Thespis is regarded as being the first actor, setting himself apart from the chorus and assuming a role for the first time in the mid 5^th century BC. Thespis and a group of wandering players are believed to have travelled the countryside of Ancient Greece performing stories and myths. This primitive form of drama gave birth to the first stage – a cart that doubled as a makeshift platform stage. The mobile platform stage can be seen to reappear in the form of the pageant wagon in Europe in the 12^th and 13^th centuries AD.

Ancient Greek theatres such as the Theatre of Dionysos and the Theatre of Epidauros, spawned the first purpose-made stages which were used to raise actors above ground level, to heighten the dramatic action both literally and metaphorically. Initially a sacrificial table placed at the centre of the orchestra was probably used by the actors as a makeshift platform. However, by the middle of the 5^th century BC the Greeks had devised a specially constructed raised platform stage.

This stage stood at the rear of the orchestra and provided a separate acting area, away from the central playing space. The platform stage probably measured about 12 feet by 6 feet and developed gradually in size and decoration.

At first the platform was a simple temporary structure backed by a painted wooden or canvas scenic wall or scenae frons, erected for the dramatic festivals and then removed. However, as the theatre developed during the Lycurgean, Hellenistic and Roman periods, the stage and skene were made permanent and from stone, and increased in size to resemble the scale of the stages and stage structures of early European playhouses.

The platform stage became a permanent stone structure with a stone skene, proskenion and paraskenia. The skene adopted such features as a door and windows, a second upper level, and a room behind the skene that provided a dressing area for the actors; stage machinery was also incorporated into the later designs, including a wheeled platform stage called the ekkyklema, and the machine, a large crane allowing for actors to be lowered onto the stage.

Medieval Liturgical drama and platform stages

It is understood that during the 3^rd and 4^th centuries AD organised theatre fell into decay and disuse, coinciding with the fall of the Roman Empire. The next European theatre of which we have any knowledge is that staged in Christian churches in the 10^th century, at such places as the Church of Annunciation in Florence and the Santa Maria in Elche, Spain. With this rebirth of drama, came the resurrection of the platform stage.

These platform stages, known as ‘houses’ or ‘mansions’, were temporary structures erected around the nave of the church to indicate locations such as Paradise, Hell, Galilee, and Emmaus. The nave, which was called the platea or place, provided a generalised acting area, apart from the localised settings of the stages. This space was also used by the actors as an extension of the locales of the mansions; a convention reminiscent of the phlyakes mimes.

The mansions were raised platforms, standing approximately 1½ metres above ground level so that the actors could be seen above the heads of the standing audience. The spectators would be gathered in and around the nave of the church, meaning that the conventional audience/performer divide common in today’s theatre, did not exist. Instead the actors and audience shared the platea; it was both an acting area and an auditorium. The mansions, set adjacent to the platea, were used variously, with the actors crossing the neutral playing space of the nave as the drama required.

The platform stages measured approximately 2 metres square, and were invariably roofed. Some mansions had more than one storey; sometimes a hidden space beneath the platform, at other times another platform directly above the lower one. The mansions were often elaborately decorated, but no attempt was made at realism or verisimilitude in the stage setting. The medieval dramatists preferred to indicate a setting by means of a few significant stage properties. Some mansions were equipped with curtains so that scenes could be prepared and then revealed.

The plays performed were based on biblical stories, such as Adam and Eve, the birth of Christ, the Last Supper, and the resurrection. The actors’ costumes were church vestments decorated with a few symbolic accessories to identify their characters, and the dramatic action is believed to have been more symbolic and schematic, than realistic. The evidence of liturgical drama indicates that emphasis was placed on movement and pantomime, rather than text. Any scripted dialogue was usually performed in Latin, and was chanted, not spoken.

The liturgical drama continued throughout the 10^th, 11^th and 12^th centuries, but by the latter century, theatre is known to have moved outside the church, onto the city streets and plains of the countryside, in the form of pageant wagons and medieval rounds.

Medieval Liturgical drama and platform stages

Early 20^th-century scholars thought the Passion and Mystery plays outside the church stemmed from the liturgical drama. Recent research has challenged this view, pointing out that the two forms not only overlap in time but also are characterised by important differences in organisation, structure, subject matter and social function. Nevertheless, it seems that the liturgical church-plays and the open-air passion performances had a lot in common as far as the construction of spatial meaning is concerned.

The east-west symbolism already existed before the large cathedrals and was not restricted to the churches. A comparable symbolic system can be found in the organisation of open-air performances in Frankfurt (1350), Luzern (1583) and Villingen (around 1600). All three present (a platform depicting) Heaven towards the east and the hellmouth to the west. In between are the mundane loci (amongst others: the temple). The crucifixion is placed between the centre and heaven.

In this kind of open-air performances, as well as in the case of processional pageants, the medieval city can be viewed as part of the theatrical space. Other types of space included the theatre in the round that was restricted to one spot in the city or village but more or less environmental in nature, in that the audience was not necessarily seated but could move around freely.

There existed a more frontal stage-type too, the mansions-stage (as used for the Valenciennes Passion Play in 1547), and the booth stage (used at fairs and festivities, but also at Entries). However, all of them were temporary: they were constructed for a specific event, and removed afterwards.

The city as theatre

Types of Medieval theatre spaces

Valenciennes Passion Play (1547)

Pageant wagon (Brussels 1615)

Booth stage (Engraving by De Bruyn,1602)