WACE ATAR Drama flashcards

33 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Given circumstances

The who, where, when, and why of a scene, including what has happened before it begins. Actors use these facts to justify behaviour and build believable relationships.

Stage left and right

Directions taken from the performer's perspective facing the audience. Stage right is the audience's left, which matters for blocking notation and cue calling.

Blocking notation

A written record of movement on the script, using abbreviations such as X for cross and DS or US for downstage and upstage, so staging can be repeated exactly.

Vocal variables

Pitch, pace, pause, volume, resonance, and articulation are separable vocal choices. Changing one variable alters the emotional colour of a line without altering the words.

Performance energy

Sustained physical and vocal commitment maintained through dialogue, entrances, exits, and transitions. Audiences read the whole stage, so relaxation between lines reads as a drop in conviction.

Warm-up sequence

A structured preparation order: body mobilisation, breath and resonance, articulation work, then focus and ensemble connection, so voice and body are ready before performance.

Proxemics on stage

The use of distance between performers to signal relationship and power. Intimate, personal, social, and public distances each carry different dramatic meanings for an audience.

Evidence-based evaluation

An evaluative claim supported by a specific moment from the production plus its effect on the audience. Plot summary without named moments earns no analytical credit.

Staging form

The physical arrangement of audience and performance, such as proscenium, thrust, in-the-round, or promenade. Each form changes sightlines, actor contact, and staging possibilities.

Semiotic layers

The sign systems of a production: visual, aural, spatial, and temporal. Naming which layer carries meaning shows analytical control rather than personal taste.

Audience reception data

Observable responses such as laughter, silence, tension, and restlessness. These are evidence of how a theatrical choice landed and can be cited in evaluation.

Personal response separation

Stating an emotional reaction first, then identifying the specific theatrical choice that produced it, keeps subjective response distinct from analytical argument.

Beat and unit

A section of a scene in which a character pursues one objective using one tactic. A new beat begins when the objective or tactic changes.

Playable objective

A character's goal expressed as an action verb directed at another character, such as to persuade or to humiliate. Adjectives and emotions are not playable objectives.

Text-to-stage translation

Separating what the dialogue states, what stage directions prescribe, and what subtext leaves open for the director and actors to invent in production.

Status transactions

Readable power shifts shown through who initiates, interrupts, holds silence, or occupies strong stage positions. Status is performed behaviour, not fixed character trait.

Design concept statement

A single sentence linking the play's themes to a governing visual metaphor, which then directs consistent choices across set, costume, lighting, and sound.

Genre staging markers

Conventions that follow from genre: naturalism implies fourth-wall logic and detailed realism, while expressionism permits distorted sets, heightened light, and non-literal movement.

Devising stimulus

The starting provocation for original work, such as an image, object, text extract, music, testimony, or question, explored through improvisation before structuring.

Accept and build

An improvisation rule requiring performers to accept a partner's offer and add to it rather than deny it, keeping the scene alive and generating usable material.

Devising log

A record of stimulus, workshop activities, accepted and rejected decisions, and individual contribution. It is the primary evidence of collaborative process in assessment.

Viewpoints of movement

A vocabulary for generating physical material: tempo, duration, kinesthetic response, repetition, shape, gesture, spatial relationship, and architecture of the space.

Refinement test

A decision rule for cutting material: remove any moment that fails to advance the dramatic question, reveal character, or create a shift in tension.

Stanislavski system

An acting approach built on given circumstances, objectives, super-objective, emotion memory, the magic if, and units and beats, aimed at psychological truth.

Verfremdungseffekt

Brecht's alienation effect, produced through direct address, placards, song, and visible stagecraft, to prevent empathy and provoke critical analysis in the audience.

Theatre of Cruelty

Artaud's approach using sensory assault, non-verbal sound, extreme light, and ritual immersion to bypass rational thought and affect the audience physically and emotionally.

Poor theatre

Grotowski's stripping away of design and spectacle to concentrate on the live actor-audience relationship, using via negativa to remove habitual behaviour rather than add technique.

Commedia dell'arte

An Italian masked form using stock characters such as Arlecchino and Pantalone, lazzi comic routines, fixed physicality, and improvisation from a scenario outline.

Forum Theatre

Boal's form in which spectators become spect-actors, stopping and replacing a protagonist to rehearse alternative actions against oppression, testing social change theatrically.

Lighting angle effects

Front light flattens facial features, side light sculpts, back light separates the actor from the background, and underlight distorts features to create unease.

Sound design functions

Four roles: reinforcement of voices, atmosphere through ambience beds, punctuation with stings and transitions, and accurate cueing in performance.

Prompt copy

The stage manager's master document containing the script, blocking, all technical cue numbers, actor calls, running time, and interval markers for the performance.

Technical rehearsal purpose

To integrate light, sound, fly, and actor cues with the performance, establish standby calls and cue numbers, and record timings in the prompt copy.