It has often been said that the Elizabethan theater was the image of the world. The open stage was a busy marketplace, its trapdoor led down to hell, the curtained inner stage exposed the confidences of private life that four walls hide, the balcony was that higher level from which some may look down so that others can look up, and the highest gallery was a reminder that the order of the world is maintained by gods, goddesses, kings and queens.
Threads of Time
Peter Brook