ABSTRACT
T h e r i s e o f re a l i s m i n t h e We s t The most important impact of photography on Western theatre after 1850 was the rise of stage realism. Since the 1830s, the romantic interest in history and exotic cultures had excited audience interest in authentic costuming and properties for historical melodramas, Shakespearean productions, and escapist spectacles. Photography focused a similar interest on more mundane realities, especially the ways in which contemporary dress and domestic lifestyles marked class, regional, and economic differences among various populations. This led to a greater demand for realistic costuming and stage properties. Early nineteenth-century managers in the West often required actors to purchase their own costumes, a costly expense for women actors especially, and a practice that defeated the possibility of uniformity in costuming style. By the 1880s, however, most producers purchased costumes for their entire casts to ensure a measure of authenticity for contemporary as well as historical and exotic productions.
