Unit information: Popular Performance: Cabaret, Music Hall, Musicals and Revue in 2013/14

Unit name	Popular Performance: Cabaret, Music Hall, Musicals and Revue
Unit code	DRAM23124
Credit points	20
Level of study	I/5
Teaching block(s)	Teaching Block 1 (weeks 1 - 12)
Unit director	Dr. Krebs
Open unit status	Not open
Pre-requisites	None
Co-requisites	None
School/department	Department of Theatre
Faculty	Faculty of Arts

Description including Unit Aims

This unit explores theatrical and musical performance and stage spectacle in the cafés, cabarets, dance halls and music halls. It will consider the diverse range of entertainment offered in the various venues and look closely at the theatrical forms they programmed including the chanson, shadow theatre, the cabaret sketch, the musical and dance. Beginning in the 1880s and moving up to the present day, it will look at venues in cities including Paris, Berlin, Zurich and New York, exploring the similarities and differences between the artistic cabaret and more popular understandings of cabaret, music hall and revue entertainments. It will consider issues such as the male domination of the artistic cabaret and the female spectacle of music hall and revue; and the relationship between cafés, cabarets, dance halls and music halls and their particular social and historical moments.

Aims

• To explore critically a range of performance practices.
• To develop appropriate critical and theoretical approaches to the chosen practices.
• To investigate in a chosen practical and creative manner one or more alternative languages of theatrical expression.
• To develop appropriate self-reflective analytical methods.
• Engage in research-based investigation of appropriate primary and secondary material.

Intended Learning Outcomes

• To demonstrate sound knowledge of key secondary literature
• To be aware of, and able to apply a range of established critical and theoretical ideas
• To present a clear and well-structured argument, supported by relevant critical and theoretical literature
• To present work that is consistently accurate in terms of its use of English and referencing
• To be able to communicate verbally key ideas based on secondary reading and relevant primary texts
• To demonstrate skills of time management
• To plan and execute a research project

Plus as appropriate to the mode of teaching, that is, the combination of seminar and practice-based workshop and/or presentations:

• To be able to write a reflective account of practical work
• To be able to work constructively and creatively in a group-based workshop
• To be able to work within the disciplines of production and project processes, working to deadlines and within production budgets
• To work independently and reach individual/personal judgements within a collaborative context
• To be able to reflect on individual work within a collaborative production context

Teaching Information

Seminars, workshops, screenings, as appropriate

Optional units may be taught according one of three models, depending on student numbers choosing the option and resource matters. Unit convenors will decide on teaching mode in consultation with HoE and with students in advance of advertising option year-on-year. Contact hours and assessment details will be mapped to teaching mode, as detailed below.

Model A is a seminar-based unit

Model B combines seminars with workshops encompassing an average 30-hour production period

Model C is taught through workshops encompassing an intensive 60-hour production period

Assessment Information

Teachers will assign assessments according to the teaching mode employed.

Model A:

3,000-word essay (50%) + student presentation (25%) + 1,500-word write-up (25%), or equivalent.

OR

Model B:

Essay [1,500 words] (33%) +

Workfile (22%): containing evidence to demonstrate student contribution to workshops / practical exercises; contribution to seminars Presentation/performance (22%) Critical analysis [1,500 words] (22%)

OR

Model C:

Workfile (33%): containing evidence to demonstrate student contribution to workshops / practical exercises; contribution to seminars, preparation & execution of technical production role Presentation/performance (33%) Critical analysis [1,500 words] (33%)

Reading and References

• Appigenesi, Lisa, Cabaret (London, 1975)
• Harris, Geraldine (1989) ‘But is it Art? Female Performers in the Café-Concert’, New Theatre Quarterly, 334-47
• Henderson, J.A. (1971) The First Avant-Garde 1887-1894: Sources of the Modern French Theatre. London: Harrap
• Oberthur, Mariel (1984) Cafes and Cabarets of Montmartre. Salt Lake City: Gibbs M Smith
• Segal, Harold, B. (1987) Turn-of-the-Century Cabaret. New York: Columbia University Press
• Current, Richard Nelson and Marcia Ewing Current, Loie Fuller: Goddess of Light (Austin, Texas, 1997)