Full text document will be published online on décembre 2026.
Seeking insights in artists’ perspectives on producing online readings of stage plays during the first year and a half of the COVID-19 pandemic, this essay is a discussion of a particular theater’s performance innovations, an inquiry into how the experiences of presenting of a play can inform and broaden our understanding of the play, and reciprocally, a suggestion of what a play so understood can tell us about theatrical presentation. The result is a reflection on a trying time from the recent past, a consideration of the sense and structure of plays from a deeper past, and a consideration of values common to theatrical presentation for the future.
Cherchant à connaître le point de vue des artistes sur la production de lectures en ligne de pièces de théâtre au cours de la première année et demie de la pandémie de COVID-19, cet essai est une discussion sur les innovations d'un théâtre spécifique, une enquête sur la façon dont les expériences de présentation d'une pièce peuvent informer et élargir notre compréhension de la pièce, et réciproquement, une suggestion de ce qu’une pièce ainsi comprise peut nous dire sur la présentation théâtrale. Le résultat est une réflexion sur une période difficile du passé récent, une considération du sens et de la structure des pièces d'un passé plus lointain, et une considération des valeurs communes à la présentation théâtrale pour l'avenir.
On March 28th of 2020, two weeks into a “Stay at Home” advisory that shut down nearly all in-person entertainment in New York City, Metropolitan Playhouse, a New York producer of stage plays for over twenty-five years, began what became a 15-month series of weekly online broadcasts via a medium almost entirely new to its creators. Under the nom de guerre The Metropolitan Virtual Playhouse, the company livestreamed play readings by actors assembled via video conferencing software, each performer addressing his or her own microphone and camera in isolation, their video feeds manipulated and complemented with visual and audio effects run by a likewise remote technician, and all under the guidance of a remote director. Neither film nor theater, these hybrid presentations also distinguished themselves from other online readings of the period chiefly for their graphic and audio innovations, exploring ways not merely to overcome the deadening alienation of performer...
Full text document will be published online on décembre 2026.
Boyce’s adaptation of The Sea Lady is not properly considered a Provincetown Players play. Though written by one of the founders of the company, it…
Metropolitan’s virtual broadcasts all took place before AI technology had become near-ubiquitous. One wonders if AI enhanced presentations would be…
Bibliographical reference
Alex Roe, « Playing for Living Beings: Susan Glaspell and the Provincetown Players in a Plague Year », Coup de théâtre, 39 | 2025, 107-127.
Electronic reference
Alex Roe, « Playing for Living Beings: Susan Glaspell and the Provincetown Players in a Plague Year », Coup de théâtre [Online], 39 | 2025, Online since 01 décembre 2026, connection on 07 septembre 2026. DOI : 10.54563/coupdetheatre.1213
Alex Roe is a New York City based stage director, writer, designer, and actor who has directed and performed across the US and written numerous new plays and adaptations of Western classics. Since 2001, he has been Producing Artistic Director of the award-winning Metropolitan Playhouse, for which he has produced over 100 productions and video broadcasts. He holds a BA in Comparative Literature from Harvard College.
