Ancient Greece: The Roots of Modern Theater

In Greece, the land beneath your feet is steeped in very ancient history and lore. Many of our current civic, as well as theatrical traditions, come to us from the city-state of Athena, in Attica. So when you visit Greece, keep all of what you’ll learn in this article in mind.

The Athenian basin is surrounded by mountains on three sides and the sea in the South. The city of Athens was built mostly around natural strategic points, the city’s steep hills, so that the populace could take refuge on the fortified hilltops whenever needed.

One of the prominent hills in the basin is the Acropolis, where most of the ancient city’s many religious structures were located. The Acropolis is the foundation upon which the Athenian civilization was built. Its strategic location at the center of the basin was the city’s beginnings.

The Acropolis’s identity remains indelibly tied to classical Greece, which is the birthplace of modern democracy, philosophy, and theater. Two surviving ancient theaters – an early Athenian and later Roman -are located on the southern side of the hill. They have been rebuilt and refurbished and are still in use in the summer months as open-air stages.

An ancient theater is built in a semi-circle (amphitheater) usually backed by a hillside with tiered seating rising above the stage. Most ancient theaters used this configuration up to the Middle Ages.

It was only later on, starting in England and Germany, that we begin to have actual closed-roof theatrical venues. That was to improve the acoustics and protect the audience and actors from the elements so that the theaters could operate year-round. Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre in London comes to mind.

The Greek stage is circular. There was no movable scenery or stage sets as in modern theaters, and no curtain.

The backdrop was an actual building that represented whatever the play required – a palace, temple, or noble’s house, for example. That building was also used as a backstage area to hide the “machine” – a winch used to lower an actor playing the role of a god to the stage (whenever the play called for a god to appear and intervene in the happenings).

As our legacy from the ancient Greek theater, we still use the Latin expression “Deus ex Machina,” meaning “God from the Machine” when we want to express that a person or thing is introduced into a situation unexpectedly to provide a contrived solution to an insoluble difficulty.

The ancient actors wore masks, which were used to help the physical actor disappear since many people would know him from everyday life. That way, they could hopefully believe in the character he was portraying.

The actors often played several different parts, and they would put on a different mask for each one. The masks also enabled the all-male casts to play both male and female roles. There were a few props used for symbolism or to suggest something about the character portrayed, such as crowns, scepters, lyres, or walking sticks.

In the Greek theater, the theatrical experience was built around the stories written by writers/producers. In a play cycle, there were three tragic performances on a particular subject, followed by a comedy to lighten the mood. Both tragedy and comedy had a didactic role to show what could possibly happen if the viewers acted in the same way as the characters.

There were no theater critics in ancient times. If the audience didn’t like a play, the response was immediate, as they hurled over-ripe fruit or pillow at the players.

We know the names of a number of these playwrights: Thespis, Achaeus of Eretria, Aeschylus, Euripides, Sophocles, Aristophanes, etc. Actually, the term for a modern actor – a thespian – is derived from the name of that early Athenian playwright, Thespis.

The three best known playwrights who created epic tragedy plays were Aeschylus, Euripides, and Sophocles. They all won numerous theatrical competitions, and it was considered a great honor to have your play performed during a religious festival.

Many of the early plays were rewritten by later playwrights, as the Athenian mores changed in later years. For example, we see the Eumenides, a euphemistic name for the three chthonic goddesses of vengeance, written about early by Achaeus of Eretria and at a later date as a part of the Aeschylus trilogy, The Oresteia.

The Orestia consists of three 5th century B.C.E. tragedies regarding the murder of Agamemnon, king of Mycenae, by Clytemnestra, his unfaithful wife and her lover, after Agamemnon’s return from the Trojan War. The killing of Clytemnestra in revenge by their son Orestes, the trial of Orestes, and the end of the curse on the House of Atreus are also part of these tragedies.

Obviously, there were many plays, but most of them did not survive. The surviving ones are still performed every summer in Greece in adaptations in the modern Greek language either at the amphitheater of Herodus Atticus in Athens or at the amphitheater of Epidaurus.

This summer’s tragedies and comedies include the following…

The tragedies:

The Persians by Aeschylus

The play is based on the true events behind the victory of Athens against the Persian fleet during the Battle of Salamis in 480 B.C.E. The Persians play was controversial at the time it was written. The contemporary philosopher, Aristotle, perceived it as sympathetic toward the Persians. However, Aristophanes, another dramatist, saw it as a celebration of a major victory in the context of an ongoing war.

Orestia by Aeschylus

Orestia is based on the trilogy of the three linked plays, Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, and The Eumenides. As mentioned above, it’s about the murder of the king of Mycenae, Agamemnon, and the revenge taken by his son, Orestes.

Seven Against Thebes by Aeschylus

Seven Against Thebes is a tragedy about the battle of two brothers, Eteocles and Polynices, to claim the throne of Thebes. Despite the wish of Oedipus, their father, to alternate the throne every year, the two brothers decide to fight each other, resulting in their death. Aeschylus pointed out that if stable institutions are in place, they can prevent tragic events.

Oedipus Rex by Sophocles

This tragedy, the first of a number of plays on the subject also by other playwrights, describes the quest of Oedipus, king of Thebes, to uncover the reason for a curse that had befallen the city he ruled. Oedipus became king of Thebes after he successfully solved the riddle of the sphinx and married the widow of the previous king, Laius.

A prophecy sheds light on the mystery, revealing that Oedipus was actually the murderer of Laius, who was his father. According to the myth, Oedipus was abandoned in the wild when he was a newborn baby after it was prophesized that one day he would kill his father and marry his mother. He was rescued and grew up not knowing his actual lineage.

As the story unfolds, it’s uncovered that Oedipus had unwittingly killed his father and married Queen Iocasta, Laius’s widow, having children with her. When the revelation was made, Iocasta hung herself, and Oedipus blinded himself, departing Thebes, guided by his daughter/sister Antigone. The story continued in Oedipus in Colonus and Antigone, but these other connected plays were not performed at this time.

The comedies:

Lysistrata by Aristophanes

A masterpiece about war and sex, considered to be one of the greatest theatrical plays, Lysistrata was first staged in 411 B.C.E. The comedy portrays the way the Peloponnesian War was ended by a woman named Lysistrata, who successfully persuaded the women of Athens to withhold sexual favors from their husbands and lovers as a means of ending the war. 

Ornithes (The Birds) by Aristophanes

This play, first staged in 413 B.C.E., was awarded a prize at the Dionysian festival in Athens. The plot is set around two middle-aged men discussing their discontent with Athenian life, where the only thing people seem to do is argue all day over politics.

The two men decide that it’s perhaps time to search for a better life somewhere else, until some birds show them that there is a way to change the situation.