Ancient Greek Theatre

The Greek theatre history began with festivals honoring their gods. A god, Dionysus, was honored with a festival called by "City Dionysia". In Athens, during this festival, men used to perform songs to welcome Dionysus. Plays were only presented at City Dionysia festival. Athens was the main center for these theatrical traditions. Athenians spread these festivals to its numerous allies in order to promote a common identity.

At the early Greek festivals, the actors, directors, and dramatists were all the same person. After some time, only three actors were allowed to perform in each play. Later few non-speaking roles were allowed to perform on-stage. Due to limited number of actors allowed on-stage, the chorus evolved into a very active part of Greek theatre. Music was often played during the chorus' delivery of its lines. Tragedy and comedy were two types of plays that dominated Greek Theatre. Tragedy and comedy were viewed as completely separate genres, and they balanced each other out. Tragedies reminded us to think, while comedies reminded us not to overthink...

Tragedy plays

Thespis was once considered to be the first Greek "actor" (thus the term Thespian) and originator of tragedy. Although the accuracy of this is now disputed, what is commonly agreed upon is that the tragedy became first defined under Aeschylus. Tragedies, involved conflict. At first, tragedies involved conflict between the Gods and humans. They utilized oral traditions and mythological subjects. Then gradually, tragedies evolved to explore more real/everyday topics. Regardless of the subject/content, tragedies involve conflict, and usually end sadly for the main characters. Three well-known Greek tragedy playwrights of the fifth century are Sophocles, Euripides and Aeschylus. You can read more about them in the link "PLAYWRIGHTS"