Theatre of ancient Greece
In a large open-air theatre, like the Theatre of Dionysus in Athens, the masks brought the characters' face closer to the audience, as they had exaggerated features and expressions. An actor could appear and reappear in different roles, since the audience did not identify the actor with one character. Their variations help the audience to distinguish sex, age, and social status. Also, they could show a change in a character’s appearance, for example, Oedipus after blinding himself.p70 Unique masks were also create characters and events in a play, such as The Furies in Aeschylus’ Eumenides and Pentheus and Cadmus in Euripides’ The Bacchae. Worn by the chorus, the masks created a sense of unity and uniformity, a sort of multi-voiced persona or single organism.