Commedia Dell Arte Research Paper

Commedia dell’Arte is a form of theatre known as Italian comedy. It is a humorous theatrical presentation performed by professional players who traveled in troupes throughout Italy in the 16th century. (About.com). This was a popular form of entertainment in the time of the renaissance. At the time, a majority of the theatre plays were very classical, but Commedia dell’Arte was very loud, energetic, and funny. According to a man named Jeff from math.bu.edu, who has been part of Commedia dell’Arte troupe says it is when you “improvise an entire performance from stage directions like "Pedrolino and Oratio enter and do something funny" or, our own personal favorite, "Everyone comes on stage and everything is resolved happily".” Commedia dell’Arte consists performers called stock characters. According to dictionary.com, stock characters are characters that are quickly recognized and accepted by the reader or viewer and requiring no development by the writer. In Commedia dell’Arte, there are 13 stock characters, 10 are men, and 3 are woman. This was a change in the normal “all male actors” phase in theatre at the time. All according to About.com, Some of these characters were Arlecchino, the most famous. He was an acrobat and a
Each character would have a specific outfit to help the audience identify who they were. Costumes consisted of loose fitting closes, tight fitting clothes and many colors to create an elaborate look. In commedia dell’Arte, the colors of the costumes would also represent mood and social class. Each character had a, individual mask that would also make it easy to figure out who each character was. The masks would also, “limit the view of the actors, making them snake their head from side to side to see what was going on. The characters all had characteristics that governed the way they moved and this would directly affect the way they did things on the stage.”(