In the Seventh Room (Case H 2) is a bronze statuette of an actor in the New Comedy ([fig. 19]). The ridiculous dress of the earlier period has been discarded for a fringed himation, but the mask is still worn. This actor seems to be declaiming a passage “full of sound and fury” accompanied by sweeping gestures.
FIG. 19. ACTOR IN NEW COMEDY
In the same case is a statuette of an actor of mimes or pantomimes, in itself a masterpiece of the grotesque ([fig. 18]). These performances were generally satires upon contemporary life, and were immensely popular in Greece and Italy, being sometimes provided as entertainment for guests after dinner. The actors did not wear masks and probably relied much upon gestures and facial play for their effects.
FIG. 20. COMIC ACTOR AS HERAKLES
In Rome as well as in Athens the drama was connected with religious festivals and the funerals of the great, but it encountered much opposition from the more old-fashioned moralists and was never so popular as were grosser amusements. The actors were frequently slaves, though citizens engaged in this profession in increasing numbers under the late Republic and the Empire, but their occupation deprived them of certain civil rights and affected their social standing; while at Athens parts in both tragedies and comedies were taken by citizens, who lost nothing in public estimation by so doing. This in itself shows the marked difference in the Greek and Roman attitudes. Roman tragedy was closely modeled upon the Athenian, and the plays of Menander and his contemporaries, translated and adapted by Plautus and Terence, became Roman comedy, from which the classic comedy of modern Europe is derived. More popular, however, were the farces and pantomimes of various kinds, in which the native influence was strong, the dialogue and gestures being largely extemporaneous, thus affording an opportunity to a clever actor for displaying all his skill.
