Thefourth wall is a performanceconvention in which an invisible, imaginary wall separates actors from the audience. While the audience can see through this "wall", the convention assumes the actors act as if they cannot. From the 16th century onward, the rise ofillusionism in staging practices, which culminated in therealism andnaturalism of thetheatre of the 19th century, led to the development of the fourth wall concept.[1][2]
Themetaphor suggests a relationship to themise-en-scène behind aproscenium arch. When a scene is set indoors and three of the walls of its room are presented onstage, in what is known as abox set, the fourth of them would run along the line (technically called theproscenium) dividing the room from theauditorium. Thefourth wall, though, is a theatrical convention, rather than ofset design. The actors ignore the audience, focus their attention exclusively on the dramatic world, and remain absorbed in its fiction, in a state that the theatre practitionerKonstantin Stanislavski called "public solitude"[3] (the ability to behave as one would in private, despite, in actuality, being watched intently while so doing, or to be "alone in public"). In this way, the fourth wall exists regardless of the presence of any actual walls in the set, the physical arrangement of thetheatre building or performance space, or the actors' distance from or proximity to the audience.[citation needed] In practice, performers often feed off the energy of the audience in a palpable way while modulating performance around the collective response, especially in pacing action around outbursts of laughter, so that lines are not delivered inaudibly.
Breaking the fourth wall is violating this performance convention, which has been adopted more generally in the drama. This can be done by either directly referring to the audience, to the play as a play, or the characters' fictionality. The temporary suspension of the convention in this way draws attention to its use in the rest of the performance. This act of drawing attention to a play's performance conventions ismetatheatrical. A similar effect ofmetareference is achieved when the performance convention of avoiding direct contact with the camera, generally used by actors in a television drama or film, is temporarily suspended. The phrase "breaking the fourth wall" is used to describe such effects in those media. Breaking the fourth wall is also possible in other media, such asvideo games andbooks.
The acceptance of the transparency of the fourth wall is part of thesuspension of disbelief between a work of fiction and an audience, allowing them to enjoy the fiction as though they were observing real events.[2] The concept is usually attributed to the philosopher, critic and dramatistDenis Diderot, who wrote in 1758 that actors and writers should "imagine a huge wall across the front of the stage, separating you from the audience, and behave exactly as if the curtain had never risen".[4] CriticVincent Canby described it in 1987 as "that invisible scrim that forever separates the audience from the stage".[5]
Diderot's "un grand mur" became "the fourth wall" toLeigh Hunt when in 1807 referring toMr. Bannister, wrote:
In the late nineteenth century the concept of the fourth wall is also called "fourth wall theory" possibly arising from an article byHenry Irving in February 1879 explaining a stage device used in a production of Hamlet:
The first known use of "fourth wall theory" follows later that month in a comment on that article in the Glasgow Times.[8]
The fourth wall did not exist as a concept for much of dramatic history. Classical plays fromancient Greece to the Renaissance have frequent direct addresses to the audience such asasides andsoliloquies.
The presence of the fourth wall is an established convention of modernrealistic theatre, which has led some artists to draw direct attention to it for dramatic or comic effect when a boundary is "broken" when an actor or character addresses the audience directly.[1][9] Breaking the fourth wall is common inpantomime and children's theatre where, for example, a character might ask the children for help, as whenPeter Pan appeals to the audience to applaud in an effort to revive the fadingTinker Bell ("If you believe in fairies, clap your hands!").
