THE: Lesson - Roman Drama

Roman Drama

In this lesson, we're going to outline the major parts of Roman drama: the theater, the costumes, the major playwrights, and the plots.

The Theater Building

The Roman theater was based on its Greek predecessor. The image below is labeled with a set of numbers describing the parts of the theater, which will be described below the image:

Costumes and Props

Costumes were critical in Roman drama to convey information to the audience about the characters. Recall that every role in a Roman play was performed by a man (there were exceptions, but this was the general rule). To compensate for this, Romans used several indicators: costume color and design, props, and of course the famous dramatic masks that all the actors wore. Costuming followed Greek tradition, with most actors wearing a Greek chiton (a long robe, somewhat similar to a long Roman tunic). The chiton and the draped cloak worn on top (called a himation) were often colored to indicate the characters' gender, age, and rank:

• A purple costume identified a rich man
• Boys wore striped togas
• Soldiers wore short cloaks
• Red costumes indicated a poor man
• A yellow robe meant the character was a woman
• Short tunics indicated a slave
• A yellow tassel meant the character was a god

One of the most distinct parts of the Roman costume was the mask. If you recall, in the earliest Greek performances, a single actor would play every role, which necessitated the use of masks to distinguish what character was performing at a given time. Even once the number of actors increased and each role was performed by a unique actor, the masks remained, providing more visual cues for the audience. The masks were large enough to cover the whole head, including hair. They were usually made of linen or other light materials, with large holes for the eyes and mouth. The design of the mask also allowed the actor to project their voice because of the shape of the mouth hole - it basically acted as a megaphone. In the image above, you can see several actors getting ready for a performance. The masks are still in a box in the middle of the mosaic.

Finally, the Romans used props. Many of these were quite basic: swords for mock fights, dinner settings, and other easily moved objects. The stage would also often be decorated with furniture, plants, and statues to provide a setting for the scene. 

Playwrights and Plots

In the video from the previous lesson, we met three playwrights: Plautus, Terence, and Seneca. Plautus and Terence were comic playwrights while Seneca wrote tragedies. We will be reading a complete play by Plautus, so we'll get a good idea of his style.

In general, the Romans preferred comedic plays. The earliest known playwrights, like Livius Andronicus and Ennius, either translated from Greek or heavily borrowed from original Greek plays. Interestingly, a large portion of the oldest surviving Latin is from these playwrights, which gives us insight into what the Romans valued. They actively sought to maintain these plays and continued performing them well into the age of the emperors.

In general, the plots of Roman plays followed their Greek predecessors. Comedies were full of stock characters (the old man, the young hero, the prostitute, the sneaky slave, and so on) and stock plots (mistaken identity was a source of great mirth to Romans, apparently). Tragedies followed the Greek model and were often gruesome. In fact, some historians argue that certain plays written by Seneca could never have been actually performed because of how much gore was involved. Then again, these are the Romans, who enjoyed watching gladiators fight in the arena, so it could at least be possible that there was actual violence at the theater.

To review: comedies tended to focus on daily life and its absurdity, often taking a common scenario and twisting it up to make it funnier than it normally would be. Tragedies were heavily focused on history, often centered on the Trojan War and the lead up to and fallout from that event. If you remember your Roman history, even though the Trojan War involved the Greeks and Trojans (Rome wasn't even around when the war supposedly happened), Rome traced its origin to refugees from Troy, so the war remained culturally important to the Romans.

In both cases (comedy and tragedy), plays were an avenue for skewering those in power, making these dramatic performances a source of political commentary and satire.

For Your Entertainment

The following brief clip is from a Greek play (The Clouds by Aristophanes), but it highlights some of the features we've talked about in this lesson. You'll notice that all the characters are being played by women in this presentation due to the fact that this was a performance done by the Randolph College drama department (Randolph College formerly called Macon Women's College). In this scene, Socrates (in a yellow chiton with a brown himation) is answering questions about rain asked by Stepsiades (in a light blue chiton with a darker blue himation). The chorus is dressed as clouds.

Note also how the play moves from dialogue (between Socrates and Stepsiades) to a musical number involving the chorus and Stepsiades. This was a common feature, especially of comedies: the chorus would break into song to move the plot along.

Video Source: TheGreekPlay (Randolph (Macon Women's) College)

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