Exam 7: Dramatic Structure and Dramatic Characters

Minor characters in a play are always written as basic stock characters.

Patterns as structure exist not only in dance but also in some plays, where the characters' movement and circumstances can be repetitive, as in Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot.

An intellectual or artistic movement that breaks with tradition and therefore seems ahead of its time is called ________; literally, it means "advance guard in a military formation."

A repetition or reenactment of a proceeding or a transaction which has acquired special meaning is called a

Common structure in musical theatre requires that every song have a segment that involves the chorus.

Identify and discuss ways in which television dramas or popular films utilize the deus ex machina dramatic device to wrap up a story.

Narrators in the most traditional sense remain outside the action of the play and typically comment on the action communicating directly with the audience.

Explain the major differences among characters in the three major categories: extraordinary, representative, and stock.

Choose a well-known ritual such as a funeral, wedding ceremony, or inauguration and analyze the individual elements of it. Is there a structure to it? What is it?

Recall stock characters in film or television that were designed to mislead the audience into assuming they possessed one or two characteristics but, it turns out, become more multidimensional. What are the various reasons as to why this strategy may be used?

Discuss the stock characters of Italian commedia dell'arte. In what way is their behavior predictable and stereotypical? Compare and contrast them with television situation comedy (sit-com) characters.

We know that playwrights frequently write plays about a single family in classic climactic structure and they will also occasionally create two contrasting characters that are siblings or husband and wife in order to allow character traits to stand out more dramatically in the action.

When nonhuman characters are written into a script it is typically because the producers do not want to create a stage prop when an actor can solve the problem nicely.

Stock characters have been used in entertainment throughout history. Discuss the relationship between stock characters and ethnic and religious stereotypes. When does a stock character become a negative stereotype? Is it possible to have a stock character that does not insult a group? Why or why not?

________ was at the heart of most plot complications in the commedia dell'arte.

Discuss whether a particular medium leads to the use of one of the structures. For instance, does film's ability to easily move from place to place encourage an episodic structure?

What about "normal, everyday" people in a play or film-i.e., characters who are not extraordinary, representative, stock, or possessing a single characteristic? Are there such characters? Would "normal, everyday" people be "representative"? Is part of drama about revealing what is extraordinary or representative about people?

Extraordinary characters are increasingly prevalent in today's films. Discuss such characters. In what type of films do they most often appear? How can we, as normal people, relate to such characters? What values might the character and the audience share?

The term "robot" was actually first used in an early twentieth-century play by Neil Simon.

Discuss current films or television shows in terms of dramatic structure. Do certain types of shows (such as police action shows or situation comedies) tend to use one type of structure more than the other? Why might this be the case?