Entr'acte
Encyclopedia
is French for "between the acts" (German: , Italian: Intermezzo
, Spanish: ). It can mean a pause between two parts of a stage production, synonymous to an intermission
, but it more often indicates a piece of music performed between acts of a theatrical production. In the case of stage musicals, the entr'acte serves as the overture
of act 2 (and sometimes acts 3 and 4, as in Carmen
). In roadshow theatrical releases
, films that were meant to be shown with an intermission, there was frequently a specially recorded entr'acte on the soundtrack between the first and second half of the film.
.
Like an interquel, an entr'acte can take the action from one part of a large-scale drama to the next by completing the missing links. An interquel, however, is a much later innovation. In contrast to an entr'acte, an interquel utilizes the same kind of resources and magnitude as the parts it joins. The Spanish Sainete
often performed a similar function.
could also bridge the 'closed curtain' periods: ballet
, opera
and drama
each have a rich tradition of such musical interludes. The literal meaning of the German word, refers to its original function – "change music". Eventually, entr'actes (or intermezzi) would develop into a separate genre of short theatrical realizations (often with a plot completely independent from the main piece), that could be produced with a minimum of requisites during intermissions of other elaborate theatre pieces. These later entr'actes were distinctly intended to break the action or mood with something different, such as comedy or dance. Such pieces also allowed the chief players of the main piece to have a break. Eventually the idea of being an insert into a greater whole became looser: interlude sometimes has no other connotation than a "short play".
(the term is Italian; the French divertissement
is also used) rather than an entr'acte.
In the French opera tradition of the end of the 17th century and early 18th century (Jean-Philippe Rameau
, for example) such divertissements would become compulsory in the form of an inserted ballet passage, a tradition that continued till well in the 19th century. This was eventually parodied by Jacques Offenbach
: for example, the cancan ending Orpheus in the Underworld
.
By the middle of the 18th century, a divertimento had become a separate genre of light music as well. These divertimenti could be used as interludes in stage works, many of the divertimenti composed in the last half of the 18th century appears to have lost the relation to the theatre, the music in character only having to be a "diversion" in one or another way.
Intermezzo
In music, an intermezzo , in the most general sense, is a composition which fits between other musical or dramatic entities, such as acts of a play or movements of a larger musical work...
, Spanish: ). It can mean a pause between two parts of a stage production, synonymous to an intermission
Intermission
An intermission or interval is a recess between parts of a performance or production, such as for a theatrical play, opera, concert, or film screening....
, but it more often indicates a piece of music performed between acts of a theatrical production. In the case of stage musicals, the entr'acte serves as the overture
Overture
Overture in music is the term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera...
of act 2 (and sometimes acts 3 and 4, as in Carmen
Carmen
Carmen is a French opéra comique by Georges Bizet. The libretto is by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée, first published in 1845, itself possibly influenced by the narrative poem The Gypsies by Alexander Pushkin...
). In roadshow theatrical releases
Roadshow theatrical release
A roadshow theatrical release was a term in the American motion picture industry for a practice in which a film opened in a limited number of theaters in large cities like Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Houston, Atlanta, Dallas, and San Francisco for a specific period of time before the...
, films that were meant to be shown with an intermission, there was frequently a specially recorded entr'acte on the soundtrack between the first and second half of the film.
Origin
Originally entr'actes resulted from stage curtains being closed for set or costume changes: to fill time as not to halt the dramatic action, to make a transition from the mood of one act to the next, or to prevent the public from becoming restless. In front of the closed curtains, the action could be continued during these entr'actes, albeit involving only players with no scenery other than the curtain, and a minimum of propsTheatrical property
A theatrical property, commonly referred to as a prop, is an object used on stage by actors to further the plot or story line of a theatrical production. Smaller props are referred to as "hand props". Larger props may also be set decoration, such as a chair or table. The difference between a set...
.
Like an interquel, an entr'acte can take the action from one part of a large-scale drama to the next by completing the missing links. An interquel, however, is a much later innovation. In contrast to an entr'acte, an interquel utilizes the same kind of resources and magnitude as the parts it joins. The Spanish Sainete
Sainete
A sainete was a popular Spanish comic opera piece, a one-act dramatic vignette, with music. It was often placed at the end of entertainments, or between other types of performance. It was vernacular in style, and used scenes of low life. Active from the 18th to 20th centuries, it superseded the...
often performed a similar function.
