The volume analyzes staging practices at court and in public and private theatres during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, tracing the development of scenery, stage machinery, audience arrangements, and managerial technique. It compares continental precedents in perspective and decoration with English practice, weighs internal stage-directions against external records to reconstruct probable arrangements, and distinguishes courtly presentations from regular theatrical production. The work concludes with chapters on the printing of plays and on playwrights, and is accompanied by diagrams, illustrations, bibliographical notes, and appendices that assemble documentary evidence and critical references.