Theatre. Chapters 1-2.

I. Allusions.

1. Literary:

• Beatrice – the protagonist in in Shakespeare’s  play “Much Ado About Nothing”
• Romeo - the protagonist in in Shakespeare’s  play “Romeo and Juliet”
• Henrik Johan Ibsen (20 March 1828 – 23 May 1906) was a major 19th-century Norwegian playwright, theatre director, and poet. He is often referred to as "the father of realism" and is one of the founders of Modernism in theatre. His major works include Brand, Peer Gynt, An Enemy of the People, Emperor and Galilean, A Doll's House, Hedda Gabler, Ghosts, The Wild Duck, Rosmersholm, and The Master Builder. He is the most frequently performed dramatist in the world after Shakespeare.
  
• George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950) was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60 plays. He was also an essayist, novelist and short story writer. Nearly all his writings address prevailing social problems, but have a vein of comedy which makes their stark themes more palatable. Issues which engaged Shaw's attention included education, marriage, religion, government, health care, and class privilege.
  
• Hermann Sudermann (September 30, 1857 – November 21, 1928) was a German dramatist and novelist.
  
• John Galsworthy ( 14 August 1867 – 31 January 1933) was an English novelist and playwright. Notable works include The Forsyte Saga (1906–1921) and its sequels, A Modern Comedy and End of the Chapter. He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932.
  

2. Artistic

• Sarah Siddons (Kemble ) (5 July 1755 – 8 June 1831) was a Welsh actress, the best-known tragedienne of the 18th century. She was the elder sister of John Philip Kemble, Charles Kemble, Stephen Kemble, Ann Hatton and Elizabeth Whitlock, and the aunt of Fanny Kemble. She was most famous for her portrayal of the Shakespearean character, Lady Macbeth, a character she made her own, and for famously fainting at the sight of the Elgin Marbles in London.
  
• Jean-Marc Nattier (March 17, 1685 – November 7, 1766), French painter, was born in Paris, the second son of Marc Nattier (1642–1705), a portrait painter, and of Marie Courtois (1655–1703), a miniaturist. He is noted for his portraits of the ladies of King Louis XV's court in classical mythological attire.
  
• Sir Thomas Lawrence  (13 April 1769 – 7 January 1830) was a leading English portrait painter and president of the Royal Academy.
  
• Benoît-Constant Coquelin (23 January 1841 – 27 January 1909), known as Coquelin aîné ("Coquelin the Eldest"), was a French actor, "one of the greatest theatrical figures of the age."
  
• Sir Peter Paul Rubens (28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640), was a Flemish Baroque painter, and a proponent of an extravagant Baroque style that emphasised movement, colour, and sensuality. He is well known for his Counter-Reformation altarpieces, portraits, landscapes, and history paintings of mythological and allegorical subjects.
  
• Edmund Kean (4 November 1787 – 15 May 1833) was an English actor, regarded in his time as the greatest ever.
  
• Sarah Bernhardt (c. 22/23 October 1844 – 26 March 1923) was a French stage and early film actress, and was referred to as "the most famous actress the world has ever known." Bernhardt made her fame on the stages of France in the 1870s, at the beginning of the Belle Epoque period, and was soon in demand in Europe and the Americas. She developed a reputation as a serious dramatic actress, earning the nickname "The Divine Sarah."
  
• Mounet-Sully (February 28, 1841 – 1916), a French actor, was born at Bergerac. His birth name was Jean-Sully Mounet: "Mounet-Sully" (without the "Jean") was a stage name.
  
• Eleonora Duse (3 October 1858 – 21 April 1924) was an Italian actress, often known simply as Duse.

  

3. Others

• Thomas Chippendale (probably born at Otley, West Riding of Yorkshire) was a London cabinet-maker and furniture designer in the mid-Georgian, English Rococo, and Neoclassical styles. In 1754 he published a book of his designs, titled The Gentleman and Cabinet Maker's Director. The designs are regarded as reflecting the current London fashion for furniture for that period and were used by other cabinet makers outside London.
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• The Comédie-Française or Théâtre-Français is one of the few state theatres in France. It is the only state theatre to have its own troupe of actors. The company's primary venue is the Salle Richelieu. The theatre is part of the Palais-Royal complex and located at 2 rue de Richelieu on the Place André-Malraux in the 1st arrondissement of Paris.
  
• The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) is a drama school located in London, England. It is one of the oldest drama schools in the United Kingdom, having been founded in 1904, and is generally regarded as one of the most prestigious drama schools in the world.
  

All the allusions are used to create the special atmosphere of theatre, splendor and to underline the epoch, in which the action takes place.

II. Words and phrases

• Complacency - a complacent attitude or way of behaving

• Three times running - following or happening one after the other

• Filthy – very dirty, very unpleasant, offensive

• Supercilious - a supercilious person behaves as if they think they are better or more important than everyone elseж; a supercilious manner/smile/attitude

• Military bearing - (1) The element of outward appearance of a serviceman (clean and correctly arranged uniform, properly worn and adjusted equipment, manner of behavior in and out of formation) imparting a brisk military outward appearance to the individual and the entire detachment.

(2) A part of individual drill instruction with the purpose of inculcating the soldier with the habits of behavior in and out of formation and the ability to execute the drill manuals quickly and dexterously. This instruction also serves the purpose of developing in the soldiers unity, uniformity, and coordination during actions in motion, with arms, and in machines. The soldier’s bearing is achieved by a combination of drill, physical training, and sports.

