For the past fifty years, critics and scholars have been searching for a critical language to explain the work of Britain’s most successful playwright, Harold Pinter. One of the richer paths of enquiry has been to analyse the plays using a psychoanalytic vocabulary. In general terms, however, most of these studies have been restricted to using a Freudian terminology. This study develops the psychoanalytic tradition of Pinter studies by applying the theories of one of Freud’s successors, Melanie Klein. The study has been undertaken through an analysis of play texts to develop a synthesis of Kleinian theory and Pinter. Klein’s work develops Freudianism by exploring the primitive building blocks of the infant’s mind. Chapter 1 introduces the thesis argument and gives a detailed introduction to Pinter’s background and his work as writer. Chapter 2 provides an examination of the fundamental elements of Klein’s theories in the context of Freud’s own ideas. Chapter 3 uses Klein’s theory of dreams to analyse Pinter’s earlier work and argues that the plays explore complex unconscious phantasies of relations to bad and good objects. A further contribution is made to psychoanalytic vocabulary with the introduction of the notion of the split object. Chapter 4 explores the manic- depressive aspects of The Dwarfs, whilst Chapter 5 is a close reading that argues that The Caretaker can be read through the lens of the characters’ anxious attempt to repair ‘objects’ damaged in phantasy. Chapter 6 provides a detailed Kleinian exegesis of The Homecoming and then Pinter’s later work in considered: his memory plays, and his work after 1980, including his overtly political work and his last plays including Ashes to Ashes and Celebration. In this chapters Kleinian lexis is employed to get at the unconscious undercurrents of the plays. Throughout, along with a specific emphasis on the characters’ unconscious anxieties and relations to objects, the relationship between society, the historical moment and the text are considered.

This study of the theatre of the British Labour Movement had its roots in 1985 when History Workshop published a collection of documents relating to the Workers' Theatre Movements in Britain and America between 1880 and 1935. In his introductory essay in Theatres of the Left, Raphael Samuel concludes that there are no traditions in British Labour Theatre except those which have been broken or lost, that There is no continuous history of socialist or alternative history to be discovered, rather a succession of moments separated from one another by a rupture (1). Since this conclusion was reached, others have repeated Samuel's assertion in varying forms. So, Andrew Davies talks of "scanty Chartist theatrical activity" and of the mainstream lab6ur movement in the 1920s remaining "uninterested in cultural matters" and Ian Saville asserts that the conception of a partisan, organised theatre devoted to spreading the socialist message throughout the working classes only began to take shape in Britain in the mid-1920s (2). Yet a cursory glance at the theatre which preceded the Workers' Theatre Movement, a glance which Raphael Samuel provides in his introductory essay on theatre and socialism in Britain, reveals I a plethora of activity in the labour movement. From the Chartists and the Owlenites in the nineteenth century, through the Socialist Sunday Schools and the Socialist League to the Clarion movement, the Independent Labour Party and the Labour Party, the theatrical activity pointed to by Samuel is startling in comparison to anything we can see today. What follows is an attempt to look at some of those moments, to look at the plays they produced and at both how and why working class political organisations looked to the theatre, to try to ascertain if they were indeed no more than broken threads and if so to try to account for why this may be the case. It is also an attempt to re-examine some of our notions of what is political theatre, for since the discovery of the work of the Workers' Theatre Movement and subsequently of the Actresses Franchise League much has been made of these as the starting point of political theatre in Britain. Yet, for a country with one of the longest traditions of organised working class movements, such assertions seem at best strange, at worst dishonest. One clue as to the reason for such claims can be found in the characterisation of the theatre of the organised working class prior to the Workers' Theatre Movement which has become common currency. It was, in the words of Colin Chambers, primarily of ethical and anti-militarist rather than directly political", or in the words of Raphael Samuel: First, the belief that it is their mission to bring the working class into contact with "great" art (ie capitalist art) and second, the tendency to produce plays which may deal with the misery of the workerss may even deal with the class struggleg but which show no way out, and which therefore spread a feeling of defeat and despair (3). Such definitions of what is (or rather what is not) political theatre rest very heavily on a notion that political is most importantly propaganda. If the theatre that existed in connection with political organisations prior to 1926 was not propagandist then it follows for some that it was not political. What follows is therefore also an attempt to uncover a different approach, by looking at the groups own justifications for their involvement in theatrical ventures as part of the struggle for socialism.

