Saturday, 23 December 2017

law of re entry

Almost the only “rule” in London theater that was still faithfully followed was the one we now call, for convenience, the law of reentry, which stated that a character couldn’t exit from one scene and reappear immediately in the next. He had rather to go away for a while. Thus, in Richard II, John of Gaunt makes an abrupt and awkward departure purely to be able to take part in a vital scene that follows. Why this rule out of all the many was faithfully observed has never, as far as I can make out, been satisfactorily explained. 

No comments:

Post a Comment