The One-Act Play

Origin:                                                                

The history of one-act play dates far back to the early Mystery and Miracle plays. In fact, several little plays were combined to form a kind of cycle and from this developed the full-length drama. The Interlude of the later 15^th century was also brief. When the Interlude got popularity, the short plays disappeared from the English stage. Then in the form of farce, in once again reappeared in 18^th century. But in 19^th century interlude got more importance. At the late period the standard programme of London theatre consisted of a full-length play preceded by a one-act piece. This one-act piece was called “curtain raiser’.  This was often ignored by people because they concentrated on the main plot. In 20^th century this one-act piece got its real importance because for example, evening entertainments consisted of three one-act plays by a single dramatist.  Sir James Barrie’s “The Will”, “The Twelve Pound Look” and “The Old Lady Shows Her Medals”;

Shaw’s “The Man of Destiny” and “The Dark Lady of the Sonnets” and Noel Coward’s “To-night at Eight-Thirty” got a good welcome in the beginning of the 20^th century. But later this one-act play form slowly disappeared.

Techniques:

The one-act play stands in the same relation to the drama as the short story to the novel. One-play is a single play which has its own form and techniques. In fact, the dramatist needs a special talent to write one-act play because he has to say everything, plot, characterization, incidents, scenery, themes, techniques, music and so on within the single act  of the play. So the dramatist has to follow brevity. Brevity is the soul of one-act play. Brevity in plot, characterization,  and dialogue must be significant from the beginning to the end of the play. So once could not conclude that so short a piece cannot be profound, subtle, or poetic. Like a five-act drama, one-act play also promises full entertainment and moral edification.  Barrie and Shaw are the prominent writers of this kind. Yeats in “Land of Heart’s Desire or Cathleen in Houlihan” showed his real talent of writing one-act play. One-act play mainly focuses on grim or comic themes yet it leaves abiding impression  of nobility and beauty. One-act plays follows Classical rules because it contains only tragedy or comedy. There is no mingling of both the forms in one-act plays. The three unities, unity of place, unity of time, unity of action were naturally followed in one-act plays for the reason that the form itself is small and so automatically demands these unities.