Renaissance Drama and Staging

Renaissance Drama and Staging

Margaret Jane Kidnie states “an area significantly impacted by William Shakespeare, Renaissance Theater developed into an influential period of drama deviating upon various elements of perception in each performance” (456-473). Many scholars wrote responses about renaissance drama and staging. There was a diversity of focus portrayed throughout each presentation, therefore resulting in differentiation between performances. Jealousy, gender, and spectatorship were some of the many topics that were represented in theater throughout the Renaissance Era, influenced greatly by William Shakespeare. Having written numerous plays performed during the Renaissance era, “Shakespeare’s influence on drama and staging can be shown through the language of performance criticism,” (Masten 341). interpretation of the drama, different focal points, and the way these plays were performed in relation to the text.

During the seventeenth century, most plays that were written had a focal point of jealousy and had tragic endings. According to Katharine Eisaman Maus, “Anxiety about sexual betrayal pervades the drama of the English Renaissance” (561) and becomes the plot of many plays. Many critics cannot understand why many characters have the quality of being jealous and also to being curious. Maus continues to state, “Some critics are inclined to look for cultural explanations; for then the phenomenon reflects in a particularly telling way…” (561). English Renaissance dramatists are more likely to include jealousy, sexual disloyalty and anxiety rather than non-dramatists. Shakespeare uses sexual fidelity that lead up to jealousy in many of his dramas such as Othello, and The Winter’s Tale. Maus reveals an answer to the question of why jealousy always becomes in a Renaissance drama. She states “sexual jealousy fascinates English Renaissance playwrights not only because it is a psychologically and socially interesting phenomenon but because the dynamic of sexual jealousy provides a complex analogy to theatrical performance and response to culture…” (Maus 563). When people come to the theater, they want a good performance. A good issue to represent in most Renaissance dramas is sexual jealousy and anxiety. This allows the audience to enjoy the play, while having their own interpretation as well.

Many historians and Shakespeare scholars show a great interest in how to connect the script and the performance of the play. The script or text of a play is only half of what the drama turns out to be. In order to understand the whole drama, one must comprehend the relationship between the text and the performance.