I contend that 'morality, respectability, and decorum', were Victorian values trumpeted particularly loudly in Birmingham because of the local dominance of Nonconformism. Nonconformists had materially delayed the granting of a licence to Birmingham's playhouse, and continued actively hostile to its existence. Their influence on the prevailing 'official' moral climate is apparent in the reluctance of the local magistracy to grant music hall licence applications. Theatre managers here, then, laboured under an added imperative to maintain tranquil, well-conducted houses, presenting wholesome fare, and with strong community links. II My contention is that the theatre embraced and, occasionally, stimulated technological innovation. I also argue that Birmingham industrialists played a crucial role in materially changing both the functioning and the appearance of playhouses and music halls. That the revolution in mobility was the overriding factor in the contemporary mushrooming of playhouses and music halls is, I suggest, too apparent to be gainsaid. I focus closely on the transformation of Birmingham's transport links, both externally and within the town, and the readiness of local promoters and managers of theatres to exploit the new opportunities to attract audiences. III I suggest that if cultural imperialism operated more subtly than the political brand, imperialism it remained. The relationship with the fledgling United States displayed the classic characteristics of paternalism and condescension, not unmixed with arrogance, on . the part of the metropolitan power, and a general deference, giving way to fits of resentment, pique, and sometimes open rebellion, on the part of the erstwhile colonials. Minstrelsy and the cult of the 'Wild West' represent the beginnings of a reversal of the hitherto one-way cultural traffic, mirroring changes in the transatlantic political balance. I argue that the advent of steam navigation was a key factor in the expanding and vibrant Anglo-American exchange, with Birmingham playing a full role in that exchange.

This study reveals the complexity of relationships inherent in a system of theatre governance shaped by exclusive rights. Royal patents granted in 1662 entrusted sole guardianship of the ‘national’ or ‘regular’ drama to two ‘patent’ or ‘legitimate’ theatres (ultimately, established as The Theatres Royal Drury Lane and Covent Garden). These held privileged access to the traditional canon of serious, literary drama, including Shakespeare. The monopoly regime’s power, re-affirmed in The Theatre Licensing Act 1737, prevented all other playhouses, labelled ‘minor’, from producing the national corpus of plays, and from employing ‘the spoken word’: continuous speech unaccompanied by music. ‘Minor’ theatres were restricted to exhibitions of movement, music, and rhyme, commonly termed ‘burletta’. By the early 1800s a consensus held the ‘patent’ regime responsible for degrading rather than preserving dramatic standards. Actor/manager Robert William Elliston purchased his first London ‘minor’ theatre in February 1809. From that moment he began a largely self-interested campaign to overthrow the monopoly. Seeking an equitable footing, Elliston made a series of formal challenges, but when they failed he abandoned official channels. Thereafter, while remaining within the law, he adopted subversive means to gain his goal of a free stage. The Times’s review of Elliston’s first circumvention of the law in August 1809, an innovative ‘burletta’-ized Macbeth, lauded his ‘irregular’ production, while recognizing this novel version as a landmark incursion into the ‘legitimate’ canon. Elliston’s pioneering role in the struggle for reform, recorded in 1926, has been little researched since. The thesis re-evaluates Elliston’s agency in the ‘patent’ cartel’s demise, so contributing to a re-assessment of the narrative of the monopoly regime, and the ideological and social significance of its abolition. Once free competition was achieved, the theatre became a space in which the ‘legitimate’ canon could be accessed by every class of theatre-goer.

