Virginia and I went to see the musical Matilda recently. Near the end of intermission, Matilda's dad and brother came on stage, while the house lights were still up. They sang a song about how smart people who watch the "telly" are and then Matilda's dad talked directly to the audience. He asked people who like to read to raise their hands. He asked for the name of one of the women in the front row and then made fun of her for being a bookworm.
I thought this was a nice way to gather the audience back to their seats for the second half of the musical. But I hadn't realized the impact this part of the show had on Virginia. She was confused about whether the man was in character or not.
During the rest of the show the "fourth wall" was up. The actors did not interact with the audience. And with the stage lights up and house lights down, they couldn't even see the audience. What happened at the end of intermission was totally different. The actors could see us and invited interaction. The fourth wall was down.
I find it especially fascinating that to Virginia, the fourth wall helped signal that what was going on on stage was acting. A lack of fourth wall, to her, signaled authenticity. She thought it might not be acting, but the actor being himself and expressing true opinions.
This is relevant to my research. In studying reality storytelling, I am very interested in how people both perform and deliver authenticity. Storytelling in general does tend to be more interactive than staged plays and musicals (although, not always). And in reality storytelling being "real" seems to be especially important. It makes sense that the fourth wall has a relationship with, at least, the appearance of authenticity.
I appreciated seeing the fourth wall from the perspective of someone for whom live theater is a more new experience.
