Theatre History Overview - Part 62 - The Beginnings of Melodrama

The beginnings of melodrama started with August Friedrich von Kotzebue . He was born in the Weimar, Germany, but in 1783, he entered the Russian diplomatic service in St. Petersburg. He eventually worked as the director of the German theatre in St. Petersburg after doing stints as a resident dramatist in Vienna and Weimar.

Melodrama has very clear good characters and bad characters. Good always eventually triumphs over evil. Kotzebue wrote over 200 plays in different forms. He is known as the first person to develop melodrama. These plays came from developing sentimental comedies.

Kotzebue had play and novels that were read widely. Melodrama was easy to spread because of this. Thirty-six of his plays were translated into English. Even though Kotzebue died in 1819, his plays stayed as strong vehicles for theatre throughout the 19th century.

If you enjoy my content, please consider becoming one one of my patrons through Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/TheatreGeek where I will be sharing more in depth content, answering your questions, sharing which types of software I use and how to find them, and more. By becoming my patron, you allow me to create more content about theatre and more theatrical content.