There is no fourth wall in popular performance. The show is firmly rooted in the here and now, and the performers address the audience directly, while the audience answer back with laughter, applause or heckling. Performer and role are interlaced, so that we are left uncertain about just how the persona we see onstage might relate to the private person who presents it to us.

Popular Performance defines and surveys varieties of performance where the main purpose is to entertain, and where there is no shame in being trivial, frivolous or nonsensical as long as people go home...