One of the earliest recorded breakings of the fourth wall in serious cinema was inMary MacLane's 1918 silent filmMen Who Have Made Love to Me, in which the enigmatic author – who portrays herself – interrupts the vignettes onscreen to address the audience directly.[10]
Oliver Hardy often broke the fourth wall in his films withStan Laurel, when he would stare directly at the camera to seek sympathy from viewers.Groucho Marx spoke directly to the audience inAnimal Crackers (1930), andHorse Feathers (1932), in the latter film advising them to "go out to the lobby" duringChico Marx's piano interlude. Comedy films byMel Brooks,Monty Python, andZucker, Abrahams, and Zucker frequently broke the fourth wall, such that with these films "the fourth wall is so flimsy and so frequently shattered that it might as well not exist", according toThe A.V. Club.[11]
Woody Allen broke the fourth wall repeatedly in his movieAnnie Hall (1977), as he explained, "because I felt many of the people in the audience had the same feelings and the same problems. I wanted to talk to them directly and confront them."[12] His 1985 filmThe Purple Rose of Cairo features the breaking of the fourth wall as a central plot point.[13]
Jerry Lewis wrote in his 1971 bookThe Total Filmmaker, "Some film-makers believe you should never have an actor look directly into the camera. They maintain it makes the audience uneasy, and interrupts the screen story. I think that is nonsense, and usually I have my actors, in a single, look direct into the camera at least once in a film, if a point is to be served."[14]Martin and Lewis look directly at the audience inYou're Never Too Young (1955), and Lewis and co-starStella Stevens each look directly into the camera several times inThe Nutty Professor (1963), and Lewis' character holds a pantomime conversation with the audience inThe Disorderly Orderly (1964). The final scene ofThe Patsy (1964) is famous for revealing to the audience the movie as a movie, and Lewis as actor/director.[15][16]
The 2022Persuasion film was criticized for its modernization take on the classic 1817Jane Austen novel by having the main protagonistAnne Elliot (played byDakota Johnson) constantly breaking the fourth wall by interacting with the audience.[17]
Select theatrical screenings ofFrancis Ford Coppola's 2024 science fiction epicMegalopolis, including its private industry screenings and world premiere at the2024 Cannes Film Festival, had a person walk on stage in front of the projection screen and address the protagonist, Cesar, who seemingly breaks the fourth wall by replying in real time.[18]
On television, the fourth wall has broken throughout the history of the medium.
Fourth wall breakage is common in comedy, and is used frequently byBugs Bunny and other characters inLooney Tunes and other later animated shows,[19] as well as the live-action 1960s sketch comedy ofMonty Python's Flying Circus, which the troupe also brought to their feature films.[20] George Burns regularly broke the fourth wall onThe George Burns and Gracie Allen Show (1950).[21]
Another convention of breaking the fourth wall is often seen onmockumentary sitcoms, includingThe Office. Mockumentary shows that break the fourth wall poke fun at the documentary genre with the intention of increasing the satiric tone of the show. Characters inThe Office directly speak to the audience during interview sequences. Characters are removed from the rest of the group to speak and reflect on their experiences. The person behind the camera, the interviewer, is also referenced when the characters gaze and speak straight to the camera. The interviewer, however, is only indirectly spoken to and remains hidden. This technique, when used in shows with complex genres, serves to heighten the comic tone of the show while also proving that the camera itself is far from a passive onlooker.[22]
Another approach to breaking the fourth wall is through a centralnarrator character who is part of the show's events, but at times speaks directly to the audience. For example,Francis Urquhart in the British TV drama seriesHouse of Cards,To Play the King andThe Final Cut addresses the audience several times during each episode, giving the viewer comments on his own actions on the show.[23] The same technique is also used, though less frequently, in the American adaptation ofHouse of Cards by main characterFrank Underwood.[24]
TheNetflix seriesA Series of Unfortunate Events, based onDaniel Handler's book seriesof the same name, incorporates some of the narrative elements from the books by having Lemony Snicket as anarrator character (played byPatrick Warburton) speaking directly to the television viewer that frequently breaks the fourth wall to explain various literary wordplay in a manner similar to the book's narration.[25] The protagonist ofFleabag also frequently uses the technique to provide exposition, internal monologues, and a running commentary to the audience.[26]
Every episode of the sitcomSaved by the Bell breaks the fourth wall during the introduction by the characterZack Morris. Most episodes have several other fourth wall breaks. This is similar to howThe Fresh Prince of Bel-Air,Clarissa Explains It All andMalcolm in the Middle use fourth wall breaks to set up stories or have characters comment on situations.[27]Showtime'sShameless has a main character breaking the fourth wall at every episode beginning to deliberately criticize and threaten the viewers to emphasize the morally deficient plots and characters likely in an deliberate attempt to turn away any naïve viewers to maintain the exclusiveness of the series, only to add to its popularity.
Furthermore, breaking the fourth wall can also be used inmeta-referencing in order to draw attention to or invite reflection about a specific in-universe issue. An example of this is in the first episode of the final season of the showAttack on Titan, where a newly introduced character,Falco Grice, starts to hallucinate about events that took place in the last 3 seasons. Thisliterary device utilisesself-referencing to trigger media-awareness in the recipient, used to signpost the drastic shift in perspective from the Eldian to the Marleyan side, and can be employed in all sorts of media.[28]
The use of breaking the fourth wall in television has sometimes been unintentional. In theDoctor Who episode "The Caves of Androzani", the character of Morgus looks directly at the camera when thinking aloud. This was due to actorJohn Normington misunderstanding a stage direction,[29] but the episode's director,Graeme Harper, felt that this helped increase dramatic tension, and decided not to reshoot the scenes.[30]
Interactive children's show characters also commonly break the fourth wall to "help" the audience with the episodes of the shows.
