This study brings the insights of Slavoj Žižek’s Lacan-inspired approach to bear upon a series of influential 20th century plays and their engagement with what Lacan calls the Real. The plays to be explored share a focus on experiences, events or encounters which transcend, exceed, disrupt, and in some cases shatter characters’ normal, familiar realities. Examined through the lens of Žižek, these confrontations with the sublime and the fantastic reveal a crucial relation to the plays’ contemporary contexts, prompting us to “look awry” upon the dynamics of our own symbolically-regulated reality and the ever-changing and precarious nature of our relation to it. Similarly crucial is the relation of the Lacanian Real to our theatrical forms and modes of perception in the theatre. In staging “encounters with the Real,” these plays prompt us simultaneously to explore the ways in which the Real operates —and “appears” — in our own theatrical experience, ensnaring our gaze and the force of our desire. The study offers a Žižekian approach to works including Peter Shaffer’s Equus, John Mighton’s Possible Worlds, S. An-sky’s The Dybbuk, or Between Two Worlds, Caryl Churchill’s The Skriker, Tony Kushner’s The Illusion, and Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt’s Enigma Variations.

The discourse of Western theatre practice is founded on, and maintained as, a legitimizing struggle between the terms “professional” and “amateur.” This study moves beyond the traditional signifiers of Canadian amateur theatre—the Little Theatre Movement, the Dominion Drama Festival and connotations of “inferior” and “dilettantish”—to examine two nonprofessionalized companies that have witnessed the professionalization of Anglo-Canadian theatre in order to argue for the relevance and vitality of contemporary “nonprofessionalized” theatre practices. By drawing from Pierre Bourdieu’s field theory and Michel Foucault’s discourse theory and theories of formations of disciplines, this study argues that theatre professions seek to discipline, delegitimize and exclude nonprofessionalizing practices in order to gain capital (economic, social and cultural) at the expense of the creative freedoms inherent in nonprofessionalized work. It also considers the ways in which theatre scholarship omits critical discussion of amateur practice and how the term “amateur” is co-opted as a clouded pejorative signifier and erased by the contested term “community” within theatre discourse (institutions, practices and the Canadian imaginary). Following a case study approach based on archival documents, the study provides the foundation for a social history of Alumnae Theatre Company (1918- ), beginning with its early years as part of the University of Toronto’s University College Alumnae Association, by examining the relationship between amateur theatre practice and campus philanthropy, followed by Alumnae’s impact on Toronto’s professionalizing theatre scene in the context of alterity in Canadian theatre discourse. It then examines Walterdale Theatre Associates’ (1958- ) relationship to the emerging theatre profession before and after the opening of Edmonton’s Citadel Theatre in 1965 to argue that Walterdale benefits the profession and its professionalizing artists while negotiating complex concerns over institutionalization. Their longevity is explained, in part, by the fact that both companies operate “as if” professional, yet outside of professionalized disciplinary regimes.

“The Transgressive Stage: The Culture of Public Entertainment in Late Victorian Toronto,” argues that public entertainment was one of the most important sites for the negotiation of identities in late Victorian Toronto. From the vantage point of the twenty-first century, where theatre is strictly highbrow, it is difficult to appreciate the centrality of public entertainment to everyday life in the nineteenth century. Simply put, the Victorian imagination was populated by melodrama and minstrelsy, Shakespeare and circuses. Studying the responses to these entertainments, greatly expands our understanding of Victorian culture. The central argument of this dissertation is that public entertainment spilled over the threshold of the playhouse and circus tent to influence the wider world. In so doing, it radically altered the urban streetscape, interacted with political ideology, promoted trends in consumption, as well as exposed audiences to new intellectual currents about art and beauty. Specifically, this study examines the moral panic surrounding indecent theatrical advertisements; the use by political playwrights of tropes from public entertainment as a vehicle for political satire; the role of the stage in providing an outlet for Toronto’s racial curiosity; the centrality of commercial amusements in defining the boundaries of gender; and, finally, the importance of the theatre—particularly through the Aesthetic Movement—in attempts to control the city’s working class. When Torontonians took in a play, they were also exposing themselves to one of the most significant transnational forces of the nineteenth century. British and American shows, which made up the bulk of what was on offer in the city, brought with them British and American perspectives. The latest plays from London and New York made their way to the city within months, and sometimes weeks, of their first production. These entertainments introduced audiences to the latest thoughts, fashion, slang and trends. They also confronted playgoers with issues that might, on the surface seem foreign and irrelevant. Nevertheless, they quickly adapted to the environment north of the border. Public entertainment in Toronto came to embody a hybridized culture with a promiscuous co-mingling of high and low and of British and American influences.

