epic theatre

Genre of drama, developed in Germany between World War I and II, and used almost exclusively to express left-wing political views. German dramatist Bertolt Brecht and German theatre director Erwin Piscator were its original exponents. Epic theatre was designed to dramatize issues that the theatre of naturalism was unable to portray, and is linked to expressionism. Brecht and Piscator targeted the capitalist system through their work. Epic theatre is characterized by the flexibility of its staging, allowing scenes to shift in location, for example evoking several different cities in seconds. The impact of epic theatre on modern day performance has been immense.

Several modern playwrights have continued to write in the epic genre, including Howard Brenton and David Edgar (whose Destiny (1976) is a modern classic in this style). There have been interesting combinations of epic and naturalistic styles in the work of Arthur Miller (Death of a Salesman, 1949) and Caryl Churchill (Top Girls, 1982).