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40-542: The Roundhouse Theatre is a theatre-in-the-round located in the Kelvin Grove Urban Village , Brisbane , Queensland , Australia. It is Australia's only purpose-built theatre in the round. The building is owned by Queensland University of Technology and used by the La Boite Theatre Company . The La Boite Theatre Building was Australia's first purpose-built theatre-in-the-round, constructed for

80-510: A documentary film about her life and career, Sweet Tornado: Margo Jones and the American Theater , was shown on PBS . With Jones portrayed by Judith Ivey , the film dramatized scenes from her life, adapted from her letters and correspondence with Broadway producers and Tennessee Williams (portrayed by Richard Thomas ). The film features interviews with people who worked with her, including actor Ray Walston , who got his first big break in

120-554: A collective. All Word and Action productions were performed in normal lighting conditions, without costumes or makeup. The innovations of Margo Jones were an obvious influence on Albert McCleery when he created his Cameo Theatre for television in 1950. Continuing until 1955, McCleery offered dramas seen against pure black backgrounds instead of walls of a set. This enabled cameras in the darkness to pick up shots from any position. Richard Nixon's 1968 U.S. Presidential campaign staged nine live televised question and answer sessions using

160-476: A drama with others. The stage is always in the centre with the audience arranged on all sides, and is most commonly rectangular, circular, diamond, or triangular. Actors may enter and exit through the audience from different directions or from below the stage. The stage is usually on an even level with or below the audience in a "pit" or "arena" formation. This configuration lends itself to high-energy productions and anything that requires audience participation. It

200-563: A flop in its first production, but highly regarded years later. After she directed Maxwell Anderson 's successful Joan of Lorraine , starring Ingrid Bergman as Joan of Arc , she was fired during the Washington, DC , tryout. However, her name remained on the marquee and playbills, and no other director was ever credited for the production. All three plays were filmed. Bergman repeated her Joan of Lorraine role in Joan of Arc (1948), for which she

240-513: A ground-breaking theatre-in-the-round format, adapted for a live televised audience. The first time use of the staging device was memorialized in the book, The Selling of the President 1968 by Joe McGinniss . The producer of these Nixon "Man in the Arena" programs was Roger Ailes , who later went to on start Fox News . Ailes' innovation of the theatre-in-the-round format for candidate forums became

280-446: A major hit. Inherit the Wind become an Oscar-nominated film in 1960 and has been revived as a TV special three times. On July 17, 1955, Jones invited friends over to a party, but during the party she spilled paint on the carpet, so her secretary later brought professional cleaners to deal with it. They used carbon tetrachloride , a strong solvent commonly used in dry-cleaning processes at

320-467: A theatre for training students in the performing arts, but wanted the theatre to be used commercially as well to generate income and to be consistent with the philosophy of the urban village of integrating the university with the community. By constructing the university's theatre as a theatre-in-the-round, it enabled the La Boite Theatre Company to sell the La Boite Theatre Building and lease

360-404: Is a particularly appropriate setting for staging of dramas using Bertolt Brecht 's alienation effect , which stands in opposition to the more traditional Stanislavski technique in drama. Alienation techniques include visible lighting fixtures and other technical elements. Round theatres also allow lighting parts of the audience so that people are reminded that they are in a theatre watching

400-405: Is favoured by producers of classical theatre and it has continued as a creative alternative to the more common proscenium format. In effect, theatre-in-the-round removes the fourth wall and brings the actor into the same space as the audience. This is often problematic for proscenium or end stage trained actors who are taught that they must never turn their backs to the audience, something that

440-433: Is unavoidable in this format. However, it allows for strong and direct engagement with the audience. It is also employed when theatrical performances are presented in non-traditional spaces such as restaurants, public squares, or during street theater . Set design is usually minimal since it would obscure the audience's view. Theatre-in-the-round was common in ancient theatre, particularly that of Greece and Rome , but

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480-659: The Australian Army decided it no longer required its heritage-listed Gona Barracks and wished to sell the land. This led to a partnership being formed between the Queensland Department of Housing , the Brisbane City Council and the Queensland University of Technology to redevelop the site as the Kelvin Grove Urban Village as a mixed use precinct combining educational, residential and retail use of

520-584: The Brisbane Repertory Theatre which then renamed itself La Boite Theatre Company . The La Boite Theatre Building could seat 200 at its fullest configuration. The La Boite Theatre Building was deemed to be of such significant cultural and architectural significance that it was listed on the Queensland Heritage Register in 2004. However, it struggled to be commercially viable and was eventually redeveloped as commercial offices. In 1998

560-546: The QUT Gardens Theatre on their Gardens Point campus. That theatre was originally built for the Queensland Conservatorium of Music . 27°27′19″S 153°00′49″E  /  27.4552°S 153.0135°E  / -27.4552; 153.0135 Theatre-in-the-round Theatre-in-the-round was common in ancient theatre, particularly that of Greece and Rome , but was not widely explored again until