Le théâtre populaire, concept chargé des finalités les plus diverses, sʼinstitutionnalise en France à la fin du XIXe siècle, notamment grâce à Romain Rolland, Firmin Gémier, Jacques Copeau, Jean Vilar et Bertolt Brecht. De nombreuses traces de ces réflexions et pratiques se retrouvent dans le théâtre québécois, et tout au long de lʼexistence du Théâtre Populaire du Québec (TPQ) dont ce mémoire veut dégager les principaux éléments de la pensée artistique des directions successives pour les confronter aux programmes établis de la fondation de la compagnie en 1963 jusquʼen 1976. Au cours de cette période qui sʼest avérée déterminante dans le domaine de la production théâtrale au Québec, lʼhistoire de la compagnie met en lumière les paradoxes et les apories du concept de théâtre populaire. / The concept of popular theatre, which is full of the most diverse purposes, becomes institutionalized in France at the end of the XIXth century thanks to, among others, Romain Rolland, Firmin Gemier, Jacques Copeau, Jean Vilar and Bertolt Brecht. Numerous traces of these thoughts and practices are found in Quebec theatre, and throughout the existence of the Theatre Populaire du Quebec (TPQ) of which this report aims to draw the artistic thoughtʼs main elements of the successive directions, to then confront them with the established programs, that from the foundation of the company in 1963 until 1976. During this period, which turned out to be a deciding factor in the field of theatrical production in Quebec, the history of this company enlightens the paradoxes and aporias of the concept of popular theatre.

