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The Comic Theatre

(II teatro comico)

Carlo Goldoni 1750.

Comedy that presents backstage life with unusual vividness and makes interesting use of the technique of a play-withina-play. Goldoni here attempted to prepare his audience for his famous season of sixteen plays in which many of the hackneyed tricks of improvised comedy would be eliminated. A company of actors rehearsing a new play expound Goldoni's proposed reforms of playwrighting, aimed at the creation of a more naturalistic theatre, as a playwright of the old school and an unemployed opera singer come to offer their services to the representatives of the new comedy.