All the playhouses of the Bankside from the "Curtain" to the "Globe" were square or circular places with galleries rising above one another three parts round, a floor space of beaten earth open to the sky in the middle, and jutting out on to it a platform stage with a tiring room capped by a gallery behind it.
The entertainment given by these companies of players (who usually got the patronage and took the title of some lord) was various.

They played moralities and interludes, they played formless chronicle history plays like the _Troublesome Reign of King John_, on which Shakespeare worked for his _King John_; but above and before all they were each a company of specialists, every one of whom had his own talent and performance for which he was admired.

The Elizabethan stage was the ancestor of our music-hall, and to the modern music-hall rather than to the theatre it bears its affinity.

If you wish to realize the aspect of the Globe or the Blackfriars it is to a lower class music-hall you must go.

The quality of the audience is a point of agreement.