Screening the Stage : Studies in Cinedramatic Art

This book examines the historical, cultural, and aesthetic relationships between theater and film. This book is intended to fill such a gap by providing a theoretical and practical foundation for understanding the effect that film and drama have had, and continue to have, on each other's development. Moreover, this study provides a history of the relationship between drama and cinema, starting with the pre-cinematic, late 19th-century impulse towards capturing spectacular action on the stage and examining the artistic and commerical interaction between movies and plays, both in popular and experimental work, throughout the 20th century. Important subjects treated in this book include stage versus screen acting, the adaptation process itself, the theatrical as well as the cinematic avant-garde, and the portability or adaptability of dramatic character.