Improvisation and Commedia

All three of the titles given to the historical genre, before it became retrofitted with the name ‘Commedia dell’Arte’, ¹ refer directly or indirectly to the practice of improvisation. The first two, commedia a soggetto (drama from prepared subject matter) and commedia all’improvviso ² (self-explanatory), place the historical practice of improvisation centrally within the form’s dramaturgic practices. Commedia a soggetto refers to the actors preparing the subject matter of the drama, rather than the performance deriving from a single and unified written script. The third, commedia alla maschera (masked comedy) refers to the practice of half the roles wearing masks in performance, and as such perhaps should be regarded primarily as a descriptive term. Examining both improvisation and masked improvisation, in its modern iterations, in relation to historical performance brings us into the realm of asynchronous research which is certainly contestable. However, when applied to the dramaturgy of contemporary performance we can examine the function and application of both historical and fictive practices. To reiterate Taviani (ibid.), Commedia (both old and new) is born out of a dialectic between tradition (accepted practice) and the present.