Full streets and empty theatres: the need to relate the forms of drama to a developing society

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Periodical article

Title:	Full streets and empty theatres: the need to relate the forms of drama to a developing society
Authors:	Etherton, M. Magyer, P.
Year:	1981
Periodical:	Black Orpheus: A Journal of African and Afro-American Literature
Volume:	4
Issue:	1
Pages:	46-60
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Nigeria
Subject:	theatre
Abstract:	A number of large and expensive theatres have just been completed in Nigeria. Aesthetically and functionally, these theatres have come from the contemporary international theatre for the staging of plays, ballet, opera, etc., rather than from the performance of masquerades, festivals, dances and storytelling. This paper adopts a critical stance with regard to the actual provision of such buildings, and formulates some requirements for the provision of specialized theatre buildings in Nigerian society. It takes as example the Ahmadu Bello University Theatre in Zaria, a small mud theatre, built in the style of a traditional Hausa compound. The construction of such a building is very cheap and one of its advantages is that it allows the audience to come very near to the actors. Three other schemes for the provision of theatres in the Zaria conurbation are also discussed. An appendix is included in which the authors discuss the semiotics of the traditional culture, its absorption into the new media like film, and the process of reinterpreting it in the organization of space for a multiple arts complex. Notes, ref.