Theatre facts

Shakespeare's characters. William Herschel, Englishman, discoverer of Uranus and its major moons, was very patriotic for naming. He originally named Uranus as "George Star" to honour king of England, but the name was changed later.

He never shows up. In Waiting for Godot, two characters, Vladimir and Estragon, wait endlessly and in vain for the arrival of someone named Godot.

Kabuki actor. Rice powder is used to create the white base for the characteristic stage makeup called kumadori. The red color of the kumadori indicates positive traits; blue or black, villainy; green, the supernatural; and purple, nobility.

Men only. Kabuki was born in 1603 as ensemble dance and drama performed by women. Soon it was called called prostitute-singing and dancing. Eventually, women's Kabuki was banned in 1629 for being too erotic, and Kabuki switched to adult male actors.

Chambermaid. In theatre, a soubrette is a comedy character who is vain and girlish, mischievous, lighthearted, coquettish and gossipy - often a chambermaid or confidante of the ingenue, she often displays a flirtatious or even sexually aggressive nature.

Richard Burbage was a lead actor of The Lord Chamberlain's Men, a playing company for whom William Shakespeare wrote for most of his career. He played most of the lead roles, including Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, and Macbeth.

Thalia was the Muse who presided over comedy and idyllic poetry. She was portrayed as a young woman with a joyous air, crowned with ivy, wearing boots and holding a comic mask in her hand. Many of her statues also hold a bugle and a trumpet (both used to support the actors' voices in ancient comedy), or occasionally a shepherd’s staff or a wreath of ivy.

Sophocles. Oedipus Rex, also known by its Greek title, Oedipus Tyrannus, or Oedipus the King, is an Athenian tragedy by Sophocles that was first performed around 429 BC. Originally, to the ancient Greeks, the title was simply Oedipus (Οἰδίπους), as it is referred to by Aristotle in the Poetics. It is thought to have been renamed Oedipus Tyrannus to distinguish it from another of Sophocles' plays, Oedipus at Colonus.