For special entrences.
In the Globe Theatre, trap doors were used to create dramatic effects and enhance performances. Located on the stage and the ceiling, these doors allowed actors to enter or exit quickly, representing supernatural elements or characters emerging from the underworld. The trap doors were operated manually, enabling smooth transitions during scenes. This innovative design contributed to the dynamic atmosphere of the plays performed there.
Many trap doors and pulley systems were at use but nothing special in our day, but what made it impressive was how it was used back then.
The mechanical devices used in the Globe Theatre were things like trap doors and things that made people flying or made them come up from under the ground like hanging wires.
Trap doors, wires that made people "fly", platforms that made people come from "underground" etc.
Shakespeare's Globe, a modern theatre built in 1997, is a replica of the Globe Playhouse, an Elizabethan theatre built by Richard and Cuthbert Burbage and the carpenter Peter Street in 1599. Like it, and like all theatres of that time and most nowadays, there is a trapdoor in the stage. This enables actors to suddenly appear or disappear from below (as the witches do in Macbeth) in a puff of smoke. It also could be used to represent a hole in the ground, like Ophelia's grave in Hamlet, or the mine being dug under the walls of Harfleur in Henry V.
the Globe Theatre.
The Globe Theatre was used for acting out and making people watch plays.
Side entrances led to towers where the audience could climb stairs to the second and third story seats.
The Globe Theatre
Theatre.
Cont
Natural Lighting - the original Globe theatre was an open air amphitheater.