The musical language of popular music theatre continues to gain a growing academic scrutiny. Our understanding of the possibilities of the genre can be enriched by innovative work that experiments with a variety of musical techniques. Moreover developing fresh insights into this musical potential has an aesthetic importance: it could contribute to a revitalisation of the creative ambition of the musical language of the genre, which is generally one of highly derivative stock. This submission consists of a composition folio that includes one work of substantial proportions (the stage-work Stationcery) and five satellite pieces. Stutioncery uses a diverse range of jazz cultures (including numerous improvised sections) in a single large scale staged narrative, which it could be argued has not been attempted in this way or to this degree before. Stationery, and the other pieces, also develop other experimental musical techniques that are rarely used in popular music theatre: nonchronological story-telling, collage construction, and the extreme use of diverse parody and quotations. In addition there is a written element of fifteen thousand words which discusses semantic, aesthetic and technical issues prompted by the works and the genre in general. The submission has been organised into four volumes: VOLUME ONE: Stationery A three act jazz stage-work: Full Score in C. VOLUME TWO: Stationcery Piano/ Vocal Score. VOLUME THREE: Satellite pieces: That Baling Feeling - A three act musical: Piano/ Vocal Score. Mart - A theatre of the absurd mis-en-scene: Full Score in C. Descendit De Celis - A third-stream work for small orchestra: Full Score in C. Napoleon On St Helena - Four scena for actor and piano. Rain - A film score extract for small chamber group. VOLUME FOUR: Written Element, Libretti and Lyrics.

A distinctive feature of Sade’s writings is the amount of theatricality involved in libertine activities. Every episode of libertinage is charged with an awareness of performativity on behalf of the characters, and a conscious employment of theatrical vocabulary on the author’s behalf – e.g. the participants are often called actors, the events drama, and so on. At the same time, I have noticed how there are close resemblances in specific contemporary European drama to what constitutes Sadean intersubjectivity. These semblances occur most specifically when the dramatic text is addressing a paradoxical concept, where paradox is defined as that which confronts common opinion or doxa. The intention of this research is, first, to establish what comprises Sadean theatricality, and second, to examine how Sadean intersubjectivity is represented in selected dramatic texts. This objective calls for a comparative approach and a focus on meta-theatricality. I begin with exploring definitions of libertinage before and through Sade, with particular attention paid to performative and theatrical properties of libertinage. Next, I proceed to investigate, in each chapter, one aspect of libertine intersubjectivity in certain dramatic texts. The main challenge in this research is to create a balanced dialogue between two analyses which occur simultaneously. Even so, I have found that studying Sadean intersubjectivity in parallel with contemporary drama facilitates the isolation of those elements within the Sadean text which are required for a paradigm to be formed. Similarly, observing contemporary dramatic texts through a Sadean lens offers a novel way of looking at concepts such as violence, apathy, and a self/other interaction that feeds on the desire for absolute autonomy. A dialectic conversation between the two narratives, I maintain, generates a better understanding of how Sade’s paradoxical ethics is theatrically represented in our time.

This thesis investigates theatregoing and class, using as a locus the Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool. The Royal Court is unusually successful in attracting and retaining first time theatregoers and others from some of the most deprived postcodes in the UK. The study’s original contribution to knowledge is threefold: its focus on the relationship between theatre and audience that encompasses the whole theatregoing event; its focus on theatre audiences and social class; and its use of Bourdieu’s conceptual triad not only as an underpinning theory and a framework, but also as a method. The findings have important implications for cultural policy, which has been over reliant on ticket pricing as a mechanism which has failed to widen cultural attendance. The thesis uses a single case to examine the phenomenon of theatregoing. The primary method of investigation is a series of field visits of a theatre season and subsequent thick description of observations. This is supported by ethnographic methods in order to understand phenomena from the perspective of audience members; these are focus groups, interviews, and an analysis of user generated content (TripAdvisor). The thesis finds that the history of the Royal Court Theatre has not only shaped its position in the field, but is key to its perception by audiences today, the building having a particular place in the imaginary of a working class culture. Inside the auditorium, innovative seating arrangements contribute to a playful social space that can be ‘owned’ by audiences. The Theatre’s repertoire is distinctive, in that it employs tropes, such as comedy and participation, that are bound up with the concept of ‘Scouse’, itself a classed construct. These elements combine to form a physical and social space that is congruent to a working class habitus. The implications of the findings are in two fields, sociology and cultural policy. From a sociological perspective, the thesis concludes that Bourdieu’s conceptual triad is not only useful as a concept but also as a method by which to understand theatregoing and other phenomena in the twenty-first century. The application of Bourdieu’s conceptual triad to the empirical phenomenon of twenty-first century British theatregoing results in a more nuanced understanding of a working class aesthetic and working class values. For cultural policy, the thesis finds that using pricing as a mechanism to widen cultural attendance is to miss the point of the real issues facing working class people in the theatre which are around symbolic violence. If we really wish to widen theatre attendance, we need to offer working class people a theatre model that speaks to their values.

