Growth of American drama during the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries--
Beginnings of American Drama:
1600s and 1700s The early settlers of American colonies faced harsh living conditions after migrating to this alien land. Their belief in hard work, frugality and piety also disallowed them from indulging in theatrical activity so much so, that the play Ye Bare and Ye Cubb produced in 1665 and probably the first theatrical performance in America led to the trial of actors. In the 18th century, many colonies in America enacted laws forbidding the performance of plays, because of the puritan belief that the seventh of the ten commandments in the bible did not allow dancing and enacting plays. However, opposition to theatre did not last long. Aware of the new cultural beginnings, the colonies wanted to brush up their intellectual and oratorical skills by theatrical activities. The 17th century colleges in several colonies allowed theatrical activity after much hesitation which they thought could benefit students to utilise their speech skills in their careers such as business and law. To meet this requirement, the first play Androboros (1774) written by Robert Hunter, and English Governor, came as an attack on his political enemies, despite New York's Anticipation-theatre Law. This play established the tradition of political satire charting out the course that American Drama was to follow for the next two centuries. Several popular plays of this period were The Paxton Boys (1732), The Trial of Atticus (1771) whose authorship is not known and Robert Munford's The Candiates of the Humours of a Virginia Election (1770).
Before more plays appeared, a group of British professional actors formed a touring circuit in the 1750s and this group in the early-1760s was known as "The American Company'. In 1767, they staged a play The Prince of Parthia, a tragedy by Thomas Godfrey, the first professional production of a play written in America. During the American Revolution, many professional actors moved to Jamaica. During the period of American Revolution, (1775-1783) satirical plays were written either supporting British control of the colonies of attacking it. The Battle of Brooklyn which was pro-British and written anonymously, satirised leaders like George Washington. Mercy Otis Warren, the strongest American dramatic voice of the revolution presented the revolutionary cause in her plays The Adulateur (1772), The Defeat (1773), The Group (1776) and The Blackheads (1776). A play by Robert Munford The Patriots (1779) attained true dramatic character by taking a neutral stance and attacking both sides for their intolerance. The professional actors who had moved to Jamaica during the American Revolution were touring America again in mid-1780s.
America became a nation in 1783 througha victory against the British colonial power. Robert Taylor was the first playwright of the nation to write the finest American play of the 18th Century, The Contrast (1787). This five-act comedy that satirises the customs of the upper classes is written in the format of British Comedy owing much to Sheridan's The School for Scandal (1777).
American Drama:
1800s William Dunlop introduced melodrama in his plays, the most prevalent dramatic form in the 19th century. The credit for giving drama its most important characteristic, dramatic conflict also goes to him. Most of his plays were adaptations or translations from the French and German.
The Protagonist Major John Andre in Dunlop's play Andre (1798) shows admirable qualities by saving a young American Captain despite George Washington's unqualified antagonism towards him for conspiring to destroy an American garrison. Majority of the plays written in America in the 19th century were largely produced for commercial purposes to benefit the heterogeneous public residing all over America whose primary interest was seeing the shows and their favourite actors performing in these plays. Most of the plays were not published but were meant only to be seen and not to be read; as a result they are now irrevocably lost. One of Dunlop's contemporaries James Nelson Barker produced some of the best-known works Marmion (1812) and Superstition (1824). The latter a romantic tragedy based on specific American situations, we set in New England and explored the themes of isolationism, bigotry and intolerance. The Indian Princess (1808) written by him was the first play of explore native American themes and characters. It told the story of Pocahontas, a native American woman who married in English man. The most well-known of such drama was Metamora (1828) by John Augustus Stone. The popularity of the Indian plays that began in 1820's continued through the 1840s. In the early-19th century in American Drama, there is a shift in focus from a nationalistic cause to the aesthetic values of romanticism. Edwin Forrest, an immensely popular actor encouraged the writing of American romantic plays. The best American play of the time was Francesca da Rimini (1855), a romantic verse tragedy by George Henry Boker. Brutus: The Fall of Taraquin (1819) by John Howard Payne and The Gladiator (1831) by Robert Montogomery Bird were other American Romantic tragedies that merely promoted the aesthetic values of romanticism without furthering the cause of the American Drama. In 1828, Edwin Forrest began to offer annual awards for new plays with American themes; the first to receive the award was Metamora. No one kind of drama appealed the play-going masses of America; playgoers were ready to welcome any new type of play that the actors could perform well. The lampooning of the Indian plays signalled their waning interests and by mid-century they started fading. Racial, social and economic tensions in America that brought about the civil war are well represented in Harriet Beecher Stone's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin. The adaptation of the novel for the stage by G. L. Aiken was a great success that was staged all over America and survived well into the twentieth century.
American Drama in the 19th Century :-
In the 19th century, the most pervasive dramatic genre was Melodrama. Similar to what we see in Hindi cinema where a heartless villain troubles the heroine who is finally rescued by a strong hero in the nick of time after fighting insurmountable odds. Melodrama addresses the issues of family, social position and wealth, a preoccupation of every individual. Its appeal to the general public lay in its stereotyped, easily identifiable character types and in simple, formulaic plots that could be easily adapted to any setting, character or event desired.' (American Popular Culture Through History: The Civil War and Reconstruction, Browne and Kreiser) The great flexibility of these plays made them easily adaptable'ɔ any type of audience, allowing actors to use their talents freely, taking advntage to present a wide range of materials. The popular plays in this genre are Boucicault's The Poor of the New York (1857), Daly's Under the Gaslight (1857). and Belasco's The Girl of the Golden West and The Heart of Maryland (1857). The popularity of melodramatic form that had begun in the 18th Century continued through the 19th Century.
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