Treading the boards
THEATRE IN this country at times fights an unnecessary war with the cinema. Much is made of this battle, and in terms of audience numbers, there is only one winner — the movies. But for the theatre to succeed it must avoid this competition. In the nineteenth century, we had theatre but no cinema. Interestingly though, it is not theatre that the era is renowned for, but its then rival, the novel.
Perhaps this was because of the sheer brilliance of Dickens, Austen et al, but mostly it seems, theatre itself was at fault. The birth of the melodramatic and burlesque traditions saw the origin of designer theatre, based on over-elaboration and exaggeration of hero versus villain plots, and not on the real emotions of men and women, a problem Stanislavsky was soon to combat. Back to the present day, and theatre’s main rival, on both a financial and artistic level, is cinema.
Designer theatre, complete with elaborate sets and cinematic effects, seems to have resurfaced over the past twenty years. Herein lies the problem — when theatre tries to imitate the cinema, it will always fall short. We have seen it all: video screens on stage, epic and astronomically flamboyant and expensive scenery, huge ensemble casts, and relentless supporting music (unnecessary, overlysentimental and filmic).
Instead theatre must play its own game, must concentrate on what it does best, and in particular on the things that set it apart from cinema. Trevor Nunn said in 1990 that come the new millennium, live theatre will no longer exist. There are reasons why it will always survive. Try as it might, cinema will never have the immediacy of an evening at the theatre. A performance on film is set in stone, on stage it is continually changing — from moment to moment and from night to night.
Where film is inherently visual, let us not forget that in the past an audience went to hear a play. Focus on screen is created by an editor; in the theatre, by the actor. When theatre gets it right, it takes on qualities that cannot be produced cinematically. When it goes visual, it becomes more and more static and then — at £6.50 — the cinema will always win.
25th May 2006