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Chapter 21 - The Fourth Wall

from Part IV - Traditions and Trends, Techniques and Forms

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2024

Patricia Gaborik
Affiliation:
Accademia Nazionale d'Arte Drammatica ‘Silvio d'Amico’
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Summary

Although Pirandello’s Six Characters in Search of an Author is often taken as an exercise in “metatheatre,” the play in fact imagines theatre defined as a specific technological apparatus: a fully electrified house, actors expected to play “in character,” and an audience spatially and conceptually separated from the artistic performance. That is, Pirandello’s skeptical critique of theatre and theatricality is undertaken through a specific instrument, the apparatus of the modern, darkened proscenium house. This chapter explores Pirandello’s work in the context of a specific kind of technological apparatus, one in which the thematics of critique are specifically managed by the ideological disposition of modern theatre design and signaled most effectively by its tools, notably by the rhetorical assertion of the proscenium as a “fourth wall” and by the ways lighting articulates its function in the making of dramatic performance.

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Pirandello in Context , pp. 170 - 178
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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  • The Fourth Wall
  • Edited by Patricia Gaborik, Accademia Nazionale d'Arte Drammatica ‘Silvio d'Amico’
  • Book: Pirandello in Context
  • Online publication: 14 March 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108339391.028
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  • The Fourth Wall
  • Edited by Patricia Gaborik, Accademia Nazionale d'Arte Drammatica ‘Silvio d'Amico’
  • Book: Pirandello in Context
  • Online publication: 14 March 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108339391.028
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • The Fourth Wall
  • Edited by Patricia Gaborik, Accademia Nazionale d'Arte Drammatica ‘Silvio d'Amico’
  • Book: Pirandello in Context
  • Online publication: 14 March 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108339391.028
Available formats
×