by Reagan Densmore
Being in the humanities program in university, I have often heard the prefix “meta”; metaphysical, metafictional, and more recently, metatheatrical. We explored this term in my English class and it caught my eye. Metatheatre is a fascinating concept that is quite common in media, especially movies. The idea of metatheatre is when a drama brings awareness to its own theatricality. This can be seen in situations such as breaking the fourth wall by talking to the audience, performing a play within a play, or when a character seems to recognize that they are in a play. It has an extensive history that is believed to go all the way back to ancient Greek, around the 5th century BCE and is more than just a “fourth wall break” but allows for the audience to engage with the play on a much deeper level.
The word “meta” in Greek means “after”, “with”, or “alongside” and serves as a prefix for things that acknowledge self-reflectivity. While metatheatre is believed to have traits in ancient Greek theatre, such as in tragedies by Euripides plays, the term “metatheatre” was coined in 1963 by Lionel Abel and was used to describe contemporary theatre and thus, is controversial to apply this term to Ancient Greek theatre as self-referential elements may not have been perceived in the same way as modern audiences do. Despite this, metatheatre does have its long history and place in even some of the most known pieces of media to exist, whether that be in plays, or in newer concepts, such as films.
William Shakespeare is well renowned for his metatheatrical aspects in his plays. Hamlet is quite famous for this. The play follows Prince Hamlet, whose father was recently killed by his uncle, the king’s brother, Claudius, who then shortly after marries his mother, the queen. Filled with agony and rage, Hamlet is filled with the need for revenge; to kill Claudius, the new king. But this desire for revenge is met with contemplation, and throughout the play, Hamlet battles with this quest of revenge and believes that he has to kill Claudius because it is his role to do so, and he portrays himself as a madman as he works towards this end. “To be or not to be?” to quote Hamlet himself, being or not being? Life or death? Is killing Claudius and avenging his father the right thing to do? If so, why can he not do it? There are other aspects of metatheatre in Hamlet, which include when Hamlet himself “breaks the fourth wall”, there are a few “aside” dialogues where Hamlet would speak to the audience his inner thoughts, as well as his play-within-a-play “The Murder of Gonzago” portrayed by Hamlet to Claudius in Act III scene II. This play, which is closely related to the murder of the king, serves as an illusion in order to manipulate Claudius into revealing his guilt. Hamlet uses the performance of a play to tell his story, to invoke feelings in him, which is what theatre in general tends to do to us as the audience. It is interesting as this play makes us watch a play being performed in the play and in this moment, Claudius seems to be the audience, and the actual audience gets to watch the audience. Overall, the play Hamlet tends to blend the lines of fiction and reality, as even the characters themselves are reminded that they are performing and contemplate their role and how they should act. It also leads to questions such as who they are performing for, are we the audience, or is it the characters on stage?
Coming to the newer age of media, the film director Wes Anderson tends to add metatheatrical aspects to his films. A controversial opinion that I have is that I actually enjoyed his film Asteroid City and it was for this reason of metatheatricality, before I had even learned about the term “metatheatre”. Asteroid City is about a play called “Asteroid City” written by Conard Earp and opening with a host who breaks the fourth wall and addresses the audience about the fact that Asteroid City is a play. The whole film is set up as if the audience is watching a play as there are separate acts to this film. The movie centers the main character Augie Steenback, a war photographer whose wife had passed away, leaving him and their children. Throughout the film, Augie battles this sort of depression and sadness. At the start of the movie, his car breaks down and as the mechanic tries to fix it, determining it as either junk, or a quick fix, but in this encounter, it ends up being neither. This is the start of the message of this film being about being faced with knowledge that seems to be beyond limits, and to figure out what more there is to our role in life, which seems to be why this film is set up as a play. The play is set in a space camp in Western United States, and the characters, being scientists or overall knowledgeable people, are faced with encounters of aliens, which is beyond their limits of knowledge and affects the characters on a mental level. Augie is portrayed as stone-faced and monotone and tends to confine his emotions. With this, his trauma from WWII, and the death of his wife, he struggles to tell his kids about the fate of their mother until “the time is right”. His actor, Jones Hall, while not having to deal with an alien or this trauma, still seems to be similar to Augie as he attempts to seek solutions he can never find, such as why Augie burns his hand on a grill, and he battles with trying to do things right and portraying his character correctly. This movie uses metatheatrical aspects to portray its message, breaking the fourth wall of the play to depict the reality of these characters, their obsession to do things right and their struggle with facing knowledge outside of their own.
Metatheatre is a deeply interesting concept that is very broad. There is so much to it and can appear in many different ways, whether that be simply breaking the fourth wall, having characters struggle with their role in said play, or other things. This concept can really make a play or a film intriguing as it engages with the audience on a deeper level and it can get sort of existential in a way. Hamlet and Asteroid City are just two pieces of media where I believe, at least, that metatheatre is used amazingly and makes the experience so captivating and thought-provoking as artists display their ability to explore the different worlds of reality in fiction in a form of fiction itself.
References
Cash, Justin. 2009. “What is Metatheatre? Infographic and 5 Authoritative Explanations.” The Drama Teacher. https://thedramateacher.com/metatheatre-conventions/.
Chen, Jing-xia. 2019. “Understanding Metatheatre.” David Publishing Company. Vol 17, No. 1: 35-42. https://www.davidpublisher.com/Public /uploads/Contribute/5c6a7045af79e.pdf.
Coughlan-Wills, Fionn. n.d. “1 ‘The play’s the thing’: the significance and dramatic representation of meta-theatricality in William Shakespeare’s Hamlet.” Academia. https://www.academia.edu/5326549/The_plays_the_thing_Meta_theatre_in_Shakespeares_Hamlet.
Golish, Aaron. 2014. “Local Mimesis and Plateaic Diegesis: Distinguishing the Self-referential from the Metatheatrical in Greek Tragedy.” Hirundo XII:37-48. https://www.mcgill.ca /classics/files/classics/2013-14-05.pdf.
Hoeffner, Joe. 2023. “This Is the Meaning Behind Wes Anderson's 'Asteroid City.'” Collider. https://collider.com/asteroid-city-wes-anderson-movie-meaning/.
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