dumb show
Wordless theatrical performance
Dumb show is pantomime—dramatic action performed without speech.
The term comes from theater, where a dumb show might precede or accompany a spoken play, conveying plot through gesture alone: The actors performed a dumb show of the murder before the dialogue began.
More broadly, any exaggerated silent gesturing: He went through an elaborate dumb show of apology across the crowded room.
Wordless expressive performer
- charadeAbsurd or obvious pretense
- tableauStriking pictorial arrangement
- gesturesExpressive body movements
- wordlessLacking spoken content
miming · body language · physical theater · gestural · nonverbal · enactment · mimicry · acting out
Introductory literary section
- interludePause between sections
- masqueCourtly theatrical entertainment
- HamletDanish prince's revenge tragedy
- ElizabethanOf late 1500s England
Jacobean · foreshadowing · stage direction · dramaturgy · proscenium · tragedy · allegory · symbolism
Silent-era film comedian
- KeatonHollywood surname, multiple stars
- intertitlesText frames in silent films
- slapstickExaggerated physical humor
- physical comedyHumor from bodily mishaps
mugging · melodrama · visual storytelling · black and white · accompaniment · cinema · pantomimist · silent era
mime
Wordless expressive performer
- charadeAbsurd or obvious pretense
- tableauStriking pictorial arrangement
- gesturesExpressive body movements
wordless · miming · body language · physical theater · gestural · nonverbal · enactment · mimicry · acting out · voiceless
prologue
Introductory literary section
- interludePause between sections
- masqueCourtly theatrical entertainment
- HamletDanish prince's revenge tragedy
Elizabethan · Jacobean · foreshadowing · stage direction · dramaturgy · proscenium · tragedy · allegory · symbolism · exposition
Chaplin
Silent-era film comedian
- KeatonHollywood surname, multiple stars
- intertitlesText frames in silent films
- slapstickExaggerated physical humor
physical comedy · mugging · melodrama · visual storytelling · black and white · accompaniment · cinema · pantomimist · silent era · vaudeville
- Early TheaterShakespeare, Elizabethan theatre, Globe Theatre, Marlowe, morality plays
- Elizabethan theaterBlackfriars, Globe Theatre, groundlings, heavens, trap door
- mock performancesparody song, mockumentary, mock trial, mock debate, mock battle
- stage interludesintermission, entr'acte, intermezzo, musical interlude, act break
- medieval theatermystery play, mystery plays, morality play, morality plays, passion play
dumb showmonologue
Uninterrupted solo address
soliloquy · oration · declamation · speech · dialogue
dumb showtalkie
Film with audio
opera · musical theatre · radio play · dramatic reading · recitative
dumb, show, dumber, dumbest, dumbly, dumbness, dumbbell, shows, showed