Intheater, abreeches role orbreeches part (alsopants role,pants part,trouser role,trouser part, andHosenrolle) is a role in which a femaleactor performs in male clothing.Breeches, tight-fitting knee-length pants, were a standard male garment when these roles were introduced.[citation needed] The theatrical termtravesti covers both this sort ofcross-dressing and also male actors dressing as female characters. Both are part of the long history ofcross-dressing in music and opera and laterin film and television.
Inopera, a breeches role refers to any male character that is sung and acted by a female singer. Most often the character is an adolescent or a very young man, sung by amezzo-soprano orcontralto.[1] The operatic concept assumes that the character is male, and the audience accepts him as such, even knowing that the actor is not. Cross-dressing female characters (e.g., Leonore inFidelio or Gilda in Act III ofRigoletto) are not considered breeches roles. The most frequently performed breeches roles are Cherubino (The Marriage of Figaro), Octavian (Der Rosenkavalier), Hansel (Hansel und Gretel) and Orpheus (Orpheus and Euridice), though the latter was originally written for a male singer, first acastrato and later, in the revised French version, anhaute-contre.[citation needed]
Because non-musical stage plays generally have no requirements for vocal range, they do not usually contain breeches roles in the same sense as opera. Some plays do have male roles that were written for adult female actors, and (for other practical reasons) are usually played by women (e.g.,Peter Pan); these could be considered modern-era breeches roles. However, in most cases, the choice of a female actor to play a male character is made at the production level;Hamlet is not a breeches role, butSarah Bernhardt once played Hamlet as a breeches role. When a play is spoken of as "containing" a breeches role, thisdoes mean a role where a female character pretends to be a man and uses male clothing as a disguise.[citation needed]
When the London theatres re-opened in theStuart Restoration of 1660, the first professional actresses appeared on the public stage, replacing the boys in dresses of theShakespeare era. To see real women speak therisqué dialogue ofRestoration comedy and show off their bodies on stage was a great novelty, and soon the even greater sensation was introduced of women wearing male clothes on stage. Out of some 375 plays produced on the London stage between 1660 and 1700, it has been calculated that 89, nearly a quarter, contained one or more roles for actresses in male clothes (see Howe). Practically every Restoration actress appeared in trousers at some time, and breeches roles would even be inserted gratuitously in revivals of older plays.
Some critics, such as Jacqueline Pearson, have argued that thesecross-dressing roles subvert conventionalgender roles by allowing women to imitate the roistering and sexually aggressive behaviour of male Restorationrakes, but Elizabeth Howe has objected in a detailed study that the male disguise was "little more than yet another means of displaying the actress as a sexual object". The epilogue toThomas Southerne'sSir Anthony Love (1690) suggests that it does not much matter if the play is dull, as long as the audience can glimpse the legs of the famous "breeches" actressSusanna Mountfort (also known as Susanna Verbruggen):
You'll hear with Patience a dull Scene, to see,
In a contented lazy waggery,
The Female Mountford bare above the knee.
Katharine Eisaman Maus also argues that as well as revealing the female legs and buttocks, the breeches role frequently contained a revelation scene where the character not only unpins her hair but as often reveals a breast as well. This is evidenced in the portraits of many of these actresses of the Restoration.
Breeches roles remained an attraction on the British stage for centuries, but their fascination gradually declined as the difference in real-life male and female clothing became less extreme. They played a part inVictorian burlesque and are traditional for theprincipal boy inpantomime.
Historically, the list of roles that are considered to be breeches roles is constantly changing, depending on the tastes of the opera-going public. In early Italian opera, many leading operatic roles were assigned to acastrato, a male castrated before puberty with a very strong and high voice. As the practice of castrating boy singers faded, composers created heroic male roles in the mezzo-soprano range, where singers such asMarietta Alboni and Rosamunda Pisaroni specialised in such roles.[1] (SeeXerxes below.)
As the training and use ofcountertenors becomes more common, there are more men available to sing these roles.
Casting directors are left with choices such as whether to cast the young Prince Orlofsky inJohann Strauss II'sDie Fledermaus for a woman or man; both commonly sing the role. When played by a mezzo, the prince looks like a woman, but sounds like a boy. When played by a counter-tenor, he looks like a man, but sings like a woman. This disparity is made even clearer if, as in this case, there is also spoken dialogue.
