The

Theatrical
Arts
Theater Arts is a collaborative form of
fine art that uses live performers to present
the experience of a real or imagined event
before a live audience in a specific place.
The performers may communicate this
experience to the audience through
combinations of gesture, speech, song,
music, and dance.
Elements of Theater Arts
•Literary Elements
•Plot refers to the action in the theatrical piece. It can be
called a story line.
– Preliminary Event
– Initial Incident
– Rising Action
– Climax
– Falling Action
– Denouement
Theme refers to the meaning, subject matter or content of
the play.
Characters are the people created by the author who
move the play forward. They are brought to life by actors.
Dialogue refers to what the characters say on stage. An
actor can also use action to move the play forward.
Music often accompanies a theatrical production.
– Rhythm refers to how the actors speak, whether fast
or slow, smoothly or hesitatingly.
Performance Elements
•Direction is the task of the director which is central to all productions. It
sends a play in a creative direction, which the scriptwriter or author may not
have conceived before.
•Character Creation. Actors under the director create characters; they
interpret the characters. Both director and actors discuss the play and then
analyze the character. It involves the knowledge of the actor towards the
personality of the character and he/she enters it.
•Vocal Expression refers to the nuances of delivering lines that express a
character.
•Action or nonverbal expression encompasses how an actor uses the
body
– Example: Blocking, gestures and facial expressions
Technical Elements
•Scenery and Props. Scenery creates the site of the dramatic
action. Props are moveable pieces in the scenery.
•Costume and Make Up refer to what the actors wear and
use to define the character.
•Style refers to the total visual look of the production
•Sound plays a principal and supportive element because it
enhances the production through setting the mood for a
scene.
Principles of Composition
•Coherence is achieved when every part of a script links with
other parts. All parts can be placed within a story line.
•Emphasis is made when some elements of the play stand out
above others. It is also seen in highlighting some characters
over others.
• Exposition is influenced by convention, type and audience.
- Convention refers to a set ways of doing things, developing
characters etc
Subject Matter
– Tragedy is about a hero who meets disaster
because of a flaw.
– Comedy refers to a light and humorous tale
that ends happily.
– Melodrama Convention has qualities of
both tragedy and comedy but has a light
theme, usually about love lost and regaines.
Basic Plots
•Overcoming the Monster
Example: Star Wars, Ang Panday
•Rags to Riches Example: Cinderella
•The Quest
Example: IbongAdarna
•Voyage and Return
Example: Odyssey
•Rebirth
Philippine Theater Forms
•Ethnic Rituals refer to the many and varied
rituals of the Philippine cultural communities
living mostly in the mountainous interior of
the islands.
– Catholic Based on Liturgical Year
Christmas
• Panunuluyan- reenacts the search of Mary and
Joseph for a place to stay in Bethlehem so that Jesus could
be born
• Tatlong Hari- celebrated on the feast of the Epiphany,
dramatizes the visit of the magi to the child Jesus.
• Pastores- mostly a dance, is named after the
shepherds who visit the child Jesus in the manger because
they heard the angels announcing his birth.
Pastores
Lent/Holy Week
– Osana- recalls the triumphant entry of Jesus into Jerusale,
– HulingHapunan- is held in the house of a sponsor family
where a priest and twelve men dressed as apostles dine
together.
– Paghuhugas ng Paa- is a reenactment of the washing of the
disciples’ feet done by Jesus before the last Supper.
– Siete Palabras- Seven Last Words is a three-hour sermon on
the last words of Jesus as he hung on the cross. Traditionally,
at the end of the sermon, a crucifix with a body of Jesus is
brought down from the cross and placed on a bier dresses as
the dead Christ which is then brought in procession outside the
church.
•Senakulo- is a stage or street play about the life and
Passion of Jesus that takes place in many communities,
especially in Bulacan, Rizal and Pampanga provinces.1 An
outdoor Senakulo often parades a figure of Jesus carrying
the Cross through the streets, and emphasizes the violence
and brutality of Jesus’ persecutors.
•Hudasdramatizes the despairing Judas who hangs himself
•Soledad a procession done where the image of the
sorrowful virgin Mary dressed in black winds through the
streets on Good Friday night.
– Via Crusisis a devotion consisting of
walking from one image or station to
another depicting 14 scenes from the
story of Jesus’ passion and death
then stopping and praying before
each image,
– Moriones– a type of sinakulo of
Marinduque
• Easter
• Salubongrecalls the meeting of Jesus and Mary in the first
Easter.
• Fiesta
• Flores de Mayo is a ritual consisting of prayers and floral
offerings to the virgin Mary. It is complemented by the costumed
procession Santacruzan where participants personify the virtues
of virgin Mary.
• Pangaluluwa literally means for the souls. It is performed
late night on the vigil of All Saints’ Day, impersonating souls in
purgatory, men and women beg for alms so that masses can be
celebrated for them.
 Theatrical Forms

– Drama- generic name for plays

• Dramatic Monologue- a modern type of play
where ine actor speaks and acts out thoughts and
innermost feelings
• Realism
– Comedy
• Komedta
• Moros y christianos
– Short Films
• Mimetic dances- portray movements of plants,
animals and humans. Example: Itik-itik which imitates
the movement of ducks
• Mimetic Games- are word games usually played to
pass the time away (during a wake). Example:
Bulaklakan in Pampanga
• Mimetic Joust- is a debate usually accompanied by
stylized gestures
• Saynete- a short play performed as an intermission or
an interlude in a longer play
Puppet Theater- common in Southeast Asia
 Shadow Theater
• Example: Carillo, WayangGolek (Indonesia)
o Musical Theater- refers to plays where music is integral
 Broadway- refers to American type musicals that have been
introduced to the Philippines through movies
 Opera- traces back to Renaissance and baroque Europe.
Wjen masters like Carlo Monteverde and Wolfganag Amadeus
Mozart composed operas. Operas were performed in the
Philippines in the 19th century by visiting Italian troupes.
 Sarswela- a type of play that combines
music and spoken lines
Other Forms
 Absurd refers to a type of theater influenced by the
playwrights Ionesco, beckett, and Genet. It presents ideas
through stylized characters that represent character types
rather than individuals. It exaggerates situations to drive a
point.
 Brechtian theater is influenced by the ideal of
German playwright and director Bertolt Brecht. It uses form
of theater like mime, music and dance.
• Dula-Tula- became popular in the 1970s and
1980s and was used as vehicle for political
messages
• Political Theater refer to plays with political
agenda and aims to change, reform and improve
existing institutions and systems of government
– Example: TanikalangGinto by Juan Abad (1906) is an
allegorical play also known as DramatikoSimboliko
• Street Theater using streets as dramatic space.
Thank You!