There’s an old, familiar feel to the theatre. While every theatre is different in its own way, the smell of red velvet seats and the heat emitting from the stage lights feels like home. Theatre may feel personal because even though it can be intimate, many other cultures experience this intimacy too. Throughout most of civilized humanity, hundreds of cultures around the world have taken part in some form of theatrics. From ancient Greece to Broadway today, theatre has been used to entertain and delight the masses for millenniums, arguably making it one of humanity’s greatest creations. In Asia, they performed several types of theatre, ones that even included masks and puppetry; Native Americans even had their own form of ritualistic theatre made to praise their gods. Today, we tell stories multiple ways, through film, TV, and even social media to talk about both fictional and serious topics. People have also taken the stage to talk about important and serious topics such as social issues, economic problems, and even propaganda, and it’s become more prevalent with each passing year. However, does theatre promote or incite any true political impact? Sure, we see instances of plays and musicals with political messages within them, but how effective are these plays at conveying the same message a news outlet would? In this essay, how political theatre affects America, how it affects other nations, and how it has been used throughout history will be discussed and shown that it is in fact an effective and important political platform.

America, being one of the world’s greatest superpowers, has for a while now had other nations’ eyes turned towards them, and political theatre has assuredly pressed America on certain issues. For example, within this collection of essays, edited by William W. Demastes and Iris Smith Fischer, several authors have taken a critical look at America through the lenses of political theatre and search what topics are discussed within the genre. From slavery to a post-9/11 America, this book shares an in-depth review of what America as a nation chooses to express on the stage and the famous scriptwriters that influenced political theatre here. These topics were important milestones in American culture, and theatre has used its voice to talk about them. However, someone could point to a numerous amount of shows on Broadway, such as The Lion King or The Book of Mormon and refute the existence of political theatre in the mainstream. That is an intellectually irresponsible thing to say, because while, yes, these shows are entertaining and don’t necessarily discuss politics, most mainstream shows are meant to simply entertain. Currently on Broadway, Hamilton, as most theatre enthusiasts and those who aren’t interested in musical theatre or Broadway know is one of the most popular musicals of the century. The musical largely incorporates elements of hip-hop, rap, and R&B, and tells the story of Alexander Hamilton with most the cast being minorities. This play, while giving us a history lesson, focuses on the Latin and African American culture in the United States, showing how even a play written about a bunch of white historical figures can represent all of America. Lin Manuel-Miranda, the creator of this musical is Puerto Rican, so he’s making a voice for his people and other minorities through this. Hamilton is one of the best examples of defying the standards in mainstream Broadway, as it is one of the most exciting and politically charged shows ever to hit such a wide audience.  

Another important aspect of political theatre in America is the topic of LGBT rights. While in America it is currently legal for gays and lesbians to get married, discrimination against the LGBT community still exists. In the article written by Susan V. Iverson and Christin Seher, they point out statistical information about how people view homosexuals, they also go into how theatre can provide a space for social justice and how using that space can change the views or at most make the audience question negative pretenses. Many people who are not used to being around this community and typically would show or express a negative feeling towards homosexuals. The article describes the use of political theatre for the LGBT community in a specific incident, but provides plenty of research and evidence to back up their claim. In fact, within this research, the audience was asked about how they felt about the LGBT community before viewing the play. The play discussed several issues within that community and described problems they felt needed to be addressed. Afterwards, audience members were reported stating they were often more likely to be more open-minded about the LGBT community after viewing the play. While some people may already know, theatre in the first world is typically a left-leaning culture, and this article explains that by using a certain voice on stage effectively can potentially change some aspects of an individual’s sociopolitical viewpoint.

As globalization becomes more prevalent within the world, certain aspects of life and culture begin to meld together. To see political theatre in motion around the world is just as if not more important than just viewing American political theatre. Not only does doing so help us reflect on our own social and political views, it also gives us a broader view on multiculturalism. Rustom Bharucha, the author of the book Theatre and the World: Performance and the Politics of Culture relays this message that theatre too has played a part in the modern age of multiculturalism, and explores the way Indian theatre is interpreted in western cultures. Bharucha visits topics like how the western world depicts Indian culture, how those who have migrated from India to the west have honored their traditions, and the effect of intervening in such traditions. This book furthers the poignancy of the impact of political theatre by showing the precautions an integrating society must take to imitate another culture’s society accurately and appropriately, and how using this correctly can push the globalization narrative in a respectful way.