The termtravesty (from the Frenchtravesti, disguised) applies to any roles sung by the opposite sex.[2]
A closely related term is askirt role, a female character to be played by a male singer, usually for comic or visual effect. These roles are often ugly stepsisters or very old women, and are not as common as trouser roles. As women were not allowed to sing on stage in thePapal States until the end of the 18th century,[3] although not elsewhere in Europe,[4] many female operatic roles which premiered in the Papal States were originally written as skirt roles for castrati (e.g. Mandane and Semira inLeonardo Vinci'sArtaserse). The Madwoman in Britten'sCurlew River and the Cook in Prokofiev'sThe Love for Three Oranges are later examples. The role of the witch in Humperdinck'sHänsel und Gretel, although written for a mezzo-soprano, is now more regularly[citation needed] sung by a tenor, who sings the part an octave lower. In the same opera the "male" roles of Hänsel, the Sandman, and the Dewman are however meant to be sung by women.
Händel'sAlcina: "Ruggiero" is sung by a mezzo-soprano
Händel'sAriodante: The role of "Ariodante" was premiered by a soprano-castrato and is performed today by a mezzo-soprano; "Lurcanio" was originally written for contralto, but later rewritten by Handel for tenor.[5] In modern performances it is generally left to the director to decide whether to use contralto (or countertenor) or a lyric tenor.
Händel'sGiulio Cesare: "Julius Caesar" was originally written for an alto-castrato and is today sung by a mezzo-soprano or countertenor; "Sesto" is sung by a soprano
Händel'sRinaldo: the title role "Rinaldo", sung at its premiere by a castrato, is currently sung by a mezzo-soprano or a countertenor
Händel'sXerxes: the title role "Xerxes", sung at its premiere by acastrato, is currently sung by a mezzo-soprano or a countertenor
Haydn'sLa canterina: The role of "Don Ettore" is sung by a soprano and the role of "Apollonia" is sung by a tenor
Haydn'sLo speziale: The role of "Volpino" is sung by a soprano
Mozart'sLa clemenza di Tito: "Annio" is sung by soprano; "Sesto" was originally written for a castrato and is performed today by a mezzo-soprano[6]
Mozart'sIdomeneo: "Idamante" is sung by a mezzo-soprano
Mozart'sIl re pastore: "Aminta" was originally written for soprano-castrato, and in modern performances is sung by a lyric soprano
Mozart'sLucio Silla: "Cecilio" and "Lucio Cinna" are sung by sopranos
Mozart'sAscanio in Alba: "Ascanio" and "Fauno" are sung by sopranos
Mozart'sMitridate, re di Ponto: "Farnace" is sung by a mezzo-soprano or contralto, and "Sifare" and "Arbate" are sung by sopranos. However, "Farnace" is commonly done by a countertenor.
Offenbach'sMesdames de la Halle:Croûte-au-pot (the kitchen boy) is sung by a soprano;Madame Poiretapée, Madame Madou, and Madame Beurrefondu are sung by a tenor and two baritones
^The ban on women performing on stage was imposed byPope Sixtus V in 1588. It was never legally enforceable in the Legations (Bologna,Ferrara and theRomagna) and was occasionally disapplied in Rome too, in particular from 1667 to 1669 (during the papacy of erstwhile librettistClement IX), at the instigation ofQueen Christina of Sweden, who was a fan of opera (Celletti, Rodolfo (2000).La grana della voce. Opere, direttori e cantanti (2nd edition). Rome: Baldini & Castoldi; chapter: "Nella Roma del Seicento", p by. 37 ff(in Italian)ISBN88-80-89-781-0). The ban remained in force until 1798 when the French invaded Rome and aRoman Republic was proclaimed (Kantner, Leopold M, and Pachovsky, Angela (1998).6: La Cappella musicale Pontificia nell'Ottocento. Rome: Hortus Musicus; p. 24(in Italian)ISBN8888470247).
^Women were banned fromLisbon's stages too for several decades in the second half of the 18th century. The prohibition, however, was not generally observed throughout thePortuguese Empire — not even inPorto and occasionally in Lisbon itself (Rogério Budasz (2019).Opera in the Tropics. Music and Theater in Early Modern Brazil. New York: Oxford University Press; p. 238.ISBN978-0-19-021582-8)
Howe, Elizabeth (1992).The First English Actresses: Women and Drama 1660–1700. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Maus, Katharine Eisaman (1979)."'Playhouse Flesh and Blood': Sexual Ideology and the Restoration Actress". New York: Harcourt Brace Anthology of Drama (1996).
Pearson, Jacqueline (1988).The Prostituted Muse: Images of Women and Women Dramatists 1642–1737. New York: St. Martin's Press.
