Drama (genre)

In the context of film and radio, drama describes a genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone, focusing on in-depth development of realistic characters who must deal with realistic emotional struggles. A drama is commonly considered the opposite of a comedy, but may also be considered separate from other works of some broad genre, such as a fantasy. To distinguish drama as a genre of fiction from the use of the same word to mean the general storytelling mode of live performance, the word drama is often included as part of a phrase to specify its meaning. For instance, in the sense of a television genre, more common specific terms are a drama show, drama series, or television drama in the United States; dramatic programming in the United Kingdom; or teledrama in Sri Lanka. In the sense of a film genre, the common term is a drama film.

Dramatic themes such as alcoholism, child abuse, coming of age, drug addiction, emotion, hope, infidelity, moral dilemmas, racial prejudice, religious intolerance, sexuality, poverty, class divisions, violence against women and corruption put characters in conflict with themselves, others, society, or even natural phenomena. Drama is one of the broadest movie genres and includes subgenres such as romantic drama, war films, sport films, period drama, courtroom drama and crime.