• Natural flamboyance – expected behaving or dressing in a way that deliberately attracts attention 

• Stupendous - very impressive, large, or surprising

• Staggered - very surprised and shocked

• Natural homage - something that someone does or says in order to honestly show respect or admiration

• Entanglement - the process of becoming entangled in something or a complicated situation or relationship

• Concubinage is an interpersonal relationship in which a person (usually a woman) engages in an ongoing sexual relationship with another person to whom they are not or cannot be married.

• Languorous - characterized by or producing languor (the calm or pleasant feeling that you have when you are tired and relaxed)

• Flippant - treating a serious subject or situation in a way that is not serious, especially when this annoys other people

• Rejoinder - a quick reply, especially one that is clever or rude

• To risk smth - to do something that makes it possible for something important or valuable to be destroyed, damaged, or lost

• A quick study - one who is able to memorize something easily and quickly or is able to understand and deal with something easily and successfully.

III. Character sketches

Julia Lambert

Julia was 46 year-old actress, who said that she was not beautiful and even not pretty (however, she boggled, because she liked to look at her reflection in the mirror and view her pictures). Coquelin said that she possessed “beaute  du  diable”. Her figure was perfect, her legs were long and she was quite tall for a woman and she had a “rubber face”, which was so important for her profession, since she was able to show any emotion. Julia wore the best dresses and was famous for her brilliant outlook. She often smiled, her gestures were graceful and delicate. She was a real actress, who perceived life as a theatre, where she had to impress everybody. She originated from a middle – class family, due to which she found herself in France and learned to speak French “as a real French”. There she got acquainted with an old actress, who taught her the ABC of the performing art. When Julia was sixteen, she entered Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. After that she performed some secondary roles. She was lucky to meet Jimmie Langton, who promised to make a brilliant actress out of her in three years and he kept his word. She became very famous and belonged then to higher society. Even the description of her house underlines it. We see a lot of silver things, flowers, expensive furniture, etc. Julia is a very purposeful person, since she worked hard to make her dream of being a great actress come true, At the same time she is adventurous, since she agreed to change the company after the conversation with a person, who said that she possesses everything to become the best actress, but she wasn’t able to do anything proper yet and offered her a salary, which was even lower that her previous one. Julia was flirty, because even having a husband she flirted with other men just out of curiosity and the most important thing about Julia was that she was aware of her worth. She loved and admired her husband and treated the rest of the world quite leniently, because she knew how famous and beautiful their family was and considered that everybody was considered to love them. The most interesting thing about her manner of speaking it was different when she talked to people and to herself. She “didn’t mince the words” when she was  just thinking. Her voice was low, deep and beautiful impressed people very much and her articulation was so precise that every word was heard at the last seats. In my opinion, her industry ability to risk are definitely worth approval since she wouldn’t have earned such a fame without them. However, I disapprove her lenient attitude to other people and her attempts to make a young man fall in love with her, because she was already married. So, now we can say that her life’s credo is not to live life, but to perform it.

Michael Gosselyn

This man was Julia’s husband. He came from the upper – class society ( his education gives us a hint to think so). He was very beautiful. The author describes him in the following way: He still had at fifty-two a very good figure. As a young man, with a great mass of curling chestnut hair, with a wonderful skin and large deep blue eyes, a straight nose and small ears, he had been the best-looking actor on the English stage. The only thing that slightly spoiled him was the thinness of his mouth. He was just six foot tall and he had a gallant bearing. It was his obvious beauty that had engaged him to go on the stage rather than to become a soldier like his father. Now his chestnut hair was very gray, and he wore it much shorter; his face had broadened and was a good deal lined; his skin no longer had the soft bloom of a peach and his colour was high. But with his splendid eyes and his fine figure he was still a very handsome man. Since his five years at the war he had adopted a military bearing, so that if you had not known who he was (which was scarcely possible, for in one way and another his photograph was always appearing in the illustrated papers) you might have taken him for an officer of high rank. He boasted that his weight had not changed since he was twenty, and for years, wet or fine, he had got up every morning at eight to put on shorts and a sweater and have a run round Regent’s Park.”. Michael was similar to his wife, he had a lot of fans, who loved him, but he didn’t allow himself to lose his head. He wasn’t interested in other people but his family, we can easily understand it when he said that he didn’t want to know even the name of their new acquainted, and this thing I disapprove. His life’s credo was: 'no one attacks me with impunity', so we can say that he lived in his castle and guarded himself and his family from everybody. His world must remain his one. Michael started as an actor, but then understood that it wasn’t his calling. So, he became the theatre’s owner. He was very rich and possessed a good taste, though he  preferred not to mention about designers, who helped him to thing up the interior. His voice was thin, thus he wasn’t good enough as an actor, however, it was pleasant to talk to him due to his brilliant manners. Michael was polite, but complacent. At the same time he was straight and sincere, since when he performed a lover, he wasn’t able to kiss a girl, whom he didn’t love. So, he was graceful, well – educated, but cold and clever. I think that fact that he was a bad actor, made him a good man, because if he said or did something, it was sincere, so, in this connection, we can say that he really loved his family. 

IV. Summary

When Julia Lambert came to her husband, she saw a young stranger, who turned out to be their new accountant. Michael invited him to lunch, though he didn’t even know his name. That young man adored Julia and visited her performances several times. At the end of lunch she gave him her photo. While looking through the pictures, she remembered how she began her career and also how she met Michael. Their way to present life was hard and risky. She graduated from Royal Academy of Dramatic Art , performed several secondary roles and then was lucky to meet Jimmie Langton, who promised to make a brilliant actress out of her in three years and he kept his word. In his theatre she met Michael, whom Langton also invited to his company.