In the period that immediately preceded and in that that followed the French Revolution, the theatre was forced to adapt to the prevailing political ideology. Two distinct currents took shape in the prerevolutionary phase: the first was permeated by individualist tones and expressions that were deeply loved by the German Romantics; the second, on the other hand, was inspired by the so-called republican virtues and resorted to classical themes.    
Jean François Ducis (1733-1816) tried to stand between the two trends. In the years before the Revolution he carried out various adaptations of Shakespeare's works according to the norms of the period: “Hamlet” (1769), “Romeo and Juliet” (1775), “King Lear” (1783), “Macbeth” (1784) and “Othello” (1792), works that met with large acclaim although they were lifeless, colourless and quite far from the original copies.    
He also wrote two original tragedies entitled “Œdipe chez Admète” (1778) and “Abufar” (1795). Other important figures of the French literary culture of the Revolutionary period were André (1752-1794) and Marie Joseph (1764-1811) Chénier, who actively participated to the initial stages of the Revolution and accepted some public tasks. André, however, worn out by the period of the Terror, firmly devoted to King Luis XVI's defence. He was guillotined in Paris in 1794. While André's considerable literary production was mainly devoted to the field of poetry and only marginally concerned the theatre (he wrote two satirical comedies), Marie Joseph's works were mainly tragedies that met with wide public acclaim, such as “Charles IX” (1789), “Henri VIII” (1791), “Fénelon” (1793) and the censored “Tibère”, which was allowed to be staged posthumous only in 1844. In such historical background, the theatre, in general, was forced to extol the revolutionary patriotic feeling; furthermore, some extremely restrictive and censorial measures were taken during the Terror in order to avoid whatever would go against the ideals of the Revolution.    
The themes of Marie Joseph Chénier's tragedies, for example, ultimately aimed at showing the public that when things did not arise from the feeling of freedom and did not support the revolutionary spirit, they led to individual degeneration and cruel abuse and, as such, they had to be completely rejected. When Napoleon went to power, the French theatre radically changed: state companies were given more opportunities to perform, limiting the repertoire only to the texts that had previously been approved by the censorship. Another greater limitation followed in 1807 when all small theatres were closed in Paris, with the exception of Théâtre de la Gaîté and the Ambigu-Comique. Such measures remained in force until 1830. That repressive atmosphere that limited the authors' various skills certainly failed to favour the birth of masterpieces or the emergence of new far-reaching theatrical talents because that particular historical situation led France and most of Europe to the closing of the theatres and to the censorship of the works under Napoleon.    
In revolutionary times, the playwrights had had the easy task to turn people from excessively exacting thoughts and from the atrocious deaths that were a common occurrence during the Terror.    
Thus in 1792 the comédie à vaudeville was created, that is light comedy marked by puns and biting jokes interspersed with strophes sung to popular airs, as in Louis Benoit Picard's (1769-1828) fifty light comedies, among which “The small city” (1801), whose vis comica attracted the public of the period.    
However, during the period that went from the empire to the Restoration, the melodrama, which was tantamount to the vaudeville in a pathetic and dramatic context, became the most popular theatrical genre. The most important writer of melodramas was Guilbert de Pixérécourt (1773-1844). He composed about one hundred of them, among which “Victor, or the child of the forest” (1798), “Coeline, or the child of mystery” (1800), “The solitary of the black rock” (1806). Melodramas normally staged the comparison between a virtuous hero and his implacable enemy and, only after a long series of vicissitudes, the first often managed to win. The elaborate decorations and spectacular scenes played the key role, whereas dance, singing and music were exclusively support elements. The comic role was played by a servant or by the leading actor's friend. Even the melodrama of the Napoleonic period, however, was marked by a prevailing moralistic tone in which virtue, previously persecuted, finally wins and evil people's wicked deeds are defeated.