 Theater, theater or theater is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers, typically actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music, and dance. Elements of art, such as painted scenery and stage craft such as lighting are used to enhance the physicality, presence and immediacy of the experience. The specific place of the performance is also named by the word theater as derived from the ancient Greek question mark question mark hat. Theatron, a place for viewing itself from question marky. A. Theatomy, to see, to watch, to observe. Modern western theater comes, in large measure, from the theater of ancient Greece, from which it borrows technical terminology, classification into genres, and many of its themes, stock characters, and plot elements. Theater artist Patrice Pavis defines theatricality, theatrical language, stage writing and the specificity of theater as synonymous expressions that differentiate theater from the other performing arts, literature and the arts in general. Modern theater includes performances of plays and musical theater. The art forms of ballet and opera are also theater and use many conventions such as acting, costumes and staging. They were influential to the development of musical theater. See those articles for more information.