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Difficulty:
55%
(hard)
Question Stats:
66% (02:08) correct
34%
(02:25)
wrong
based on 11646
sessions
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Theater Critic: The play La Finestrina, now at Central Theater, was written in Italy in the eighteenth century. The director claims that this production is as similar to the original production as is possible in a modern theater. Although the actor who plays Harlequin the clown gives a performance very reminiscent of the twentieth-century American comedian Groucho Marx, Marx’s comic style was very much within the comic acting tradition that had begun in sixteenth-century Italy.
The considerations given best serve as part of an argument that
(A) modern audiences would find it hard to tolerate certain characteristics of a historically accurate performance of an eighteenth-century play
(B) Groucho Marx once performed the part of the character Harlequin in La Finestrina
(C) in the United States the training of actors in the twentieth century is based on principles that do not differ radically from those that underlay the training of actors in eighteenth-century Italy
(D) the performance of the actor who plays Harlequin in La Finestrina does not serve as evidence against the director’s claim
(E) the director of La Finestrina must have advised the actor who plays Harlequin to model his performance on comic performances of Groucho Marx
The considerations given best serve as part of an argument that
(A) modern audiences would find it hard to tolerate certain characteristics of a historically accurate performance of an eighteenth-century play
(B) Groucho Marx once performed the part of the character Harlequin in La Finestrina
(C) in the United States the training of actors in the twentieth century is based on principles that do not differ radically from those that underlay the training of actors in eighteenth-century Italy
(D) the performance of the actor who plays Harlequin in La Finestrina does not serve as evidence against the director’s claim
(E) the director of La Finestrina must have advised the actor who plays Harlequin to model his performance on comic performances of Groucho Marx
24 Aug 2021, 00:25
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getmba
Solution
Passage Analysis
Theater Critic: The play La Finestrina, now at Central Theater,
A theater critic says that the play La Finestrina, which is currently playing at Central Theater,
was written in Italy in the eighteenth century.
Was originally written in the 18th century in Italy.
The director claims that this production
The director of the play La Finestrina says that his theatrical production
is as similar to the original production as is possible in a modern theater.
Is as similar to the original written play as is possible to produce a written play in the modern theater.
Although the actor who plays Harlequin the clown
In spite of the fact that, the actor who plays the role of Harlequin, the clown
gives a performance very reminiscent of the twentieth-century American comedian Groucho Marx,
gives a performance that reminds one of the performance of the twentieth-century American comedian Groucho Marx,
Marx’s comic style was very much within the comic acting tradition that had begun in sixteenth-century Italy.
Marx himself displayed a comic style that was in keeping with the comic acting style that had begun in 16th century Italy.
Gist of the passage
- The play La Finestrina was originally written in the 18th century in Italy
- A theater critic talks about a director who has produced a theatrical presentation of the same play and it is now playing in Central Theater.
- This director claims that he has kept his theatrical production of the play as similar to the written version as it is possible to, when one is adapting a written play to modern-theater production
- The play has a character called Harlequin, the clown.
- The theater critic comments that the actor who enacts the role of Harlequin gives a performance that reminds one of the 20th century American comedian, Groucho Marx.
- Though Marx was a 20th century actor, his comic style was very much in keeping with the comic acting style that had begun in the 16th century.
- We can infer here that the actor who played Harlequin in the modern production actually used a comic style that had begun in the 16th century and was also used by Groucho in the 20th century.
Question stem analysis
The considerations given best serve as part of an argument that
The information given in the passage acts as the strongest logical support to which of the following options?
Answer Choice Analysis
A
Understand the choice
The option talks about the reaction of the modern audiences viewing the modern production of a play written in the 18th century. It says that the audience would not find it easy to bear certain characteristics of the older century play.
Analyze in the context of the passage and the question stem
The passage talks about director's claim that in his theater production of the play he had adhered to the original play as much as was possible to when adapting a written play to a theater. Does the passage imply that the modern play was an absolutely accurate performance of an 18th-century play? No.
The critic commented that the performance of an actor in the theatrical production reminded one of another comedian of the 20th century who had followed a 16th-century comic acting style. But does the critic talk at all about the reaction of the audience? No.
Therefore, no comment can be made about the tolerance level of the audience.
Hence this is not the correct answer.
B
Understand the choice
As per this option, Groucho Marx had earlier played the role of the character Harlequin in La Finestrina
Analyze in the context of the passage and the question stem
The passage only talks about the comic acting style of Groucho Marx who acted in the 20th century. He followed a style of comic acting that had begun in the 16th century. And the passage tells us that the actor who played the role of harlequin in the theater production of the play La Finestrina performed in such a way that he reminded one of Marx. But whether Marx had ever played that same part earlier or not cannot be concluded. Here we can infer that the style of the two actors might have been quite similar, but we cannot comment the same about the role played by the two.
Hence this is not the correct option.
C
Understand the choice
This choice states that in the 20th century the actors in the U.S. were trained on the basis of principles that were not much different from the principles that lay behind the training of actors in 18th century Italy.
Analyze in the context of the passage and the question stem
The option means that actors in 18th century Italy and actors in the 20th century U.S. were both trained along the lines of similar principles of acting. The passage talks about Groucho, one comedian, who followed the comic style of acting that had begun in the 16th century. Whether he was trained or not, do we know? No. Was the comic acting style that had begun in the 16th century still followed in the 18th century or the 20th century? We don’t really know except for Marx. One case cannot be representative of the general.
Hence, this is not the correct option.
D
Understand the choice
The performance of the actor who plays Harlequin in the theater production “La Finestrina”, does not contradict the claim made by the director of the play.
Analyze in the context of the passage and the question stem
The critic commented that the performance of the actor who played Harlequin in the theatrical production reminded one of another comedian of the 20th century who had followed a 16th-century comic acting style. The director too claims to have adhered to the original 18th-century production as much as was possible. We, therefore, know that both the director and the actor followed the styles of an earlier period, and we can thus infer that some of the period and the prevalent style may have been common to both.
Thus, we can say that the actor’s performance was not going against what the director had claimed. Rather it was in keeping with the claim.
Hence, this is the correct option.
E
Understand the choice
The director of the play La Finestrina must have told the actor who played the part of harlequin to follow the comic style Groucho Marx.
Analyze in the context of the passage and the question stem
The director of the play wanted to keep his production as similar as possible to the original earlier version. He may have advised his actors to follow a certain school of acting or he may not. He may have told his actor playing Harlequin to follow Marx or he may not. Can we say this for sure? No. Marx might have been that actor’s role model and so he followed Marx…we don’t really know.
Hence, this is not the right answer choice.
25 Dec 2012, 23:50
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nelz007
Responding to a pm:
It is an inference/conclusion question.
Question stem: The considerations given best serve as part of an argument that
What this means: The given argument supports the argument that ... i.e. the information given to us will best be a part of which of the following arguments? i.e. what is the author trying to say by giving you this information?
