Complete the following passage by using the
sentences given below. Each sentence be used only once. Note that there are two
more sentences than you need.
Today, in most of the
theatres in Britain, the stages are situated behind a sort of arch (拱门), called the proscenium (幕布前的舞台部分)arch. The arch runs across
the building with the stage on one side of it and the auditorium, housing the
audience, on the other. The audience is kept to the area from which it can get
a clear view of the stage. This type of theatre has been is use for three
hundred years. {#blank#}1{#/blank#} The actor can ignore them
until the end, when they applaud the performance. If an actor wants to speak to
the audience he tends to step out of the picture, as it were—down to the edge
of the stage.
{#blank#}2{#/blank#} Stage furniture or
properties—"props", as they are referred to in the business – are now
as few as possible. Elaborate scenery is used only when it is going to last
throughout the play, or when it is so constructed that it can be changed
quickly. Modern theatres are built with the stage extending far in front of the
proscenium arch, if indeed they have a proscenium arch at all, electricity,
already long in use, has recently had a revolutionary effect. A change of
lighting is as good as a change of scenery, and simpler and quicker; it can
light one part of the stage in place of another. Footlights have been found
unnecessary. Curtains also are hardly necessary, since the stage can be
darkened to signify the end of a scene.
The modern idea of having
the stage in front of the proscenium arch is not really modern, of course. It
makes our stages much like Shakespeare's. {#blank#}3{#/blank#} The famous speeches of Hamlet, for instance, can be delivered
more quietly and naturally than they were in the las century. The actors no
longer have to worry much about not being heard, or about turning their backs
to the auditorium. They can get closer to the audience, while a larger audience
can see them at work.
Moreover, nowadays, people
are finding that modern theatres are built to sit in comfortably for two or
three hours at a stretch. {#blank#}4{#/blank#} The result of these
improvements is that, in spite of the high price of seats, perhaps more people
than ever before are keen on theatre-going.
A. Over the last few decades, since the Second World War,
theatrical customs have altered.
B. It makes people feel, as they watch a play or a show, that they
are seeing a living and moving picture.
C. All these innovations have quickened up the pace of the drama.
D. This is an advantage both for actors and audience.
E. Today the theatres are much more comfortable because of the
many improvements.
F. Often they can meet and eat in the restaurants attached to the
theatres.