"Here at Sterts Theatre, in South East Cornwall, we have tried to incorporate the best features of all the open air theatres built down the ages. We have a large stage but the 4/500 tiered seats are all close to the stage thus providing a feeling of intimacy and an excellent viewing and listening vantage point. "
Amphitheatres
The original Roman amphitheatres were buildings of elliptical shape, with tiers of seats enclosing a central area. They were not intended for dramatic performances, which in ancient theatres were always given in front of a permanent back-scene, but for gladiators and wild beast shows. The most famous was the Coliseum in Rome and said to be capable of seating 87,000 spectators.
In William Shakespeare’s day the theatres, a form of amphitheatre, was circular and made of wood. The actors played in their own clothes so that al plays were given what would not be called a “modern dress” production. The Elizabethan theatre was an example of simplicity of style. The play was the thing. It was no accident that in a theatre, any theatre, the patrons sit or stand in the auditorium – a place where one listens. In the prologue to Henry V, Shakespeare seems to delight in both the limitations and the glories of the wooden O.
Pardon, gentles all,
The flat unraised sprits that hath dared
On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth
So great an object. Can this cockpit hold
The vasty fields of France? Or may we cram
Within this wooden O the very casques
That did affright the air at Agincourt?
The theatres were, in effect, open-air theatres – the building surrounded an open yard (like Inn yards) with the stage at one end, jutting out into the audience to about half the depth of the theatre; the width was considerably more. Round three sides of the yard ere three tiers of galleries where the wealthier or superior members of the audience sat; the rest of the audience stood in the open yard around the stage and (for obvious reasons) they were known as the groundlings.
But this common audience paid dearly for their entertainment. It cost a penny to get into the theatre and prices were accumulative, so that for a further penny you could sit in the “two penny gallery” on the top tier and for a further penny still you could go into one of the lower galleries. The groundling paying his penny would be spending the better part of a days wages to go into the theatre.
In the Eighteenth Century an anonymous French writer notes:
…. an amphitheatre filled with benches without backboards, adorn’d and cover’d with green cloth. Men of quality, particularly the young sort, some ladies of reputation and virtue, and an abundance of damsels that hunt for prey, sit altogether in this place, higgledy, piggledy, chatter, toy, play, hear, hear not and just opposite to the stage rises another amphitheatre which is taken up by persons of the best quality - among whom are generally very few men.
In the USA especially in the last two decades, there have been a large number of amphitheatres built throughout the length and breadth of the country. Although often based on the ancient Greek/Roman model, they tend to be very sophisticated buildings incorporating the very latest technology in their visual, lighting and sound systems – the very antithesis of the Elizabethan wooden O. Although used mainly to promote music concerts – many are capable of seating in excess of 20,000 people – some of the smaller amphitheatres do run exciting seasons of classic and contemporary theatre.
Here at Sterts Theatre, in South East Cornwall, we have tried to incorporate the best features of all the open air theatres built down the ages. We have a large stage but the 4/500 tiered seats are all close to the stage thus providing a feeling of intimacy and an excellent viewing and listening vantage point. Most importantly there is a canopy so there is never any danger of a performance being cancelled because of the weather.