The Significance of Masks in Theater Arts

Terrifying vampires, demons, and the forces of darkness suddenly materialize in countries around the world, while familiar faces of current celebrities, historical figures, and questionable politicians mingle among them. Halloween, the once Celtic festival turned commercialized costumed event (http://www.history.com/content/halloween), is now a pleasurable and celebratory tradition …and a form of theater at its finest. For one night, millions of people around the world embrace an alter ego, donning costumes and disguises that allow the opportunity to become one with a character, often choosing one quite unlike themselves. Many people immerse themselves fully in the experience by taking on a role for the duration of the evening, seldom breaking character, and using their costumes as an excuse to act in ways that on any other night could seem not only uncharacteristic, but even rude or alarming. The fun is in the fact that actions on this night can be considered consequence free, true selves are hidden behind an exterior that has supposedly has a personality of its own.

Costumes, and specifically facial masks, have an immeasurable power. Wearing something as seemingly insignificant as a mask has the power to change actions and behaviors. In the “real world”, a prime example being Halloween, masks allow the individual to hide behind a face that is not their own. While use of masks have been an essential characteristic of theater arts since antiquity, the use of masks in ancient Japanese theater presents some of the most interesting uses of this artistic tool.

The ancient Japanese art form known as Noh Theater requires masks for performance (Greenwald, Schultz, & Pomo, 2001). Actors of this genre will spend hours in the “mirror room” before a performance, apply their mask, sit completely still and stare at their reflection in order to wholly induce their psyche into believing they are physically the character whose mask they wear. The use of masks in Japanese theater is especially intriguing because it encourages an intense focus on aspects of acting that are not always viewed as salient in today’s theatrical endeavors. For example, many productions today can be large, flashy, and at times ostentatious, and we often end up focused on dialogue, character interactions, and elaborate stage surroundings. In Japanese Noh Theater however, audiences don’t have such opportunities as the stage is bare, the dialogue is minimal, and any movement is a slow, diligently prepared process (Greenwald, Schultz, & Pomo, 2001).

Noh Theater essentially forces audiences to pay close attention to actor body language and overall presence. In addition, while in the more unassuming mainstream theater (such as many of the plays on Broadway stages this season) we look forward to analyzing the deep emotional expressions on an actor’s face, in Noh Theater, all actors wear a mask. Their mask remains completely unchanged for the duration of the play, but nevertheless must be able to convey a vast array of emotions. The use of these masks draws our attention to body language and the actor’s overall stage presence. The actors of Noh Theater are forced to physically embody a character in an all encompassing way, so that their body language expresses the intense emotions that usually emanate from the face. While they wear a mask that displays one expression for the duration of a play, Noh actors must help audiences see different expressions within the mask, wholly by utilizing their bodies and surrounding stage lighting to encompass an entire world of emotion within the mask they wear. Whether used as a tool to deceive friends and neighbors on all hallows eve, or used as part of an ancient and ritualistic artistic endeavor, masks serve the purpose of aiding one to mentally and physically become anything other than themselves.

Traditional Noh Masks: http://liveness.org/plasticfutures/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/noh-masks.jpg


“Rotation of the head out of the visual plane changes the two dimensional image characteristics of the mask which viewers may misinterpret as non-rigid changes due facial muscle action. The figure below shows the same Edo-period Noh mask, Magojiro, at three inclinations.”
Changeability of the Noh mask: http://www.kasrl.org/noh-mask-effect.gif)