Comme la représentation théâtrale est une forme d’art fugitive qui, en raison de son caractère performatif, possède son propre monde fictionnel, la question de l’oposition entre représentation et réalité occupe une place centrale dans les études théâtrales. Ainsi, les œuvres scèniques d’un metteur en scène comme Frank Castorf représentent des objets d’analyse particulièrement appropriés. Parce que Castorf met d’abord l’accent sur le moment présent et la réalité de la représentation théâtrale, il est légitime de se demander quelle est la part qu’occupe la représentation d’un monde fictionel dans ses spectacles. Ce travail vise précisément à identifier l’importance qu’accorde Castorf à la performativité dans deux adaptations théâtrales des romans de Dostoïevski Les démons et l’Idiot. Comme notre société donne une place grandissante aux médias reproductibles tels que la télévision et le cinéma, et que l’être humain tend toujours davantage à se méditiaser lui-même, le théâtre comme toutes les autres formes d’art s’en trouve transformé. C’est dans cette optique que ces deux adaptations théâtrales ont donné lieu à d’autres manifestations artistiques, soit deux films et deux livres. Cet ouvrage retrace également le processus de re-représentation, c’est-à-dire du passage d’un média à un autre, dans le but d’analyser l’interrelation entre ces œuvres ainsi que de comprendre les raisons qui ont poussé le metteur en scène et son théâtre, la Volksbühne Berlin, à transposer d’abord des romans en spectacle de théâtre pour ensuite en faire des films et des livres. De plus, malgré son utilisation croissante au théâtre, la vidéo représente encore pour certains puristes un envahisseur à bannir. Elle introduirait la perte de l’essence du théâtre : le caractère performatif, qui consiste en une rencontre du public et des acteurs dans un même espace-temps. Par contre, les images vidéo-projetées en direct peuvent conserver une part de performativité puisqu’elles sont susceptibles d’influer sur le spectateur, et inversement. En prenant comme exemple l’Idiot de Frank Castorf, ce travail montre comment les caméras et leur dispositif de transmission en direct ont la capacité de se substituer aux principaux objets du spectacle théâtral : les acteurs. / As a theatre performance is a volatile piece of art, as it has a performative character, and therefore possesses its own fictional world, the two concepts “representation” and “reality” are of meaning in theater studies. In this context, the works of the Berliner theater director Frank Castorf represent particularly rich research objects. Because Castorf give a lot of value to the present and the reality of the performance, it is to ask: what role does the representation of a fictional world play in the productions of Castorf? This work aims to first identify how important the performativity for Castorf in two theater adaptations of Dostoevsky's novels is for the stage, Die Dämonen und Der Idiot. Since man mediates his own phenomenon more and more and since in this context, the reproducible media like television or cinema has an overwhelming and increasing importance in our consumer society, the theater, like other art forms, has changed. For this reason, the two theatrical adaptations were transferred to other media, that is, in films and books. This work describes the process of "re-representation", i.e. the transition from one medium to another. Here will be analyzed the connections between the various works of art and the motivations of the Berliner director and his theater, The Volksbühne Berlin, to “repurpose” the novels in plays and plays in movies and books. Moreover, despite their increasing integration in theater, video projections are still seen by certain number of puristas as invaders to be proscribed because of their threat to theatre’s essence: performativity as the encounter between actors and an audience in the same space, at the same time. However, live video-projection images can maintain a performative nature since they are likely to generate mutual influences between themselves and the members of the audience. By analyzing Frank Castorf’s Der Idiot, this thesis shows how cameras and their transmission devices have the capacity to be substituted to the main objects of the theatrical show: actors. / Da eine Theateraufführung ein flüchtiges Kunstwerk ist, weil sie einen performativen Charakter hat und deswegen ihre eigene fiktionale Welt besitzt, ist das Begriffspaar Darstellung/Wirklichkeit in der Theaterwissenschaft von Bedeutung. In diesem Zusammenhang stellen die Theaterwerke des Berliner Regisseurs Frank Castorf besonders komplexe Forschungsgegenstände dar. Weil Castorf der Gegenwart und der Wirklichkeit der Aufführung eine große Bedeutung beimisst, stellt sich die Frage, welchen Platz die Darstellung einer fiktionalen Welt in den Inszenierungen Castorfs einnimmt. Diese Arbeit geht zunächst um den Platz des Performativen in zwei Theaterbearbeitungen von Dostojewskis Romanen Die Dämonen und Der Idiot für die Volksbühne Berlin. Da der Mensch sich mehr und mehr medialisiert und in diesem Kontext die reproduzierbaren Medien wie das Fernsehen oder das Kino, eine überwältigende und steigende Bedeutung in unserer Konsumgesellschaft haben, wird das Theater wie die anderen Kunstformen, verändert. Aus diesem Grund wurden die beiden Theaterbearbeitungen in andere Medien übertragen, in diesem Fall in Film und Literatur. Diese Arbeit beschreibt den Vorgang der „Re-repräsentation“, das heißt den Übergang von einem Medium zu einem anderen. Dabei werden die Verbindungen zwischen den verschiedenen Kunstwerken und die Motivation Castorfs analysiert, die Romane in Theaterstücke und die Theaterstücke in Filme sowie in Bücher zu übertragen. Darüber hinaus stellt das Video noch heute für einige Puristen – trotz einer steigenden Nutzung der Videotechnik auf der Theaterbühne – einen Fremdkörper dar, der von der Bühne verbannt werden muss. Er würde die Essenz des Theaters bedrohen: den performativen Charakter, der im gleichzeitigen Zusammentreffen von Akteuren und Zuschauern in einem gleichen Raum besteht. Allerdings können die Live-Videoübertragungen den performativen Charakter des Theaters teilweise bewahren, da sie das Publikum beeinflussen können; und umgekehrt. In dieser Arbeit wird durch die Analyse des Stückes Der Idiot von Castorf gezeigt dass die Kameras und ihr Live-Übertragungssystem das wesentliche Element der Theateraufführung ersetzen können: die Schauspieler.

“The Transgressive Stage: The Culture of Public Entertainment in Late Victorian Toronto,” argues that public entertainment was one of the most important sites for the negotiation of identities in late Victorian Toronto. From the vantage point of the twenty-first century, where theatre is strictly highbrow, it is difficult to appreciate the centrality of public entertainment to everyday life in the nineteenth century. Simply put, the Victorian imagination was populated by melodrama and minstrelsy, Shakespeare and circuses. Studying the responses to these entertainments, greatly expands our understanding of Victorian culture. The central argument of this dissertation is that public entertainment spilled over the threshold of the playhouse and circus tent to influence the wider world. In so doing, it radically altered the urban streetscape, interacted with political ideology, promoted trends in consumption, as well as exposed audiences to new intellectual currents about art and beauty. Specifically, this study examines the moral panic surrounding indecent theatrical advertisements; the use by political playwrights of tropes from public entertainment as a vehicle for political satire; the role of the stage in providing an outlet for Toronto’s racial curiosity; the centrality of commercial amusements in defining the boundaries of gender; and, finally, the importance of the theatre—particularly through the Aesthetic Movement—in attempts to control the city’s working class. When Torontonians took in a play, they were also exposing themselves to one of the most significant transnational forces of the nineteenth century. British and American shows, which made up the bulk of what was on offer in the city, brought with them British and American perspectives. The latest plays from London and New York made their way to the city within months, and sometimes weeks, of their first production. These entertainments introduced audiences to the latest thoughts, fashion, slang and trends. They also confronted playgoers with issues that might, on the surface seem foreign and irrelevant. Nevertheless, they quickly adapted to the environment north of the border. Public entertainment in Toronto came to embody a hybridized culture with a promiscuous co-mingling of high and low and of British and American influences.