600-512: The Fair Oaks Playbox in Pasadena, California, an important early practitioner of central staging in addition to other stage configurations that it pioneered in its advent of flexible staging . As Indicated by Jones, the centrally staged productions of the Fair Oaks Playbox were followed approximately eight years later by the work of Glenn Hughes in his Seattle Penthouse. Stephen Joseph was

640-591: The Fall (1964), and through to this day. For eight years, Jones balanced her career between Broadway and regional projects. In Dallas, she staged the world premiere of Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee's Inherit the Wind , a fictionalized retelling of the Scopes monkey trial , after it had been rejected by several Broadway producers. The play received rave reviews and subsequently opened on Broadway in April 1955, where it became

680-855: The Federal Theatre in Houston, traveled to Soviet Russia for a festival at the Moscow Art Theatre, and founded and directed the Houston Community Theatre. She had recently joined the faculty of the University of Texas's drama department in Austin (around 1942)." She traveled internationally, experiencing theater abroad, and eventually gained commercial success on Broadway as co-director of the original production of The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams. She directed Williams' Summer and Smoke ,

720-601: The Ford Foundation began giving grants outside of New York during the 1950s, the movement gathered momentum and Theatre '47 became the model of how to build a new company. In her book Theatre-in-the-Round , Jones outlined inexpensive methods to enable companies to get started, detailing valuable information on subscription sales, board development, programming, actor/artist relations, and other issues relevant to new regional-theatre companies. Her theater-in-the-round concept requires no stage curtain or little scenery, and allows

760-481: The Roundhouse Theatre instead, a commercially viable arrangement for both the theatre company and the university. The Roundhouse Theatre can seat 400 people for central staging (audience on four sides) or 336 people for thrust stage (audience on three sides). The La Boite Theatre Company (Queensland's 2nd largest theatre company) perform at the Roundhouse Theatre. Queensland University of Technology also own

800-512: The Top of the Stairs . Though touring shows did exist at this time, no quality professional American theatre companies existed outside of New York. Jones believed in the decentralization of theater. She wanted her art to exist all across America, beyond the realm of commercialized Broadway, and this was a key component in the start of the regional-theatre movement. She reasoned, "If we succeeded in inspiring

840-419: The audience and so necessarily lose exclusive command of the acting space. All members of the audience can see the actor, but the actor can no longer see all of them. At this point, in order for the play to function, the audience themselves must be allowed to become key conductors of the meaning of the performance. Some, like the writer Mick Fealty , have stressed a close analogy between Gregory's description of

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880-524: The audience to sit on three sides of the stage. The physical space also requires particularly skilled blocking, directing, and acting: "Its mistakes are mistakes seen very close up." Theater-in-the-round staging was used for well-known shows as the original stage production of Man of La Mancha , and all plays staged at the ANTA Washington Square Theatre (demolished in the late 1960s), including Arthur Miller 's autobiographical play After

920-525: The blueprint for modern "town hall" candidate formats and even multiple-candidate debates. Elvis Presley's '68 Comeback Special TV program was performed with the musicians seated using a raised staging in-the-round format. When an arena staging was conceived for the progressive-rock group Yes by their tour manager Jim Halley in the mid-1970s, it prompted a redesign of rock concerts and venue seating arrangements. The politics of theatre-in-the-round were explored most deliberately by RG Gregory. In his view

960-567: The concept of theater-in-the-round to television with his Cameo Theatre . The Margo Jones Award was established in 1961 by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee. The theater space inside the Magnolia Lounge building has been renamed the Margo Jones Theatre to honor Jones and is the home to several small theater groups. The television series Curious & Unusual Deaths features an episode in season two about Jones' death. In 2006,

1000-623: The corresponding year every New Year's Eve, but according to the New York Times , was more often simply called "Margo's". Her theater was in the sleek "Magnolia Lounge" ( Magnolia Petroleum Company , later Mobil Oil) building, designed by Swiss-born architect William Lescaze, in 1936 for the Texas Centennial and situated on the grounds of Fair Park in Dallas. The theater was America's first modern nonprofit professional resident theater, and also

1040-595: The first professional arena theater (theater-in-the-round) in the country. Jones was inspired by Franklin Roosevelt 's Depression-era National Theater Project and the European arts movement, which she had experienced directly during the 1930s. The resident company was dedicated to staging new plays and classics of world theater rather than revivals of past Broadway hits. The initial season introduced William Inge's first play, Farther Off from Heaven , later revised as The Dark at

1080-737: The first regional professional company when she opened Theatre '47 in Dallas. Of the 85 plays Jones staged during her Dallas career, 57 were new, and one-third of those new plays had a continued life on stage, television, and radio. Jones played an important role in the early careers of a range of playwrights, such as Tennessee Williams , William Inge , Joseph Hayes , Jerome Lawrence , and Robert E. Lee . Born Margaret Virginia Jones in Livingston, Texas , Jones worked in community and professional theaters in California , Houston , and New York City. "Since 1936, Margo Jones had served as assistant director of