The role of music
In traditional theatre, incidental musicIncidental music
Incidental music is music in a play, television program, radio program, video game, film or some other form not primarily musical. The term is less frequently applied to film music, with such music being referred to instead as the "film score" or "soundtrack"....
could also bridge the 'closed curtain' periods: ballet
Ballet
Ballet is a type of performance dance, that originated in the Italian Renaissance courts of the 15th century, and which was further developed in France and Russia as a concert dance form. The early portions preceded the invention of the proscenium stage and were presented in large chambers with...
, opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
and drama
Drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...
each have a rich tradition of such musical interludes. The literal meaning of the German word, refers to its original function – "change music". Eventually, entr'actes (or intermezzi) would develop into a separate genre of short theatrical realizations (often with a plot completely independent from the main piece), that could be produced with a minimum of requisites during intermissions of other elaborate theatre pieces. These later entr'actes were distinctly intended to break the action or mood with something different, such as comedy or dance. Such pieces also allowed the chief players of the main piece to have a break. Eventually the idea of being an insert into a greater whole became looser: interlude sometimes has no other connotation than a "short play".
Other dramatic devices
When the insert was intended only to shift the mood before returning to the main action, without a change of scene being necessary, authors could revert to a "play within a play" technique, or have some accidental guests in a ballroom perform a dance, etc. In this case the insert is a divertimentoDivertimento
Divertimento is a musical genre, with most of its examples from the 18th century. The mood of the divertimento is most often lighthearted and it is generally composed for a small ensemble....
(the term is Italian; the French divertissement
Divertissement
Divertissement is used, in a similar sense to the Italian 'divertimento', for a light piece of music for a small group of players, however the French term has additional meanings....
is also used) rather than an entr'acte.
In the French opera tradition of the end of the 17th century and early 18th century (Jean-Philippe Rameau
Jean-Philippe Rameau
Jean-Philippe Rameau was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the Baroque era. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer for the harpsichord of his time, alongside François...
, for example) such divertissements would become compulsory in the form of an inserted ballet passage, a tradition that continued till well in the 19th century. This was eventually parodied by Jacques Offenbach
Jacques Offenbach
Jacques Offenbach was a Prussian-born French composer, cellist and impresario. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s–1870s and his uncompleted opera The Tales of Hoffmann. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss, Jr....
: for example, the cancan ending Orpheus in the Underworld
Orpheus in the Underworld
Orphée aux enfers is an opéra bouffon , or opéra féerie in its revised version, by Jacques Offenbach. The French text was written by Ludovic Halévy and later revised by Hector-Jonathan Crémieux....
.
By the middle of the 18th century, a divertimento had become a separate genre of light music as well. These divertimenti could be used as interludes in stage works, many of the divertimenti composed in the last half of the 18th century appears to have lost the relation to the theatre, the music in character only having to be a "diversion" in one or another way.
Examples
Some more or less elaborate and/or independent entr'actes or intermezzi became famous in their own right, in some cases eclipsing the theatre productions for which they were originally written:- La serva padronaLa serva padronaLa serva padrona is an opera buffa by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi to a libretto by Gennaro Antonio Federico, after the play by Jacopo Angello Nelli. The opera is only 45 minutes long and was originally performed as an intermezzo between the acts of a larger serious opera...
, a two-act opera buffaOpera buffaOpera buffa is a genre of opera. It was first used as an informal description of Italian comic operas variously classified by their authors as ‘commedia in musica’, ‘commedia per musica’, ‘dramma bernesco’, ‘dramma comico’, ‘divertimento giocoso' etc...
by PergolesiGiovanni Battista PergolesiGiovanni Battista Pergolesi was an Italian composer, violinist and organist.-Biography:Born at Iesi, Pergolesi studied music there under a local musician, Francesco Santini, before going to Naples in 1725, where he studied under Gaetano Greco and Francesco Feo among others...
, was intended to break the seriousness of his opera seriaOpera seriaOpera seria is an Italian musical term which refers to the noble and "serious" style of Italian opera that predominated in Europe from the 1710s to c. 1770...
Il prigioner superbo (1733). Eventually the intermezzo got more attention than the large-scale work to which it was added (see Querelle des Bouffons). - MozartWolfgang Amadeus MozartWolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
shows his mastery in the finale of the first act of Don GiovanniDon GiovanniDon Giovanni is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and with an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the Teatro di Praga on October 29, 1787...