Ce mémoire se penche sur l’évolution des stratégies d’autoreprésentation et d’autofictionnalisation dans cinq solos de Marie Brassard entre 2000 et 2011 – Jimmy, créature de rêve, La noirceur, Peepshow, L’invisible et Moi qui me parle à moi-même dans le futur. L’objectif de cette étude est d’analyser comment les masques vocaux contribuent au dévoilement de soi et produisent de ce fait un sentiment d’intimité malgré l’alternance des effets d’identification et de distanciation qu’ils suscitent. Le premier chapitre montre que, par l’ouverture du moi sur le monde au fil des créations, les protagonistes parviennent bientôt à dire « je » sans avoir la consistance d’un personnage, alors que le moi de l’archiénonciatrice se dilate grâce à la perméabilité et aux permutations continuelles des thèmes, des motifs et des personnages. Le second chapitre analyse le décloisonnement spatial qui affecte la scène et la salle comme la performeuse et ses collaborateurs dans l’établissement d’un véritable dialogisme. À partir de l’étude du corps en scène, le dernier chapitre examine les effets du décloisonnement textuel et spatial, et montre que la mise en évidence du triple rôle endossé par Brassard – auteure, actrice et agenceure scénique – oblige à reconsidérer la nature du corps qui s’offre au regard durant la représentation, en invitant le spectateur à s’investir dans le jeu scénique au-delà des évidences. / This dissertation focuses on the development of the strategies of self-representation and autofictionnalisation in five one-woman shows by Marie Brassard between 2000 and 2011 – Jimmy, creature de reve, The Darkness, Peepshow, The Invisible and Me Talking to Myself in the Future. The objective of this study is to analyze the way vocal masks contribute to self-disclosure and thereby produce a feeling of intimacy despite the alternating effects of identification and alienation they engender. The first chapter shows that by opening the “me” to the world through creations, the protagonists soon come to say “I” without having the consistency of a character, while the “me” of the archienonciator expands through continual permeability and permutations of themes, motives and characters. The second chapter analyzes the deregulation affecting the space stage and the audience as well as the performer and her collaborators in the establishment of a genuine dialogism. With the study of the body on stage as its starting point, the last chapter examines the effects of spatial and textual decompartmentalization and shows that the display of the triple role endorsed by Brassard – author, actress and scenic organizer – forces us to reconsider the nature of the body that offers itself to the audience during the performance, inviting the audience member to invest himself in stagecraft beyond what is obvious.

This dissertation examines theatre and film in Ireland between 1988 and 2005, focusing on the plays of Sebastian Barry and Marina Carr, as well as a select group of films from this period. Employing a method of analysis that couples close-readings with attention to socio-cultural context, aesthetic form, and issues of representation, the dissertation demonstrates how theatre and film work to complicate conventional Irish historical narratives and thereby encourages a reassessment of contemporary constructs of Irish identity. The introduction provides a contextual framework for significant contemporaneous social, cultural and economic changes in Ireland, and includes a case study of ‘The Spire,’ a monument unveiled on Dublin’s central boulevard in 2003, which I argue is the architectural metonym for the transitional nature of Celtic Tiger Ireland. The case study explores the aesthetics of the monument, as well as the politicised public debate that ensued, and thereby provides a snapshot of issues relevant to the readings pursued in dissertation’s remaining chapters. The discussion of Sebastian Barry’s ‘family plays’ reveals the playwright’s effort to refuse traditional binary conceptions of identity and to proffer, instead, a dramatic landscape that similarly refuses to allow conflict to dominate. Barry’s use of a non-conflictual dramatic form supports his narrative interest in compassion and peaceful resolution, and provides a model for living with otherness that could prove useful in an increasingly diverse and globalised Ireland. Marina Carr’s plays share Barry’s desire to represent aspects of Irish character anew, but they also dramatise how cultural transitions are difficult and never linear, and how the conventional pull of memory and the past has a residual presence in the ‘new’ Ireland. Taken together, these chapters reveal Barry’s hopefulness as an antidote to Carr’s tragic endings. The final chapter provides close readings of several ‘Celtic Tiger’ films, arguing that the representation of landscape is the key lens through which Irish film communicates shifting images of Irish identity. A cycle of films from the first years of the new millennium ekes out a space for new modes of representation through a critical dialogue with major tropes in Irish film history.

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