History of Acting: From Greeks to Modern Days

This paper analyzes the historical accounts of acting by focusing on the styles of acting starting from the Greeks to modern days. It discusses the role of actors in ancient Greek drama, acting styles of Romans, and modern acting styles.

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Introduction
The early stages of drama can be found in Athens. At this stage, ancient hymns known as
the dithyrambs were sung in dignity of the god Dionysus. These hymns were at the later stage
adapted for choral processions. At the later stage, participants would dress according to the
character and indulge in plays1. The following paper will analyse the historical accounts of acting
by focusing on the styles of acting starting from the Greeks to modern days.
Discussion
The main role of the actors in the ancient Greek drama depends on carrying on dialogue
and subsequently performs as per the character of the play. Mills has noted that the history of the
early development of drama have been regarded as the history of the continuing introduction of
actors. Furthermore, dialogues in the choral entertaining form have increased the importance of
dialogue presentation until it eventually surpassed the choral part in general2. The initial step of
the process was changed into a spectacular one by the tradition of balancing the interval between
various portions.
Furthermore, focusing on widespread appreciation that theatre acting ignores description;
Western theory has followed the link of drama and presentation as a central factor of acting and
acting. Moreover, as per the view of Burke, audiences, actors, performers with organized space,
were considered as essential factors to theatre3. Castiglione and Davide Infante have noted that
even though the mimesis study tends to guide several practitioners and scholars regard as theatre.
1 Mills, C. Wright. "The power elite." In Inequality, pp. 71-86. Routledge, 2018.
2 Burke, Peter. Popular culture in early modern Europe. Routledge, 2017.
3 Joseph, Jordania. Choral Singing in Human Culture and Evolution. Lap Lambert Academic Publ, 2015.

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However, the acting styles of Romans disclose clear differences from Greek times
whereby their charge was rude and vulgar in addition to obscene caricature based on
drunkenness, greed, disloyalty and play. Theatrical performances which had been once
recognized as the magnificence Greece and of great implication in Republic Rome developed as
a low-graded form of popular entertaining activities. Kruger has noted that several individuals
believed an absence of connection between the two stating that one died with the attack of the
barbarians and later following the breakage of several nations, the other was born4.
Subsequently the restitution period witnessed not only restitution of monarchy but also
the acting styles of theatre artists. Comprehensive studies of Nicholson Darius have focused on
Charles II who revived theatrical performances during competition between two well-organized
theatre companies governed under his personal knowledge. Such revival of acting styles required
the playwrights of the 1660s and 70s to match to the growing interest of the audience. Nicholson
Darius have noted that idea had been typically inspired from the Spanish or French theatre, the
English Caroline or Jacobean drama and also from Greek or Roman classical comedies and these
eventually destroyed the plotlines in investigative ways5.
However, acting in modern times can be viewed through the lenses of history. Nicholson
Darius has identified variety of American acting styles which requires modern acting in the form
of Shakespeare plays and further extends out till the realm of Cirque De Soleil and the modern
Broadway musicals. The theme has been regarded as highly dependable in modern acting styles
that portrays real life with rational ideas and thoughts. Furthermore, on the other hand, Mills has
4 Castiglione, Concetta, and Davide Infante. "The evolution of theatre attendance in Italy: patrons and companies."
In Enhancing Participation in the Arts in the EU, pp. 155-169. Springer, Cham, 2017.
5 Kruger, Marie. "What’s in a name? The sense or non-sense of labelling puppets in contemporary Western
theatre." Cogent Arts & Humanities 1, no. 1 (2014): 990866.

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shed light on the major development in the acing styles for actors with contemporary theatre.
These acting styles no longer function as the union similar to former generations6. Moreover,
modern acting styles have formed personal associations which provide knowledge and ideas of
acting as well as theatre. Acting and theatres in contemporary era sustains the image and
popularity of actors regardless of his or her poor acting ability thus can be significantly heard.
However, the enormous open-air theatre at Athens essentially requires actors possessing
unusually apparent and powerful voice to make the dialogues successfully heard to the huge
multitude of audience.
Conclusion
Hence to conclude, it modern era encounters several challenges to distinguish actors who
combined histrionic talent with voices of adequate power, but restricted the number of actors to
reduce propensity of spoiling the play. However, such a deliberation certainly ascertained the
sustained observation of the rule as to the number of the actors.
6 Nicholson, Rashna Darius. "Corporeality, aryanism, race: The theatre and social reform of the Parsis of Western
India." South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies 38, no. 4 (2015): 613-638.

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References
Mills, C. Wright. "The power elite." In Inequality, pp. 71-86. Routledge, 2018.
Burke, Peter. Popular culture in early modern Europe. Routledge, 2017.
Joseph, Jordania. Choral Singing in Human Culture and Evolution. LAP LAMBERT
ACADEMIC PUBL, 2015.
Castiglione, Concetta, and Davide Infante. "The evolution of theatre attendance in Italy: patrons
and companies." In Enhancing Participation in the Arts in the EU, pp. 155-169. Springer, Cham,
2017.
Kruger, Marie. "What’s in a name? The sense or non-sense of labelling puppets in contemporary
Western theatre." Cogent Arts & Humanities 1, no. 1 (2014): 990866.
Nicholson, Rashna Darius. "Corporeality, aryanism, race: The theatre and social reform of the
Parsis of Western India." South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies 38, no. 4 (2015): 613-638.