            Also, Jan Cohen-Cruz (Associate Professor of Drama, NYU) and Mady Schutzman (Senior Faculty member at CalArts) have together compiled and edited a collection of essays that discuss how theatre involves itself in cultural politics. Specifically, they focus on the works of Augusto Boal, a Brazilian theatre director who is best known for his work in the Theatre of the Oppressed and how it has influenced others. This book outlines the use of TO and how it relates to other forms of expression, theatre, and other methodologies from chapter to chapter. Boal’s work in political theatre allowed for both actor and audience to interact with one another, typically conversing about political issues concerning those who are oppressed. This collection of writings is important because it shows once again that using political theatre to give a voice for the silent is not only prevalent in the first world. It shows that theatre is universal in a way in which no other platform is.

            Furthermore upon the topic of worldwide instances of political theatre, Roselyn Constantino (Pennsylvania State University) discusses within the essay University Theatre and Cultural Politics in Contemporary Mexican Society the cultural importance of theatre as a tradition in Latin America, and the need for a push in theatric activity in Mexico, despite the government’s stubbornness. She states that there should be a large push for a revival of Latin theatre tradition, and use this form of media as political platform for democracy. In this essay, there is a strong push against the monopolistic ideals of the Mexican government, using political theatre to oppose and refute such economic ideas. This text does something that none of the other texts discuss, and that is the economic state of a nation. Also, Professor Joseph W. Esherick (History, University of California, San Diego) and Assistant Professor Jeffrey N. Wasserstrom (History, University of Kentucky) share how students and scholars demonstrated democracy through political theatre in China in the midst of outrage by its citizens. These demonstrations happened during 1989, around the time the Tiananmen Square Massacre (another student-led protest) happened; they were semi-improvised pieces protesting communism and calling for a rise of democracy in China. Students called for leaders to step down and resign from office by using different forms of theatre, expressing their dissatisfaction through symbolism. While China is (except for Hong Kong) a communist nation, students called for freedom, which is what is truly important about this text. People were given a voice with the use of theatre in a nation that wanted to suppress its citizens. Coming back to America for a moment, Heather Neilson writes and breaks down American political theatre in her book A Theatre of Politics: History’s Actors in Gore Vidal’s Empire. The novel discusses Vidal’s book and the presidencies of William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt and the prospect of imperialism during that time. Neilson, in return shares her opinion as an outsider (that being she is not an American citizen) and debates the points of isolationism and imperialism, both referring to the book and Vidal’s personal opinions, as well as other influences and critics of Vidal. This essay is effective in sharing how an outsider views the political sphere of America, and shows how politically theatric the viewpoint might be.

Samuel Beckett, a famous Irish writer, is discussed in this article, and his works of literature are explored and evaluated, as many of which shared political ideals that of Beckett’s. The article focuses on two essays, Catastrophe (1982) and Company (1980), as the author tries to explain how while politics may seep into works such as novels and scripts, plenty of these points may not win over ideas which are already more prevalent or popular during that time. In relation to political theatre, this article argues an unsuccessful example of political activism within the theatre community, showing that not all forms of political theatre turn out to be successful within their time. On the flip side, political theatre that has been used for nefarious purposes and worked have shown up in history as well. In this book, Berghaus has compiled fifteen different essays from the universities of Bristol, Granada, and Berlin discussing the use of political theatre within the Third Reich, the Mussolini Regime, and other such fascist regimes during this era. These essays specifically focus on the way theatre was used as propaganda, but also mentions plays that weren’t necessarily political but were accepted in these regimes as appropriate. They also go into the staging of the plays themselves, the acting, the directing, costuming, and even choreography amongst all platforms of theatre (operas, festivals, plays, etc.). The fascist nations used all aspects of theatre to their advantage during such a heated political climate, and is one of many instances of pushing a political platform through the arts.

In review, theatre has without a doubt played a vital role in the discussion of politics not only in America, but throughout the world and throughout history. Not only is it such a staple to so many cultures, it also embodies those cultures and the emotions they are feeling at the time. Political theatre is so important to humanity because of this.