Stage management is a professional, technical craft which is essential to the product of the professional British theatre. Yet with no dedicated academic study into its development and no published resources chronicling its history, stage managers of the present age have no means of accessing their professional heritage. As a profession committed to practising and preserving theatrical traditions within their daily activities, it is anomalous that its practitioners have not the means to explore and understand the roots of many aspects of their daily practice, and regrettable that scholarship has not access to an academic study of its evolution or the contextual catalysts for its development in order to inform the wider body of research into British theatre history. This study aims to address this complete absence of scholarship in the field by providing the first dedicated academic research into the development of professional stage management in Britain. It will draw upon the primary evidence of stage management documents such as prompt manuscripts and interpret them from the perspective of a professional practitioner, tracing the development of stage management from the support offered to the early modern companies of the Elizabethan age to the professionalisation and unionisation of stage management which emerged in the second half of the twentieth century. By so doing, this thesis constitutes an entirely original contribution to knowledge in relation to this important yet neglected aspect of the history of the British theatre, and will enable professional practitioners to access their professional heritage for the first time.

This thesis investigates the significance of rhythm to the actor, examining the ways it is approached, understood and embodied within a range of training practices. In what ways does rhythm facilitate and transform the practices of individual performers and ensembles, affecting their use of attention, physical coordination, qualities of connectivity, states of consciousness and emotions? The psychophysical mechanisms through which rhythm informs these key aspects of actor training are analysed here via a range of contemporary and historical psychophysical and cultural frameworks. Drawing on this body of research this thesis argues the case for a greater understanding of the pedagogy of rhythm within actor training, indicating a number of areas for further investigation and potential developments within this field. Beginning with Stanislavski’s use of “Tempo-rhythm” and progressing through the practices of Meyerhold and Grotowski, a number of key rhythmic principles will be discussed. This will lead on to a series of case studies on the contemporary training practices of John Britton, Nicolás Núñez, and Reinhard Flatischler. Following this will be an examination of simultaneity in acting practices and an analysis of the author’s own practical research into the use of polyrhythm as a tool for cultivating modes of simultaneous attention and action in actor training.

The ways of reaching out to the people to supply news are substantially increasing after the emerge of the Internet. Because of the Internet anyone can make their message heard. The Young Turks claims to be the largest online news show in the world and they have over 650 000 subscribers on Youtube. Therefore it is important to study how alternative media differs from more traditional media.  This study focuses on alternative journalism on Youtube. The aim of this study is to identify the difference between the Youtube channel The Young Turks and CNN. The weight in the study lays in the ways the news is being presented. This study uses qualitative content from four news videos made by The Young Turks and four news videos made by CNN. This study focuses on the specific content in a few news videos rather than the overall content in several news videos. A dramatic analysis method is used to determine how the two media channels differ.  The result shows that the news videos made by CNN used objectivity as a means to claim their professionalism more often than The Young Turks. CNN’s news reporting was also clearer in presenting sources, compared to The Young Turks.