Given their interactive nature, nearly all video games break the fourth wall by asking for the player's participation and havinguser interface elements on the screen (such as explanations of the game's controls) that address the player rather than their character. Methods of fourth wall breaking within the narrative include having the character face the direction of the player/screen, having a self-aware character that recognizes that they are in a video game, or having secret or bonus content set outside the game's narrative that can either extend the game world (such as with the use of false documents) or provide "behind the scenes" type content. Such cases typically create a video game that includes ametafiction narrative, commonly presently characters in the game incorporating knowledge they are in a video game.[31]
For example, inDoki Doki Literature Club!, one of the characters namedMonika is aware that she is a part of a video game, and at the end, communicates with the player. To progress further in the story, the player must remove the “monika.chr” file (an action they take outside of the game).[32] The plot of the gameOneShot revolves around the fictional universe of the game being asimulation running on the player's computer, with certain characters being aware of this fact and sometimes communicating directly with the player.[33] In other cases of metafictional video games, the game alters the player's expectation of how the game should behave, which may make the player question if their own game system is at fault, helping to increase the immersion of the game.[31]
But since video games are inherently much more interactive than traditional films and literature, defining what truly breaks the fourth wall in the video game medium becomes difficult.[34] Steven Conway, writing forGamasutra, suggests that in video games, many purported examples of breaking the fourth wall are actually better understood asrelocations of the fourth wall or expansions of the "magic circle" (the fictional game world) to encompass the player.[34] This is in contrast to traditional fourth wall breaks, which break the audience's illusion orsuspension of disbelief, by acknowledging them directly.[34] Conway argues that this expansion of the magic circle in video games actually serves to more fully immerse a player into the fictional world rather than take the viewer out of the fictional world, as is more common in traditional fourth wall breaks. An example of this expansion of the magic circle can be found in the gameEvidence: The Last Ritual, in which the player receives an in-game email at their real-life email address and must visit out-of-game websites to solve some of the puzzles in the game. Other games may expand the magic circle to include the game's hardware. For example,X-Men for the Mega Drive/Genesis requires players to reset their game console at a certain point to reset the X-Men's in-game Hazard Room, whileMetal Gear Solid asks the player to put theDualShock controller on their neck to simulate a back massage being given in-game.[34]
Other examples include the idle animation ofSonic the Hedgehog in his games where the on-screen character would look to the player and tap his foot impatiently if left alone for a while, and one level ofMax Payne has the eponymous character come to the realization he and other characters are in a video game and narrates what the player sees as part of the UI.[34]Eternal Darkness, which included a sanity meter, would simulate various common computer glitches to the player as the sanity meter drained, including theBlue Screen of Death.[34]The Stanley Parable is also a well-known example of this, as the narrator from the game constantly tries to reason with the player, even going so far as to beg the player to switch off the game at one point.[35]
The method of breaking the fourth wall in literature is ametalepsis (the transgression of narrative levels), which is a technique often used inmetafiction. The metafiction genre occurs when a character within a literary work acknowledges the reality that they are in fact a fictitious being.[36] The use of the fourth wall in literature can be traced back as far asThe Canterbury Tales andDon Quixote.Northanger Abbey is a late modern era example.[37]
It was popularized in the early 20th century during thePost-Modern literary movement.[38] Artists likeVirginia Woolf inTo the Lighthouse andKurt Vonnegut inBreakfast of Champions used the genre to question the accepted knowledge and sources of the culture.[39] The use of metafiction or breaking the fourth wall in literature varies from that on stage in that the experience is not communal but personal to the reader and develops a self-consciousness within the character/reader relationship that works to build trust and expand thought. This does not involve an acknowledgment of a character's fictive nature.[40] Breaking the fourth wall in literature is not always metafiction.
Modern examples of breaking the fourth wall include Ada Palmer'sTerra Ignota,[41] and William Goldman'sThe Princess Bride.[42]Sorj Chalandon wrote a novel called "The 4th wall" of the setting-up of a theatrical performance of Antigone in Beirut, while the civil war is raging.[43]