Popular Performance
“Popular Performance” by Adam Ainsworth, published by Bloomsbury Academic in April 2017, offers a comprehensive exploration of various forms of entertainment that engage directly with audiences. This 304-page book delves into the dynamics of performance where the boundaries between performer and audience blur, emphasizing the immediacy and interaction inherent in popular performance. Ainsworth examines how these performances thrive on entertainment value, often embracing triviality and frivolity to ensure audience satisfaction.
Readers will find a detailed analysis of performance techniques and production methods that contribute to the appeal of popular entertainment. The book covers a wide range of topics, including the variety tradition, circus acts, and contemporary forms such as street theatre and stand-up comedy. Through historical and modern examples, Ainsworth addresses the complexities of performer identity and audience engagement, providing insights into the vibrant world of performing arts.
Official synopsis Publisher
There is no fourth wall in popular performance. The show is firmly rooted in the here and now, and the performers address the audience directly, while the audience answer back with laughter, applause or heckling. Performer and role are interlaced, so that we are left uncertain about just how the persona we see onstage might relate to the private person who presents it to us.
Popular Performance defines and surveys varieties of performance where the main purpose is to entertain, and where there is no shame in being trivial, frivolous or nonsensical as long as people go home happy at the end of the show. Contributions by new and established scholars focus particularly on how it is made, explaining the techniques of performance and production that make it so appealing to audiences. With sections examining how popular performance works in a range of historical and contemporary examples, readers will gain insights into:
* performance forms associated with the variety tradition: music hall, vaudeville, cabaret, variety
* performance forms associated with circus: wild west shows, clowning
* issues relating to the identity of the performer in relation to magic, burlesque, pantomime in contemporary performance
* issues relating to venue and audience in relation to contemporary street theatre, stand-up, and live sketch comedy.
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