"The Difference Between Theatre and Film" or "I Digress far, far too often..."

.... What difference?

Being the argumentative type that I am, I've engaged in many a conversation about the nature of Theatre and what it should or shouldn't be. While most of these discussion are quite fruitful and benign, (Artaud vs Brecht notwithstanding) there is one topic I've heard time and again that boils my blood like an angry walrus.

The subject rears it's belligerent posterior when a theatre maker is trying to justify some sort of artistic decision or criticize the decisions of another. "What really needs to happen..." they begin, their chins raised high as pious templar of the theatrical religion, "Is that theatre needs to find ways to distinguish itself from film!" At which point I get the primordial urge to throw something heavy or bite somebody.

These theatre eugenicists wish to compete with film the same way Allstate competes with Geico. "Sure, Geico is cheaper, but dollar-for-dollar (says Dennis Dexter Haysbert), nobody protects you like Allstate." Compare that to "Sure, Film has better realism since they have close ups (because close-ups are somehow realistic...) but  the theatre can have characters talking to the audience and building community!"

Of course, anyone who's seen a Film Noir knows that actors onscreen can talk plenty well to an audience, and I'd wager "Star Wars" has created a community larger than the entire American theatre community combined,but I digress...

The best part about any artistic medium is it's ability to innovate, and that includes the power to borrow, learn from, and use the toolkit of any other artistic medium. We would have nothing to gain from becoming the Académie Française, forced to preserve the purity of "Theatre" with a capital "T"

Although the costumes would be rather fabulous...

It's true that theatre and film are similar in two fundamental ways. First, they are both story-telling mediums and second, they both employ the concept of realism; realism being that a person onscreen or onstage generally represents a multifaceted person. Unlike dance, where humans are meant primarily as artistic instruments, in theatre and film we expect the characters to have thoughts, feelings, opinions, and so forth. Of course there are exceptions to both rules in both mediums, but would it really be an art form if it's practitioners didn't incessantly try to break the conventions?

As someone who studies narrative structure, the first difference between theatre and film that stood out to me was the difference in plot. Plays begin with a static world, introduce an element that disrupts the status quo of that world (usually a character but not always), and end with a resolution which creates a new stasis, for better or for worse. Movie plots tend revolve around single character (or pair of characters in the case of a buddy movie) going through a Joseph-Cambellian Hero's Journey, complete with a call to action, helpers, descent into the underworld, and so on. (This is also the plot structure of the oral storytelling tradition, but that's another topic for another day)

This plot distinction has to do with the fact that in film the point of view is very limited, so the camera needs to follow something (like a main character) in order to maintain it's logic. As for a play, although the set may change, the theatre space is entirely consistent, and it's up to the characters to find a way to inhabit, change or "get along", as director Anne Bogart would say, in the world of that space. (I think the changing nature of a distinct area is why they refer to battle zones as "Theatres of War" but once again, I digress...)

So perhaps there's the distinction we've all been searching for. Thankfully for a writer like me, all I need to worry about is whether I'm writing italicized stage directions or INT. HYDROELECTRIC DAM - NIGHT.  I don't think that Martin Mcdonagh should be rebuked for incorporating massive amounts of gunplay, and other artistic elements into his plays first thought up by filmmakers, nor do I think Quentin Tarantino should be held in contempt for having long, drawn-out 'theatrical' conversations in his movies. 

Art is not auto insurance. Perhaps in some ways it is like auto insurance in that they both involve Dennis Dexter Haysbert but, as I mentioned before, theatre and film both strive to do the same thing: Tell stories. Since their ultimate aims are tantamount, fretting over distinction can only serve to detract from the overall goal of both mediums. 

A uniting force.

Perhaps what theatre makers should really discuss is the meaning or purpose behind storytelling in the first place. This could lead to real deep and contemplative inconsequential gibberish, but I am quite done discussing art like a homemaker discusses laundry detergents. 

Not that there's anything wrong with homemaking and/or laundry detergents... Except Arm and Hammer. That stuff itches, man...