3,335 articles
Nikolai Erdman
Nikolai Erdman (Николай Эрдман, 1900–1970) was a Soviet playwright and screenwriter from Moscow whose comedy The Suicide was banned and ended his career as a dramatist.
Nina Conti
Nina Conti (Nina Margarita Conti) is a British ventriloquist, comedian, actress and director, daughter of Tom Conti, known for her puppet Monkey, her mask act turning audience members into dummies, the documentary Her Master's Voice, and shows including In Your Face and Whose Face Is It Anyway?.
Nish Kumar
Nish Kumar, British stand-up comedian and satirist from Croydon, host of BBC Two's The Mash Report (2017-2020) and Newsjack, known for left-wing political comedy, Edinburgh shows, and the 2019 bread-throwing incident.
No Exit
No Exit (Huis clos) is a 1944 one-act play by Jean-Paul Sartre in which three dead characters torment each other in a room in hell.
No soap, radio
"No soap, radio" is the punchline of a conformist anti-humor prank: confederates laugh at a meaningless joke about bathing animals, pressuring a victim to fake understanding. Also the name of a 1982 ABC sitcom.
No Sugar
No Sugar is a 1985 play by the Noongar Australian playwright Jack Davis, depicting an Aboriginal family's resistance to government "protection" policies in Western Australia from 1929 to 1934.
Noël Coward
Sir Noël Peirce Coward (1899–1973) was an English playwright, actor, composer, and director who wrote more than 50 plays, including Private Lives and Blithe Spirit, and was knighted in 1970.
Noël Coward Theatre
The Noël Coward Theatre, formerly the New Theatre and Albery Theatre, is a Grade II listed West End theatre at 85-88 St Martin's Lane, London, opened 1903, seating about 872-877, owned by Delfont Mackintosh.
Noel Fielding
Noel Fielding (born 1973, London) is an English comedian, artist, and TV host, co-creator with Julian Barratt of The Mighty Boosh, creator of Noel Fielding's Luxury Comedy, and co-host of The Great British Bake Off since 2017.
Noh (能)
Noh (能), with Kyogen part of Nohgaku, is Japan's classical masked musical dance-drama, developed by Kan'ami and Zeami in the 14th–15th centuries from 8th-century Chinese-derived sarugaku, codified under the Edo shogunate with about 250 standard plays, and UNESCO-listed since 2001.
Noises Off
Noises Off is Michael Frayn's 1982 three-act backstage farce, first staged at the Lyric Theatre Hammersmith, in which a touring company's production of Nothing On collapses across three acts; Olivier Award winner, major Broadway revivals in 2001 and 2016.
Norbert Leo Butz
Norbert Leo Butz (born 1967, St. Louis) is an American stage and screen actor, two-time Tony winner for Best Actor in a Musical (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Catch Me If You Can), original Fiyero in Wicked, and current Hermes in Hadestown on Broadway.
Nordic theatre traditions
Nordic theater traditions are the theatrical cultures of Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Finland, shaped by royal and national theaters and the breakthrough of Ibsen and Strindberg.
Norm Lewis
Norm Lewis (born 1963), American baritone actor-singer from Eatonville, Florida; Broadway debut in The Who's Tommy (1993), Tony-nominated Porgy (2012), and first African-American Phantom of the Opera on Broadway (2014-15).
Norm Macdonald
Norm Macdonald (1959–2021), Canadian stand-up comedian and SNL "Weekend Update" anchor, fired over O.J. Simpson jokes; known for deadpan delivery, the moth joke, Dirty Work, and Norm Macdonald Live.
Norman Lovett
Norman Lovett, English stand-up comedian and actor known as Holly, the ship's computer in BBC2's Red Dwarf (series 1-2, 7-8, 2020); also starred in I, Lovett; deadpan alternative comedy pioneer.
North African playwrights
North African playwrights work in traditions shaped by Amazigh and Arabo-Islamic heritage, including Tawfiq al-Hakim, often called the founder of Arabic drama, and Algeria's Brecht-influenced Kateb Yacine.
Norwegian Ibsen Prize
The Norwegian Ibsen Prize, also called Ibsenprisen, is an annual prize awarded by Skien Municipality to a Norwegian writer for a new staged play or a collected dramatic body of work, first awarded in 1986.
Noye's Fludde
Noye's Fludde is a one-act community opera by Benjamin Britten, setting the medieval Chester Miracle Play of Noah's flood, first performed at Orford Church in 1958.
Nritya-natya
Nritya-natya (নৃত্যনাট্য, dance-drama) is a Bengali theatrical genre conveying complete stories through dance with song and music, introduced by Rabindranath Thakur, whose chief works are Chitrangada, Chandalika, and Shyama.
Nukkad Natak
Nukkad Natak (नुक्कड़ नाटक), Hindi for street play, is Indian street theater performed at street corners and marketplaces without stage, curtain, or paying audience, carrying social and political messages.
Nuyorican Poets Café
The Nuyorican Poets Café is a nonprofit performance venue on Manhattan's Lower East Side, founded in 1973 and known for pioneering poetry slam in New York.
O (Cirque du Soleil)
O by Cirque du Soleil ("O" at Bellagio) is a permanent aquatic circus show in Las Vegas, premiered October 19, 1998, directed by Franco Dragone, on a 1.5-million-gallon pool stage with hydraulic lifts; its 25th anniversary fell in October 2023.
O Beijo no Asfalto
O Beijo no Asfalto is a three-act play by Nelson Rodrigues, written in 1960 and first staged in 1961 as one of his Rio tragedies.
O Juiz de Paz na Roça
O Juiz de Paz na Roça is an 1838 one-act comedy by Luís Carlos Martins Pena, considered the first comedy of customs in Brazilian theater.
O Noviço
O Noviço is an 1845 three-act comedy by Brazilian playwright Martins Pena about a bigamist who hides his wife's heirs in a convent to keep their inheritance.
O Pagador de Promessas
O Pagador de Promessas is a 1960 play in three acts by the Brazilian dramatist Dias Gomes about a poor backlands farmer whose religious vow is blocked by the Catholic Church.
O Rei da Vela
O Rei da Vela (The Candle King) is a three-act play by Brazilian modernist Oswald de Andrade, written in 1933, that satirizes usury and Brazil's dependence on American imperialism.
Oberammergau Passion Play
The Oberammergau Passion Play (Oberammergauer Passionsspiel) is a Passion play performed by residents of Oberammergau, Bavaria, roughly every ten years since 1634 under a plague vow.
Observational comedy
Observational comedy, also called observational humor, is a stand-up style built on everyday-life absurdities. Pioneered by David Brenner, popularized by Cosby, Carlin, and Jerry Seinfeld, and adapted to TV in Seinfeld.