Acting Styles and Political Representation

• In Event: Theatres of Truth: Against Interpretive Hegemonies

Abstract

This paper analyzes theatrical acting styles as a way to better understand manifestations of political representation. Typically, the theatricalization of politics is said to have overwhelmingly negative influences on democratic culture. But I argue that, by looking at how acting styles and staging conventions have changed historically in Western theater, we can better understand politicians’ public appeals in representative democracy. I suggest that what passes as sincere, authentic or spontaneous in the public realm is often closely allied to what acting styles or staging conventions are dominant in the culture at the time. I historicize the concept of theatrical representation to investigate the evolution of the value placed on sincerity, specifically placing it in its context in relation to shifts in acting styles and staging conventions, first in medieval English theater through to current theater and film. The prominence of certain acting styles in our day is one “circumstance of political judgment” (Nadia Urbinati) that often goes unacknowledged.

Author

• Katherine Goktepe, Yaşar University