Entr'acte

Entr'acte (or entracte, French pronunciation: [ɑ̃tʁakt]; German: Zwischenspiel and Zwischenakt, Italian: intermezzo, Spanish: intermedio and intervalo) means 'between the acts'. It can mean a pause between two parts of a stage production, synonymous to an intermission (this is nowadays the more common meaning in French), but it more often (in English) indicates a piece of music performed between acts of a theatrical production.

For the film by René Clair, see Entr'acte (film).

In the case of stage musicals, the entr'acte serves as the overture of act 2 (and sometimes acts 3 and 4, as in Carmen). In films that were meant to be shown with an intermission, there was frequently a specially recorded entr'acte on the soundtrack between the first and second half of the film, although this practice eventually died out.

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