While theatre troupes were formerly often travelling, the idea of the national theatre gained support in the 18th century, inspired by Ludvig Holberg. While there is some dispute among theatre historians, it is probable that the plays by the Roman Seneca were not intended to be performed.

While most modern theatre companies rehearse one piece of theatre at a time, perform that piece for a set "run", retire the piece, and begin rehearsing a new show, repertory companies rehearse multiple shows at one time. Jean-Pierre Vernant argues that in The Persians Aeschylus substitutes for the usual temporal distance between the audience and the age of heroes a spatial distance between the Western audience and the Eastern Persian culture. Shadow puppetry is said to have reached its highest point of artistic development in the eleventh century before becoming a tool of the government. Most Athenian tragedies dramatise events from Greek mythology, though The Persians—which stages the Persian response to news of their military defeat at the Battle of Salamis in 480 BCE—is the notable exception in the surviving drama. In Ancient Greece however, the word drama encompassed all theatrical plays, tragic, comic, or anything in between.Theatre or theater [a] is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. Discover current and upcoming West End plays, browse our special offers, and book tickets for a night to remember. That many of the precepts of his system of actor training seem to be common sense and self-evident testifies to its hegemonic success. The earliest evidence is from the late 1st millennium CE, in medieval-era texts and archeological sites.

Some forms of improvisation, notably the Commedia dell'arte, improvise on the basis of ' lazzi' or rough outlines of scenic action (see Gordon 1983 and Duchartre 1966). However, according to Webster, satyr actors did not always perform typical satyr actions and would break from the acting traditions assigned to the character type of a mythical forest creature.

Although Rome had a native tradition of performance, the Hellenization of Roman culture in the 3rd century BCE had a profound and energizing effect on Roman theatre and encouraged the development of Latin literature of the highest quality for the stage. Secular plays were known as akhraja, recorded in medieval adab literature, though they were less common than puppetry and ta'ziya theatre. Music and theatre have had a close relationship since ancient times— Athenian tragedy, for example, was a form of dance- drama that employed a chorus whose parts were sung (to the accompaniment of an aulos—an instrument comparable to the modern oboe), as were some of the actors' responses and their 'solo songs' ( monodies).