ABSTRACT
The British and American theatre’s twentieth-century preference for lagging behind the times, rather than surging ahead of them, was abruptly broken down in the reactive aftermath of the Cold War. The ideas of consensus and orthodoxy to which the mainstream theatre subscribed, and by which it had been controlled, were steadily eroded by the impact of the 1960s’ Counter Culture. The very conception of the theatre’s role, its function and its constituencies began to be challenged.
