The production's constraints dictated a single arcade screen backdrop consisting of four mansions and a curtain. Heaven and Hell, while not directly mentioned in the text, must be focal points balancing each other in terms of colour and detail.
Death's entrance and Everyman's exit required the use of a trapdoor and elevator, a complicated effect due to the pageant wagon nature of the show. The set has to be adaptable to either a performance outside Silver Cultural Arts Centre in the amphitheatre by the West entrance or in case of inclement weather, the Studio Theatre. This production of Everyman is designed to be a study in the staging of a Medieval drama.
It is an excellent opportunity to blend Medieval artistic ideas and theatre with the modern view of the Medieval world and appreciation for classic drama. Everyman was probably written before the end of the fifteenth century.
However, it is preserved in only four printed copies in four different editions, which date from between and The two copies by Richard Pynson are fragmentary, but two complete copies represent John Skot's editions. Sir Walter Greg has reprinted all four editions, with a reproduction of the woodcut of Everyman and Death from the title-page of the Skot editions Cawley Everyman closely resembles the Flemish play Elckerlijc, first printed in One of them is probably a translation of the other and many scholars have argued as to the superiority of one over the other.
The difficulty of deciding whether Everyman or Elckerlijc came first is a reminder that the play is a product not of Holland or England in particular, but of medieval Catholic Europe. Everyman's fear of death is a universal emotion, but his spiritual victory over death is a triumphant expression of Christian faith and Catholic doctrine. Everyman was originally produced in the late fifteenth century and was performed regularly for the next seventy-five years by professional and semi-professional companies.
Although the play was based on a Dutch play and was extensively produced in Holland and England, no production records from that time exist today. After a lapse of nearly four hundred years, William Poel, founder of the Elizabethan Stage Society, produced the first modern production on July 7, in the Great Hall of the Charterhouse in London. Poel directed and designed the play as well as acting the part of Death, in subsequent productions he played the role of God. Poel's productions were acted in strict accordance with the original text with no cuts alterations or additions.
His set design consisted of a bare medieval chapel interior. They were meant to be seen by the common people. Like other morality plays, "Everyman" is an allegory. The lessons being relayed are taught by allegorical characters , each one representing an abstract concept such as good deeds, material possessions, and knowledge. God decides that Everyman a character who represents an average, everyday human has become too obsessed with wealth and material possessions.
Therefore, Everyman must be taught a lesson in piety. And who better to teach a life lesson than a character named Death? Everyman has been living for his own pleasure, forgetting about the importance of charity and the potential threat of eternal hellfire.
Everyman must go before God, never to return to Earth again. Death does say that the hapless hero can take along anyone or anything that may benefit him during this spiritual trial. At first, Fellowship is full of bravado. When Fellowship learns that Everyman is in trouble, he promises to stay with him until the problem is resolved. However, as soon as Everyman reveals that Death has summoned him to stand before God, Fellowship abandons him. Kindred and Cousin, two characters that represent family relationships, make similar promises.
One of the funniest moments in the play is when Cousin refuses to go by claiming he has a cramp in his toe. After getting rejected by fellow humans, Everyman turns his hopes to inanimate objects.
Everyman pleads for Goods to assist him in his hour of need, but they offer no comfort. Not wanting to visit God and subsequently be sent to hell , Goods deserts Everyman. Finally, Everyman meets a character who will genuinely care for his plight. Good-Deeds is a character who symbolizes the acts of charity and kindness performed by Everyman. Good-Deeds introduces Everyman to her sister, Knowledge. This is another friendly character who will provide good advice to the protagonist.
Module 4: Everyman. Search for:. Licenses and Attributions. See also Clark, Dance of Death , pp. Pauls Cathedral in London , pp. Warren, p. This illustration shows Death with a spear about to stab a young man who has thrown up his hands in terror; see Elckerlijc , ed. Logeman, p. See also our note to Everyman , line 76, below. Hitchcock, p.
Whiting, p. For a listing of some other Western versions of the parable, see Barlam and Iosaphat , ed. Hirsch, p. Hirsh, pp. Herrtage, pp. Ross, pp. Shoukri, pl. But, as noted above, the woodcut on the title page of the Vorsterman edition of Elkerlijc holds a spear with which he is about to kill the protagonist.
Walsh Editor , Ton J. Broos Editor. Everyman has been frequently anthologized and is generally represented as the best and most original example of the English morality play. It could, of course, have been staged, though unrecorded, any number of times in the early sixteenth century, and would have been ideal for presentation as a school play.
Very possibly other editions, now lost, were originally printed. Everyman would have been quite consistent with the taste of the time for treatises on dying and on the spiritual life and hence would have served well as reading matter catering to the interests of the public both on the Continent and in early sixteenth-century English.
The originality of Everyman is a matter to be set straight. The play certainly possesses originality in concept and execution, but not as entirely an English work. This even led the Dutch scholar R.
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