Elements of Drama
This element of drama refers to the sense of anticipation or conflict that keeps an audience engaged.
Tension
An actor changes pitch, pace, volume and tone when manipulating this expressive skill.
Voice
This theatre convention involves a character speaking their thoughts aloud while alone, or as though they are alone.
Soliloquy
Facial expression, gesture, posture and movement are all ways an actor uses this instrument to communicate meaning.
The body
This element of drama concerns where performers are positioned and how the performance area is used to communicate meaning
Space
This convention occurs when an actor temporarily breaks the imaginary barrier separating performers from spectators and speaks directly to the audience.
Direct Address/Breaking fourth wall
An actor's physical and vocal choices should be shaped by what their character wants to achieve in a scene. This is commonly called the character's ________.
Objective
When performers stop completely and hold their bodies in position to create a significant visual moment, they are using this convention.
Freeze frame/Tableau
A director has five actors suddenly turn towards one silent performer downstage. The director is deliberately manipulating this element to make the audience notice that performer.
Focus
Rather than presenting events chronologically, a production moves between past, present and future. This structure is called ______?
Episodic/Non-linear
An actor shifts seamlessly, playing many different characters. This is called __________
Multiple role
A repeated prop, image, colour, gesture or sound is given meaning beyond its literal function. This element of drama is being manipulated.
Symbol
A character desperately needs information from another character, but the second character continually avoids answering. This creates the type of dramatic tension arising specifically between characters.
Tension of relationship
Varying physicality, vocal and/or emotional intensity
energy levels
Performers openly change characters, move set pieces in full view and directly acknowledge the audience rather than attempting to create the illusion of real life. These choices deliberately challenge this theatre convention.
Fourth Wall/Realism
The space is changed by using background/props/staging to move from one space/place to another
Scene Change
Before entering the stage, an actor identifies where the character has come from, what has just happened and what the character wants next. Collectively, this information helps establish these contextual details surrounding the character's situation.
Given circumstances
A director deliberately places a joyful children's song underneath a disturbing dramatic scene, creating meaning through the opposition between sound and action. This element of drama is being manipulated.
Contrast
pace, tempo and flow of a performance, ensuring emotional and physical energy of a scene and how it rises, falls, or shifts to create dramatic action and meaning
Rhythms of performance
An actor speaks a seemingly polite line while their pause, vocal tone, physical tension and avoidance of eye contact reveal an intention completely different from the literal words. This underlying meaning is known as this.
Subtext/layers of meaning.