1120-816: The first to popularise the form in the United Kingdom from the US in the 1950s and set up theatres-in-the-round in Newcastle-under-Lyme and the Studio Theatre in Scarborough. The current theatre, opened in 1996, is known as the Stephen Joseph Theatre . Joseph was reputed to have once rhetorically asked, "Why must authorities stand with their back to a wall?" His answer was: "So nobody can knife them from behind." Sam Walters set up an impromptu performance space in

1160-872: The latter half of the 20th century. The Glenn Hughes Penthouse Theatre in Seattle, Washington was the first theatre-in-the-round venue built in the United States. It first opened on May 19, 1940 with a production of Spring Dance , a comedy by playwright Philip Barry . The 160-seat theatre is located on the campus of the University of Washington in Seattle and is on the National Register of Historic Places . In 1947, Margo Jones established America's first professional theatre-in-the-round company when she opened her Theater '47 in Dallas. The stage design as developed by Margo Jones

1200-407: The lit space of a proscenium arch is analogous to the seat of power; the audience adopts the role of passive receivers. In traditional theatre design, maximum care is taken with sight lines in order to ensure that the actor can engage every member of the audience at the same time. However, once removed from the picture frame of the arch, the actors are compelled to turn their back on some members of

1240-401: The operation of 30 theatres like ours, the playwright won't need Broadway." Playwrights Inge, Jerome Lawrence , and Robert E. Lee championed this sentiment when they received their first big breaks from Jones' Dallas theater. Jones envisioned it as a place where actors, writers, and technicians could have steady jobs and not be subject to the problems found in the volatile New York scene. When

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1280-534: The rudimentary dynamics of theater-in-the-round with the network effect of Internet-based communication in comparison to traditional broadcast and marketing channels. George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia is home to the largest arena stage archive and contains material from the theatre's 50-year history. Included in the collection are photographs, production notebooks, scrapbooks, playbills, oral histories and handwritten correspondence. According to their website,

1320-468: The site. The urban village had a strong arts and entertainment theme as the university was placing its Creative Industries Faculty in the village. This was complemented by the Queensland Academy for Creative Industries , a selective public senior high school for students wishing to specialise in the arts and entertainment. The university constructed the Roundhouse Theatre in 2004 to meet its needs for

1360-470: The time. Jones, satisfied with the cleaning, fell asleep into the night. Unfortunately, some carbon tetrachloride had been absorbed into the carpet and later evaporated, filling her home with toxic fumes. She woke up dizzy; the gas was later found to have caused kidney failure . She was then found unconscious on the couch resting and she was rushed to hospital, but died a week later. According to her friends, she briefly regained consciousness and found out she

1400-596: The total volume is 260 cubic feet (7.4 m ) or 440 feet (130 m) linear and is housed in the Fenwick Library. Margo Jones Margo Jones (December 12, 1911 – July 24, 1955), nicknamed the "Texas Tornado", was an American stage director and producer , best known for launching the American regional theater movement and for introducing the theater-in-the-round concept in Dallas, Texas . In 1947, she established

1440-687: The upstairs of the Orange Tree pub in Richmond, London in the early 1970s and subsequently moved across the road to a permanent Orange Tree Theatre . In 1972, RG Gregory set up the Word and Action theatre company in Dorset in England to work exclusively in theatre-in-the-round. Gregory sought to create a grammar that would enable actors to maximise the form's potential for connecting with the audience both as individuals and as

1480-475: Was Oscar-nominated. Geraldine Page was Oscar-nominated for her performance in Summer and Smoke (1961). Since 1950, at least five different film/TV productions of The Glass Menagerie have been made. The success of The Glass Menagerie allowed her to take the next step toward her dream of running a repertory theatre outside of New York. She moved back to Dallas and opened Theatre '47. The theater changed its name to

1520-461: Was going to die, and made elaborate preparations for her burial, including asking her friends to dress her properly and grooming her for her funeral. She died July 24, 1955, at the age of 43, never realizing what killed her. In 1959, her theater was closed. Jones' innovative ideas inspired the growth of numerous resident companies, and made experiencing the art she loved possible for regions across America. In 1950–55, producer Albert McCleery brought

1560-406: Was not widely explored again until the latter half of the 20th century. In Margo Jones' survey of theatre-in-the-round, the first two sources of central staging in the United States she identified were the productions by Azubah Latham and Milton Smith at Columbia University dating from 1914, and T. Earl Pardoe 's productions at Brigham Young University in 1922. In 1924, Gilmor Brown founded

1600-403: Was used by directors in later years for such well-known shows as Fun Home , the original stage production of Man of La Mancha , and all plays staged at the ANTA Washington Square Theatre (demolished in the 1960s), including Arthur Miller 's autobiographical After the Fall . Such theatres had previously existed in colleges, but not in professional theatre buildings. Theater in the round

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