighten the overall mood of the play. Often, tragicomedy is a serious play that ends happily.
TRAGEDY
Tragic dramas use darker themes, such as disaster, pain, and death. Protagonists often have a
tragic flaw — a characteristic that leads them to their downfall. A drama that treats in a serious
and dignified style the sorrowful or terrible events encountered or caused by a heroic individual.
Best example is the famous work of William Shakespear ‘Romeo and Juliet’

FARCE
Generally, a farce is a nonsensical genre of drama, which often overacts or engages slapstick
humor.

MELODRAMA
Melodrama is an exaggerated drama, which is sensational and appeals directly to the senses of
the audience. Just like the farce, the characters are of a single dimension and simple, or may be
stereotyped.

MUSICAL DRAMA– In musical dramas, dramatists not only tell their stories through acting
and dialogue, but through dance as well as music. Often the story may be comedic, though it may
also involve serious subjects.