(1) The mention of place in the dialogue does not necessarily mean that either a part of the stage façade or a property is employed. Only actual use of the stage area or property confirms its employment or appearance on stage. (2) A new scene does not have to be played in a different part of the stage from the previous one. This premise is closely connected with the idea that (3) a change of location in the narrative is not necessarily accompanied by a change in location on stage. Most scholars have recognized that the exit of one character and the entrance of another from a different door is enough to signify a change of location. Although this is generally true, there are exceptions even in these cases, for examples of scenes exist where a change of location is effected without the clearing of the stage (Julius Caesar, III, i; Miseries of Enforced Marriage, scene x; Measure for Measure, III, i-ii; London Prodigal, D3r-E1v). (4) No regular system of scene alternation occurs. Brödmeier’s simple theory of alternation, one scene in front of a curtain and one scene behind, has been discarded by scholars long ago. But more elaborate systems of alternation, employing the “inner” and “upper stages,” are still advanced. Examples are available for examination in Watkins’ book and Reynolds’ reconstruction of Troilus and Cressida. (5) Evidence for the use of the enclosure in one scene of a play does not mean that the enclosure was used in other scenes for which there is no evidence. Many years ago Ashley Thorndike advocated the opposite premise. “Clear evidence of the curtained inner stage in one scene of a play must be taken as a presumptive evidence that it was used in others,” he wrote.[4] Thorndike’s presumption has been liberally interpreted by students of staging. Perhaps the absence of additional mention of the enclosure is the clearest proof of its limited use. After all, when the total evidence for a curtained space is gathered together, the bulk is fairly slim in comparison to the vast number of scenes which contain no such mention. Of the 519 scenes in the Globe plays, sixteen of them show fairly strong evidence of being partly placed in the enclosure. This is about 3 per cent of the total. Perhaps the texts of the non-Shakespearean plays offered by the Globe company reflect a truer percentage. Of their 182 scenes, twelve show evidence of enclosure use, or about 6½ per cent.[5] In either case the total percentage is low.
These premises arise from my conviction that the part which the stage façade played in the presentation of the plays has been greatly overestimated. Visually, the façade was always the formal background, but in the overwhelming number of cases the action took place before it, not within it. Instead of looking to the façade for the organizing principles of staging, it might be better to look to the patterns of the scenes themselves.
III. ACTORS’ ENTRANCES UPON THE GLOBE STAGE
At one time, Sir Mark Hunter defined a scene as the action between clearances of the stage.[6] Since this definition is generally accepted, we can consider that the scene concludes with the exit of all characters and commences with the entrance of other characters. This so-called “law of reentry” operates in the overwhelming majority of scene changes. It is rare for a character who has left the stage in one scene to enter immediately in the very next. As C. M. Haines has pointed out, most of the exceptions occur in battle scenes. In those instances it is usual for an alarum or excursion to separate the two scenes. The other exceptions are in large measure suspect.[7]
Ready analogy to cinematic technique has led a number of scholars to minimize the scene markings. Emphasis has been placed on the flow of scene to scene, to the extent that the separation of scene from scene has had to be made by a shift from one stage area or mansion to another or by the opening or closing of a curtain. However, in deemphasizing the contribution of the stage façade to the continuity of the play, it is necessary to consider that the pointing of scene divisions was managed by the actors themselves. Overlapping of the exit and the entrance may not have been the habit of the Globe company; instead separation and pause may have been the method. The actors or stage attendants, on occasion, had to bring out properties. This necessitated a pause, however brief. Nor need this pause have been reflected in the text. For one entrance in The Battle of Alcazar the stage direction in the Quarto reads:
Enter the king of Portugall and his Lords, Lewes de Sylva, and the Embassadours of Spaine.
In the plot of the play, however, the corresponding direction reads:
Enter: 2 bringing in a chair of state (mr. Hunt): w. Kendall Dab & Harry enter at one dore: Sebastian: Duke of Avero; Stukeley: 1 Pages: Jeames Ionas: & Hercules (th) to them at another dore Embassadors of Spaine mr Iones mr Charles: attendants George and w. Cartwright:[8]
Unfortunately, no similar parallel of stage direction and plot exists for any of the Globe plays. In these same plots, we may also notice, a line was drawn across the page to separate one scene from another. Probably this was done to clarify the sequence of scenes, but it had the added effect of fixing the scene divisions firmly in the actor’s mind. Together with the rhyming couplet which concluded so many scenes, it may have encouraged the insertion of a slight pause between the scenes.