SOURCE: Scott, Virginia P. “The Jeu and the Rôle: Analysis of the Appeals of the Italian Comedy in France in the Time of Arlequin-Dominique.” In Western Popular Theatre, edited by David Mayer and Kenneth Richards, pp. 1-27. London: Methuen, 1977.

In the following essay, Scott discusses the development of the commedia dell'arte in France, particularly in the late seventeenth century.

Popular entertainments are generally so classified because of their appeal and availability to a large audience drawn from all classes and conditions of society. However, the assertion that the Italian Comedy in Paris in the last half of the seventeenth century was available to all classes cannot be supported. The cheapest place, in the parterre,¹ cost 15 sous,² a day's wages for many artisans in 1688³. Economic necessity dictates that the audience of the Comédie-Italienne was drawn from the middle class and the nobility. Can we then regard this...