Lui) and The Wealthy Upstart (Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme), Carrion and Aza’s Zaragueeta, Sudermann’s The Far-Away Princess, Houghton’s The Dear Departed.  The wooden frames on the rear side were painted black, the canvas panels tan, to serve in Twelfth Night for the drinking scene, Act II, scene 3.  With Greek shields upon the walls it later pictured the first scene of The Comedy of Errors.  With colorful border designs attached and oriental furniture it set a Chinese play.

A definite series of dimensions should be decided upon, and all scenery should be built in relation to units of these sizes.  As a result of this, combinations otherwise impossible can be made.  Beginners should avoid putting anything permanent upon a stage.  The best stage is merely space upon which beautiful pictures may be produced.  Beware of adopting much lauded “new features” such as cycloramas, horizonts, until you are assured you need them and can actually use them.  In most cases it is wise to consult some one with experience.

In considering plays for presentation you will have to think of whether your performers and your stage will permit of convincing production.  Remembering that suggestion is often better than realism, and knowing that beautiful curtains and colored screens are more delightful to gaze upon than cheap-looking canvas and paint, and knowing that action and costume produce telling effects, decide what the stage would have to do for the following scenes.

EXERCISES

1.  Read scene 2 of Comus by Milton.  Should the entire masque be acted out-of-doors?  If presented on an indoors stage what should the setting be?  Inside the palace of Comus?  How then do the Brothers get in?  How do Sabrina and her Nymphs arise?  From a pool, a fountain?  Might the stage show an exterior?  Would the palace be on one side?  The edge of the woods on the other?  Would the banks of the river be at the rear?  Would such an arrangement make entrances, exits, acting, effective?  Explain all your opinions.

Read one of the following.  Devise a stage setting for it.  Describe it fully.  If you can, make a sketch in black and white or in color, showing it as it would appear to the audience.  Or make a working plan, showing every detail.  Or construct a small model of the set, making the parts so that they will stand.  Or place them in a box to reproduce the stage.  Use one-half inch to the foot.

2. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, scene 1.  Interior?  Exterior?  Color?  Lighting?

3. Hamlet, Act I, scene 5.  Castle battlements?  A graveyard?  Open space in country some distance from castle?

4. Comus, scene 3.

5. The Tempest, Act I, scene 1.

6. Twelfth Night, Act II, scene 3.

7. Romeo and Juliet, Act I, scene I.