Stereotypes In Commedia's The Spirit Of The Mask

The art of incorporating several elements of drama including: social status and stereotypes in a performance to enhance the effectiveness and relevance, can be traced back to the performance style commedia. Sixteenth century traveling performers in Italy were renowned for their unique performance style and structure that utilised physical theatre, costumes, improvisation, audience interaction and stock characters reflecting levels of social hierarchy. Elements of commedia are evident in modern drama, draw upon commonly to provide effective comic relief. These … were explored further in the Homunculus theatre company’s performance, “The Spirit of the Mask”.
Commedia draws on an array of stock characters, each a representation of a stereotyped

This can be seen in the performance as the two actors’ portrayals of the popular character: ‘The Captain’ had several distinct similarities necessary to communicate the character’s set traits. Both actors adopted a distinct physicality; standing tall with should back and chest out using a purposeful stride, combined with a loud commanding voice that allowed the character to have a large presence on stage to demonstrate The Captains high status and strong, confident characteristics. Masks are the final tool utilised in commedia to clearly distinguish the characters and their personalities. The Captain’s over bearing bravado, fancy for sexual innuendos and constant need to assert his masculinity, all traits adopted by the stereotype adolesce male, is effectively communicated through the Captain’s mask and costumes. The mask’s large nose and character’s ever present sword provide an easy reference point for the characters innuendos, adding to the comical value of the character and scene. Both actors also enhanced the effect of the mask by having their nose in the air whilst speaking to those of lower status, forcing the actor to look and speak down on those characters further contributing to effectively communicating the character’s status to the audience. Beyond the few

This technique effectively creates tension as the audience is aware the interactions between the actors and volunteer is improvised. Furthermore, the volunteers are mostly given servant roles and brief instructions, commonly resulting in the volunteer becoming confused as the servant characters do as well as enabling the actors to act as master and remain in control of the scene. However, the comical value of the volunteer being genuine confused and unknowing doing the wrong thing far outweighs that of a rehearsed servant scene. However, to accommodate for the incorporating audience volunteers the actors must effectively improvise the scene, subtly guiding the volunteer’s actions to follow the basic planned outline of the scene. This was seen in the homunculus company’s performance as the audience volunteer was commanded to stab Pantaleoni, but in confusion and fluster, instead stabbed the doctor. An action made far more entertaining and humorous as it was both true to the servant character and complete unplanned. The actors used this element of surprise to create humour and relate to the audience throughout the play, asking for a near-by town to criticize and student’s name, leaving the audience both surprise and amused at the mention of either town or student. An element of tension