The Dramatic Values in Plautus | Page 9

education of the actor,[61] in which naturally gesticulation was the most vital element, was out of all proportion to the precarious reward. A rigid course of training was prescribed and strenuous exercises were required, for both actor and orator to keep the voice in proper form.[62] Indeed, Quintilian advises the budding orator to take instruction in voice production and gesticulation from the comic actor.[63] For the comic actor was at all times recognized as livelier and more vivid in his performance than the tragedian.[64] The two were usually sharply differentiated.[65] Specialization arose, too, and we hear of actors who confined their efforts to feminine roles,[66] though naturally every performer was cast for parts to which his physique was best suited.[67]
It is doubtful whether such an elaborate system had been developed in Plautus' time, but this much is certain: the comedian was on the stage lively, energetic and constantly spurred on by the fear of punishment from the dominus gregis and the violent disapproval of a fickle, tempestuous and withal exacting public. Polybius[68] relates that the visit of a troupe of Greek actors to Rome was a failure because of their over-staid deportment, until, learning the desires of the volatile Italians, they improvised a vastly more vivid pantomime depicting a mock battle, with huge success. Assuredly the early Roman comedian must have acted with greater abandon and clownish drollery, if not with the elaborate histrionic technique of the later actor.[69] We have heard Dr. Charles Knapp relate that the performance of the Ajax of Sophocles by a troupe of modern Greek players went with amazing and incredible rapidity and vivacity. It is all of a piece. We must inevitably associate vivid temperament with the sons of the Mediterranean in all ages. Yet we have just seen that the Greeks of old were too self-contained for their Italian brethren.
[Sidenote: The Histrionism] With this brief discussion of the condition, incentive and motive of the Plautine actor, let us pass on to a more detailed consideration of his methods and technique. Naturally by far the most important part of this was gesture. Here again, while some of our evidence is somewhat unreliable, practically every shred of extant testimony indicates an extreme liveliness and vivacity. In the rhetoricians frequent warning is issued to the forensic neophyte to avoid the unrestraint of theatrical gesticulation. Cicero says (De Or. I. 59. 251): "Nemo suaserit studiosis dicendi adulescentibus in gestu discendo histrionum more elaborare." Quintilian echoes (I. 11. 3): "Ne gestus quidem omnis ac motus a comediis petendus est.... Orator plurimum ... aberit a scaenico, nec vultu nec manu nec excursionibus nimius." And in the Auctor ad Herennium we find (III. 15. 26): "Convenit igitur in vultu et pudorem nec acrimoniam esse, in gestu et venustatem nec turpitudinem, ne aut histriones aut operarii videamur esse."[70] That the nature and liveliness of gesture on the stage was determined by the character portrayed, it is almost needless to say.[71]
Cicero's analysis (de Or. III. 59. 220) of the difference between theatrical and forensic gesture implies that the former illustrates individual words and ideas, while the latter comprehends more broadly the general thought and sentiment.[72] It is most unfortunate that we have lost Cicero's treatise De Gestu Histrionis.[73]
By Cicero's time a more restrained mode of acting was evidently considered good taste; witness de Off. (I. 36. 130): "Histrionum non nulli gestus ineptus non vacant, et quae sunt recta et simplicia laudantur."[74] But the passages cited above bear ample testimony to the vigor of histrionic gesticulation even at this later and far more cultivated epoch. Again we repeat, what must have been the energy and abandon of the original Plautine actor?[75]
Apart from the rhetoricians, the most fruitful literary source of our information on gesture is Donatus' commentary on Terence. The trustworthiness of this has been the subject of much argument. Sittl[76] accuses him of speaking merely from the standpoint of a professor of rhetoric, as comedies of Terence were no longer given in the time of Donatus. Weinberger in his "Beitrage zu den Buhnenaltherthumern aus Donats Terenz-commentar,"[77] admonishes us to be very careful not to put too high a value on the commentary. Van Wageningen[78] is of the opinion that much of the work was inspired by Donatus' having seen in his own time unmasked actors play. To this view color is lent by Donatus' note to And. 716: "Sive haec personatis viris agitur, ut apud veteres, sive per mulierem, ut nunc videmus."
If this is true, it makes Donatus' work of more significance to us, as it would imply a harking back to the play of feature of the unmasked performances of Plautus' day. But while it is certain that Donatus had other sources than the Terentian text for his annotations,[79] it is equally certain that practically everything he has to say