Playwrights and theater groups in post-1964 Brazil: Art, culture and politics

Abstract

Social theater and engaged theater are two categories that, among others, took shape amidsta lively debate at the end of the 19th century and were consolidated in the 20th. Their pointof convergence lay in the relationship between theatre and politics, or even between theaterand propaganda. For the English critic Eric Bentley, political theater refers to both thetheatrical text and to when, where and how it is portrayed. This article discusses the topic ofengagement, in general, and profiles some characters who, as political figures, intervene criticallyin the public sphere, producing not only a transgression of order (as in the work of PierreBourdieu) and a criticism of reality, but also a critique of their own insertion in the capitalistmode of production and, therefore, a critique of the form and content of their own activities.