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14 - ‘The Stage Hand’s Lament’

Scenography, Technology, and Off-Stage Labour

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2021

By
Kirsten E. Shepherd-Barr
Edited by
Kirsten E. Shepherd-Barr
Kirsten E. Shepherd-Barr
Affiliation:
University of Oxford
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Summary

Chapter 14: This chapter explores advances in stage technology from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries that profoundly shaped and influenced both theatrical performance and playwriting, particularly in the domain of stage lighting. Opening with the mid-twentieth-century example of Josef Svoboda, the chapter then goes back to the invention of limelight and its behind-the-scenes manipulation, which leads into a consideration of other kinds of technologically oriented off-stage labor. The discussion then turns to theatrical patents of the late nineteenth century, building on recent scholarship on backstage labor with a view to considering how scientific, technological, and theatrical work merge and often share this status of invisibility. The conclusion proposes a model for approaching and teaching theatre history based on a greater recognition of the role of technology, especially in our understanding of ‘science on stage’.

Keywords

backstage labourinvisible culturesliterature and scienceperformance innovationscenographyscience on stagetheatre lightingtheatre technologytheatrical patentsVictorian theatrical trades
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Companion to Theatre and Science , pp. 203 - 218
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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References

Suggested Reading

Aronson, Arnold, ed. The Routledge Companion to Scenography. New York, 2017.Google Scholar
Baugh, Christopher. Theatre, Performance and Technology. London, 2013.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Booth, Michael R., ed. Victorian Theatrical Trades. London, 1981.Google Scholar
Burian, Jarka. The Scenography of Josef Svoboda. Middletown, CT, 1971.Google Scholar
Davis, Tracy C. Actresses as Working Women: Their Social Identity in Victorian Culture. New York, 1991.Google Scholar
Essin, Christin. ‘An Aesthetic of Backstage Labor’. Theatre Topics 21, no. 1 (March 2011): 33–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Freeze, Karen. ‘Czechoslovak Theater Technology under Communism: Ambassador to the West’. Technology and Culture 53, no. 2 (April 2012): 449.Google Scholar
Hill, Rosemary. God’s Architect: Pugin and the Building of Romantic Britain. London, 2007.Google Scholar
Lieberman, Jennifer L. ‘Finding a Place for Technology’. Journal of Literature and Science 10, no. 1 (2017): 26–31.Google Scholar
Moynet, Jean-Pierre. Backstage in the Theatre: Scenes and Machines, trans. Christopher Baugh. London, 2015.Google Scholar
Osborne, Elizabeth A., and Woodworth, Christine, eds. Working in the Wings: New Perspectives on Theatre History and Labor. Carbondale, IL, 2015.Google Scholar
Rees, Terence. Theatre Lighting in the Age of Gas. London, 1978.Google Scholar
Roach, Joseph R. ‘Darwin’s Passion: The Language of Expression on Nature’s Stage’. Discourse 13, no. 1 (1990–1): 41.Google Scholar
Wilmore, David, and Rees, Terence, eds. British Theatrical Patents, 1801–1900. Irthlingborough, 1996.Google Scholar
Wolf, Eric R. Europe and the People without History. Preface by Thomas Hylland Eriksen. Berkeley, CA, 2010; originally published 1982.Google Scholar

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