Precolonial African Theatre

Egungun
Gelede
Carnival
Yoruba
Pierrot Grenade
Bookends: Commedia dellarte
- Servant of Two Masters Rehearsal (Yale Rep promo)
o All he really wants is something to eat.
o A great deal of freedom
o If you dont allow for the possibility of disaster, you cant
allow for the possibility for triumph.
o A complete anarchy Marx Brothers
o Whimsy, belly laugh
- Actual Clips
o Grotesquely colorful, quick punchlines, Lazzi is part of the
action, franticness, theatricality and error are completely
embraced and acknowledged, always very nearly ugly
- Multilingual, masked form
o Noh, Greek and Roman tragedy, and now Egungun and
Gelede
o Why dont we use masks today?
o Why are the lovers unmasked? What power does the mask
have?
Leather commedia masks
Egungun
Kerr begins with problem of studying historical forms
o African culture responds to events
o We tend to consolidate the entirety of Africa into one thing
African art is not just one type of art
o Trying not to use the colonial moment as a point of
reference
o English language cant really serve; drama and ritual
- There are no plays this week; Commedia and Egungun dont
leave texts behind, so theyre often left behind
- Both traditions of masked performance relying heavily on
improve
o Traveling forms
o Neither commedia or egungun or gelede artists write their
material down
- Commedia: visual evidence (Recuiel Fossard woodcut)

The Black Atlantic: Yoruban people brought by slave traders to

Carribean
o No material possessions, but traditions of music, dance,
theatre, religion
o Cuban Santoria, new world forms that incorporate West
African Yoruban traditions
o Again, neither ritual nor theatre are advanced or inferior
Egungun masks and festivals
o This mask is not a face
o Communal activity, continually spinning dancing
o All-souls festival
o Entertaining and efficacious: honors the death, cleanses
the community spirit, bone or skeleton
o Maskers sometimes perform during funerals, celebration of
individuals or village milestones
Masks: entire body is covered communicate family values,
history, sewn into cloth, emanate family spirit
o Physical manifestation of spirit the dead are imitated;
funerals are private
o Usually played by men
o Amokekeke played by young boys, small masks,
represent spirits of dead children
Pride and purpose in line of ancestors, eliminating the gulf
between individual and ancestors
o In Yoruban performance, time is not a line; the present
contains manifestations of past.
o Distinction between imitation and being there
o Presence of ancestors is very real

Gelede
- Wooden face masks, larger than life
- Honor the primordial mother
- Masks: serpent, messenger of mothers (bird)
o Only masked society governed by women; societies of men
and women
o Singers, drummers, dancers and orchestra irony and
mockery, satirical masks denounce certain types of
behavior
o The eyes that have seen Gelede have seen spectacle.
- War and matriarchal to patriarchal, dance established to remind
enemies of the tribes power
o Were still here, establishing identity under threat
o Codified facial expressions, gestures
o Language of drummers

Ge = to soothe, Le = womens reproductive parts/secrecy,

honoring our mothers
o Marketplace
o Iya Nla (big mother) most important, membership open
to everyone, not just women
o Doubling Yoruban communities have highest rate of twins
in world
Twins share one soul, people perform in identical
pairs
Effe performances, joking analogous to The Dozens, back and
forth verbal form (we can top each other)
o Sexual, power of vagina, filled with social commentary
calling out scandals
Daytime dance performances, obeying the drums speech
o Young boys first, master boys at end
o Culmination of festival is appearance of Great Mother
o More dancing in day
Transformation of body, not just face, by mask

Other Forms
- Oral storytelling and poetry
- History of European acting tradition and Yoruban fusion (Soyinka)
Commedia and the Hybridization of African and European Forms in
Carribean
- Carnival!
- Pierrot Grenade mask, mumming, disguise, Roman Catholic
Carnival and Commedia added to Yoruba tradition
- Pierrot is the clown in Italian commedia sad clown
o Often played by child (Pedrolino)
o Roots in Pedrolino, zany servant character, likeable, simple
character imitating captain, pretends to be mute
o French colonies
o Sort of a harlequin costume
o Meets the trickster of Egungun performance
Appearance before Lent, mirrors, all-body mask
except for face, Lazzi (quotes Shakespeare, power
and pluck)
- Unequal power, the carnivalesque
o How might those under colonial rule use the carnival to
upend those in power?