Breaking the fourth wall...

[BwayTday]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 9:55pm

There are so many shows that have those Nick Jr. T.V. show moments where the characters talk to the audience out of character. Personally it kinda annoys me... so I thought there should be a list. Just any show like this (excluding narrators ex. ITW)

Next to Normal
...Forum
Peter Pan

EDIT:Thanks Dolly, I should have remembered that...

Updated On: 7/26/09 at 09:55 PM

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:01pm

Our Town, Skin of Our Teeth, Midsummer Night's Dream, Twelfth Night, As You Like It...most of Shakespeare, actually.

[myshikobit]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:02pm

LiTP

[CapnHook]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:09pm

EXIT THE KING

[Dollypop]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:09pm

I think the proper term would be "breaking down the 4th wall" and not "talking to the audience."

Thank you very much.

Updated On: 7/26/09 at 10:09 PM

[blaxx]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:10pm

PATTILuPONEGYPSY

[born2bebroadway]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:13pm

RENT

[raulmark]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:19pm

How did Next To Normal do this?
The one that stands out for me was "Passing Strange" when Stu started talking with the audience and telling us a stupid story. It broke that 4th wall down and I felt it was self-indulgent. It ruined the show for me. Did he think he was doing a concert?? anyway, that's my short list

[BwayTday]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:22pm

^^^^ I don't no if there's any more times, but when I was listening to an audio of "Just Another Day" it sounded like Dan said to the audience "I never know what she's talking about." And later "Again, no clue."

[singtopher]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:24pm

^Thats about it. I had to think hard about where they did it as well.

[CapnHook]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:37pm

THE GREAT AMERICAN TRAILER PARK MUSICAL
SEUSSICAL

I mean...there is a difference between talking to the audience and giving and "aside" remark to the audience. Plays with narrators, such as To Kill A Mockingbird, obviously break the fourth wall. But then there are shows where characters reference remarks (an aside) to the audience.

[nomdeplume]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:50pm

If it's a monologue in character they do not break the flow. Sometimes they are the making of a great play as in The Little Dog Laughed. Much of Shakespeare is like that.

However you can have a narrator, or an introducer, of a play as in a prologue speaking directly to an audience that does not even have a character, as in Chorus at the start of Shakespeare's Henry V, or as in an intermittent Greek chorus, speaking directly to the audience or commenting in reflection on the action. These players are not "within" the play, yet they are part of a style within the structure of a play that have traditionally been very effective.

I think it is the quality of how well it is conceived and realized that makes it work or not work. It can be part of an artistic flow and it works for me.

I am not fond of the Brechtian style of interruption of the flow to break the audience's emotional connection to a piece. That ruins a play for me. But Brecht has his fans.

To me it can be the Theater of Vulgar Interruptions rather than the Theater of Alienation/verfremdung/distanciation.

So my question to you is do you not like it because it is poorly conceived or effected, or because it alienates you from the rest of the piece? Do you not like what it is, how it is done, or that it interrupts your enjoyment of the rest of the piece? You are not limited to one!

[everythingtaboo]

Posted: 7/26/09 at 10:50pm

Depending on the definition we're using...

Ragtime
Chicago
Xanadu
The Boy From Oz
Taboo
Mary Poppins

[legally_popular]

Posted: 7/27/09 at 12:43am

Hair

[eatlasagna]

Posted: 7/27/09 at 1:43am

Miss Saigon

[jagfkb]

Posted: 7/27/09 at 10:27am

Spelling Bee
Fiddler on the Roof
The Will Rogers Follies

Also, when I read that Peter Pan was a show listed as breaking the fourth wall, I thought the op was talking about when he flies into the audience, literally breaking the fourth wall.

[AndAllThatJazz22]

Posted: 7/27/09 at 10:31am

Ain't Misbehavin'

Updated On: 7/27/09 at 10:31 AM

[Tom's Cat]

Posted: 7/27/09 at 10:43am

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
Flower Drum Song revival

[everythingtaboo]

Posted: 7/28/09 at 1:18am

The Lion King

[heo1128]

Posted: 7/28/09 at 1:39am

I think in N2N's case, the whole song "Just Another Day" is to the audience, so it's not like one line out of the entire show is breaking the 4th wall.

[observer]

Posted: 7/28/09 at 1:39am

Practically all of Spamalot is played with the fourth wall down, ex. The Song That Goes Like This; Diva's Lament, "have a drink and a pee, we'll be back for Act 3..." etc.

[HollyGolightly2]

Posted: 7/28/09 at 3:18am

Would Drowsy Chaperone count? I don't think that show even has a fourth wall to break.

[B3TA07]

Posted: 7/28/09 at 3:49am

The Next to Normal examples are just asides. Hardly "breaking the fourth wall."

Avenue Q: "Give us your money!"

[ghostlight2]

Posted: 7/28/09 at 9:36am

But isn't it a like being "a little bit pregnant"? You either break the wall or you don't.

Where do they break the wall in Ain't Misbehaving, Allthatjazz? It's been so long since I've seen it.

"The one that stands out for me was "Passing Strange" when Stu started talking with the audience and telling us a stupid story. It broke that 4th wall down and I felt it was self-indulgent".

So with you on that one, raulmark. I thought the entire show was incredibly self-indulgent. Also he's a hypocrite. Stew talks of "scaryotypes", then goes blithely on to stereotype black Christians, German performance artists and others. I never understood why people loved this show so much. It's the only show that I ever really wanted to walk out of. It also annoyed me that he had "Youth" rather rudely rebuffing his mother's repeated pleas to come home, then had him fall apart when she dies while he's away. Where was that devotion while she was alive? Adding insult to injury, he has his mother (as an angel?) come back to forgive him after her death. Really thought that was despicable, an insult to his mother's memory.

Topic? Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead.

[JenNYferTheatrical]

Posted: 7/28/09 at 10:54am

I've often found breaking the fourth wall to be particularly effective, but of course it all depends on what kind of show you're doing it in. I went to a show in Chicago a while back that used clowning, and there was essentially no fourth wall whatsoever. It was a hilarious performance, and it wouldn't have been the same with the fourth wall intact.