A dramatic performance; also, a dramatic composition adapted for representation on the stage. (Cf. PLAY sb. 15.)
1513. More, Rich. III. (1883), 79. And in a stage play all the people know right wel that he that playeth the sowdayne, is percase a sowter.
1605–6. Act 3 Jas. I, c. 21. For the preventing and avoyding of the greate Abuse of the Holy Name of God in Stageplayes … and such like.
1693. Dryden, Juvenal (1697), Ded. 79. Stage-Plays, which are all of one Action, and one continu’d Series of Action.
1843. Act 6 & 7 Vict., c. 68 § 23. The Word ‘Stage-Play’ shall be taken to include every Tragedy, Comedy, Farce, Opera, Burletta, Interlude, Melodrama, Pantomime, or other Entertainment of the Stage, or any part thereof.
b. Dramatic acting, play-acting.
1872. Morley, Voltaire (1886), 9. The contest was real, and not our present pantomimic stage-play.
c. attrib.
1819. Keats, Otho, I. ii. I do not personate The stage-play emperor to entrap applause.
1908. Stage Year Bk., 26. Many provincial theatres also have … a stage play licence and a music and dancing licence.
