ABSTRACT
Proscenium theatres were developed for just that sort of spectacle. Plays are written with specific ways of staging them in mind, and any show more than 40, but less than 400 years old was probably written with a proscenium theatre in mind. The proscenium frames the stage for the audience, just like the frame on a painting. Box booms are located in the place where theatre box seats were traditionally placed, on the side of the auditorium and close to the front of the stage. Many theatres have holes in the stage floor equipped with removable covers. The major architectural element of any proscenium theatre is the fly house, or tower. Fire curtains are hung directly upstage of the proscenium wall and are rigged to fall automatically in case of an emergency. It is interesting to note that many of those sound booths are enclosed in glass to provide a sound barrier from the auditorium.
