There Wasn't Always Electrical Lighting in Theatre Plays?

When at Broadway and seeing a show one rarely thinks about how all this technical ability has changed the nature of theatre. Electrical lighting is used at just about every operating theatre - but what was it like before this lighting came about? And How has it changed theatre?

Greek and Romans did their plays outside and they would pace the play with the sun to provide lighting. Sometimes they would use mirrors and things to reflect light and even lit torches.

By about the 15^th century the Oil lamp came about and it made indoor theatres possible.
By the 19^th century there came about gas lights.
Both Oil and Gas lamps caused many theatres to burn down; Shakespeare's globe theatre burned down in this type of scenario.
By late 19^th century electricity had begun to make it's way into theatres and thus began the craft of the lighting designer, a previously unnecessary position due to the limited possibilities of the prior non-electric lighting.

The lighting designer is usually the last person to get to work in the pre-production phase of plays. They have to wait till everything from costumes to scenery to venue is already set in stone. This is because lighting must meet the practical demands of the other artists.
The lighting designer will prepare a lighting plot which is basically the blueprints for where the instruments are to be hung, and in what direction at what angle.
Then, the designer will hang and focus the lights (usually with electricians help), set levels and cues. They work with closely with the Technical Director (TD). The TD is the person in charge of all the physical elements of the work.

Modern Lighting design is about three main points: visibility, focus, atmosphere (mood).

Lighting design is a fairly new thing; seeing as how electricity was nonexistent for human purposes for the majority of existence. It first came about, obviously, to provide visibility and dramatic effect. With the evolution of play genres has come realism; realism really caused the surge of innovation and possibility that enabled for the possibilities of electrical lighting are known and used.

Color
The colors of lights are determined by things called "gels". It is a sheet of transparent plastic colored a certain way. The original way to color lights was with panels of colored gels. These gels however would fade and lose its color much quicker then the current day plastics do.

Modeling
The term modeling refers to the angle that the light hits the target at. This varies greatly from play to play based on theme, type of stage, dramatic effect wanted, and many other factors.

Intensity
Intensity is a key factor used in determining brightness and desired dramatic effect of lights.

Shape
Sometimes a lighting designer will feel that they want the colored light to be in certain forms; like leaves for example. Well, than they will place a "leaves" cutout, called a "Gobos", over the light.