, where he mixes the divertimento-like dancing (accompanied by a small ensembleMusical ensembleA musical ensemble is a group of people who perform instrumental or vocal music. In classical music, trios or quartets either blend the sounds of musical instrument families or group together instruments from the same instrument family, such as string ensembles or wind ensembles...
on the scene) with the actual singing. The characters mingle, performing light dances, while they're supposed to be chasing each other for murder and rape. The diversion and the drama become a single multi-layered item. - Bizet's opera CarmenCarmenCarmen is a French opéra comique by Georges Bizet. The libretto is by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée, first published in 1845, itself possibly influenced by the narrative poem The Gypsies by Alexander Pushkin...
has entr'actes before acts 2, 3 and 4; the one before act 3, featuring flute and harp, is often played in concert performances. - A comparable 'filmic' interlude was foreseen in the early 1930s by Alban BergAlban BergAlban Maria Johannes Berg was an Austrian composer. He was a member of the Second Viennese School with Arnold Schoenberg and Anton Webern, and produced compositions that combined Mahlerian Romanticism with a personal adaptation of Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique.-Early life:Berg was born in...
for his opera LuluLulu (opera)Lulu is an opera by the composer Alban Berg. The libretto was adapted by Berg himself from Frank Wedekind's plays Erdgeist and Die Büchse der Pandora .-Composition history:...
, between the two scenes of the central act. In this case Berg only composed the music and gave a short schematic scenario for a film, that was not yet realised when he died in 1935. The Lulu interlude film, in contrast to the previous example, was intended to chain the action between the first and second half of the opera. Because of the completely symmetrical structure of this opera, the filmic interlude of Lulu is, in a manner of speaking, the axis of the opera. - Interludes of the divertimento kind can be found in Leoš JanáčekLeoš JanácekLeoš Janáček was a Czech composer, musical theorist, folklorist, publicist and teacher. He was inspired by Moravian and all Slavic folk music to create an original, modern musical style. Until 1895 he devoted himself mainly to folkloristic research and his early musical output was influenced by...
's last, sombre opera From the House of the DeadFrom the House of the DeadFrom the House of the Dead is an opera by Leoš Janáček, in three acts. The libretto was translated and adapted by the composer from the novel by Dostoyevsky...
(1928): releasing the tension after Skuratov's disheartening tale at the centre of the second act, two an "opera" and a "pantomime" within the larger opera are executed consecutively by a cast of prisoners, both presentations farcicalFarceIn theatre, a farce is a comedy which aims at entertaining the audience by means of unlikely, extravagant, and improbable situations, disguise and mistaken identity, verbal humour of varying degrees of sophistication, which may include word play, and a fast-paced plot whose speed usually increases,...
variations on the Don JuanDon JuanDon Juan is a legendary, fictional libertine whose story has been told many times by many authors. El burlador de Sevilla y convidado de piedra by Tirso de Molina is a play set in the fourteenth century that was published in Spain around 1630...
theme, and mirroring the religious ceremony divertimento before the Skuratov tale. - Also, the first publicly performed furniture musicFurniture musicFurniture music, or in French musique d’ameublement , is background music originally played by live performers...
composed by Erik SatieErik SatieÉric Alfred Leslie Satie was a French composer and pianist. Satie was a colourful figure in the early 20th century Parisian avant-garde...
was premierePremiereA premiere is generally "a first performance". This can refer to plays, films, television programs, operas, symphonies, ballets and so on. Premieres for theatrical, musical and other cultural presentations can become extravagant affairs, attracting large numbers of socialites and much media...
d as entr'acte music (1920 – the play for which it was written fell into oblivion), with this variation that it was intended as background musicBackground musicAlthough background music was by the end of the 20th century generally identified with Muzak or elevator music, there are several stages in the development of this concept.-Antecedents:...
to the sounds the public would usually produce at intermission, walking around and talking. Allegedly, the public did not obey Satie's intention: they kept silently in their places and listened, trained by a habit of incidental music, much to the frustration of the avant-gardeAvant-gardeAvant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....
musicians, who tried to save their idea by inciting the public to get up, talk, and walk around. - Most of the film adaptations of the Rodgers and HammersteinRodgers and HammersteinRichard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II were a well-known American songwriting duo, usually referred to as Rodgers and Hammerstein. They created a string of popular Broadway musicals in the 1940s and 1950s during what is considered the golden age of the medium...
musicals feature entr'actes during the intermission, which make use of music from the production.