Theatre Terms

Jargon for the stage

Acting Terms

• These are words that deal with the actors craft as well as what you need to know when you are acting.

Audition

• An opportunity to try out for a play.

Aside

• When an actor speaks directly to the audience.

Bit

• A small role

• A small action or interaction to take place on stage.

Book

• Script

“Break a leg!”

• Wishing an actor good luck.

• It’s bad luck to say good luck.

Cheat Front

• Facing your body toward the audience, and your face toward another actor on stage.

Cue

• Signal to begin a line or action.

Curtain call

• The bow at the end of the play.

Ensemble

• A cast where there is no lead.

• All parts are equal.

Entrance

• When an actor comes on stage.

Improvisation

• Creating a brief acting scene with no preparation of the spur of the moment.

Monologue• Passage spoken by only one person.

Off Book• Have script memorized.

Pantomime• Telling a story without using words or

props.

Principals• Main characters.

Projection• Making your voice extend to the whole

audience using your diaphragm.

Up Staging • Drawing focus from the person who is

supposed to be in focus.

Warm Up• A verbal and physical exercise to get the

actor pumped up for the production.

Parts of the Stage

• These terms are the names of parts of the stage, and types of stages.

Arena Staging• Theatre in the round/ Black Box.

• Stage in the center with bleacher seating on all four sides.

Backdrop• Pained canvas hung to represent a setting.

Backstage• Area behind the set.

Cyclorama (cyc)• Background curtain that covers the back of

the stage.

Downstage• Area closest to the audience.

Dressing Room• Where actors get ready to go on the stage.

Flat• Rectangular frame covered with canvas to

use as scenery.

Fly• Anything flown in to the staging area.

• Verb – to fly in a fly

Green Room• Where actors wait to go on stage.

House• Where the audience sits.

Proscenium• Picture frame through which an audience

sees the play.

Scrim• Gauze screen used to create effects when

combined with light.

Stage Left• When standing on the stage, it’s your left.

Stage Right• When standing on the right, it’s your right.

Thrust Staging• Low platform stage with seating on three

sides.

Upstage• Area of the stage that is farthest from the

audience.

Wings• The sides of the stage in which actors wait

to go on.

Directing and Technical Terms

• These words have to do with the stage direction used by the director, as well as terms associated with the different technical aspects of theatre.

Black Out

• Lights out.

Blocking

• Movement of actors on stage.

Blocking Rehearsal

• Practice where director places the actors in pictures and designates movements.

Call

• Time actors are to be at the theatre.

Callback

• Second stage of auditioning process.

• Director wants to see the actor again.

Counter

• Moving in the opposite direction of the cross made by another actor.

Cross• Move across the stage.

Dark• A night of no performance in a run.

Director• “God” Makes all of the decisions.

Doubling• AKA - Double casting

• Two casts for the same show…

• Or playing more than one part.

Dressing the stage• Decorating the scenery.

Focus• Where the audience should be looking on

the stage.

Gel• Thin sheet of gelatin available in a wide

range of colors.

• Used in front of a light to color the beam.

Gobo• Usually aluminum and inserted into the

light to create a pattern on the stage.

Go Up• Time the show begins.

“Lights Up”• When the lights come on the stage.

Notes• When the director tells the actors what they

didn’t get right.

Pace• Tempo and speed of the show. 

Prompt Book• Stage manager’s “bible”

• Copy of the script with all notes and cues in it.

Props• Anything an actor picks up and uses on

stage.

Read Through• Cast reads their parts out loud with out

physically acting it out.

Run• The days a play is being put on.

Run-Lines• Recite lines as quickly as possible to get the lines down pat.

Run-Through• Rehearsal where the acting does not stop for

working.

Stage Directions• The parts in a script that tell the actor what

to do.

Strike• To dismantle and put away everything used

in the show.

Techie• Technical crew member.

Tech Rehearsals• Rehearsals devoted to adding and perfecting

the technical aspects of a production.

The End

Commit these words to memory, as you will be tested on them on

Tuesday of next week.