Theatre Of Cruelty Analysis

Theatre of Cruelty was developed by Antonin Artaud to show to audiences that the theatre wasn't necessarily an escape from the world but actually realisation of their worst nightmares and deepest fears. I believe both groups did this extremely well even though one was more subtle than the other. Each group used various techniques to enhance and manipulate the atmosphere of the performance.

In the first piece we watched, the audience was blindfolded and lead into a room. There use of space and proxemics was utilised brilliantly because of the way we were lead from one room to another while holding onto each other in a line. The blindfolds made you lose sense of all direction and having to hold onto others made you feel as if they were your …show more content…
The juxtaposition of spaces worked extremely well because one minute everyone was in a large space and the next we were shoved under, what we later found out was the stage and shut into a tight space where you couldn't move a muscle because of the other bodies surrounding you.

The use of character and roles also worked immensely well. All through the performance either one or more people were shouting at you, making you feel uncomfortable but also producing a realistic experience. The sound effects really helped in bring the whole performance to life. It not only set the mood and atmosphere but also created a perfect amount of tension. To me the sound of the waves crashing against the ‘boat’ actually signified hope because I felt as if we were getting away from the shouting and going to a better place but towards the end I felt like the sound of the waves contradicted themselves because when we were sent away from ‘Australia’ all you could hear was the waves crashing lightly …show more content…
At first it started of just like an ordinary realism piece and that in itself was creepy because I was expecting something where someone was shouting at me or trying to scare everyone and make us feel uncomfortable. They used tension extremely well throughout the performance by making the audience believe they were accidentally making mistakes and they placed the ‘mistakes’ so well that it didn't look obvious or over done. Everyone also kept to their character and role extremely well. Their projections was always appropriate and pauses were significant to the performance, once again creating tension. The mood and atmosphere changed throughout the piece due to the comedic mistakes that were made to the tense and serious fighting of the couple and the slap only enhanced that mood. This performance hit its peak when Michaelie barged through the door asking the teacher if they could start the performance again. That moment was when my heart stopped and I felt most fearfully, not for myself but for the group because I knew they were going to lose marks owing to the disruption. Tension, mood and atmosphere really made this performance shine because of the way group handled the assignment and were able to think of such a unique and different idea to display the techniques they