Postmodern theatre is a recent phenomenon in world theatre, coming as it does out of the postmodern philosophy that originated in Europe in the 1960s. Typically, a postmodern theatrical work would contain some or all of the following characteristics:

1. A diverse pastiche of different textualities and media forms are used, including the simultaneous use of multiple art or media forms, and there is the 'theft' of a heterogeneous group of artistic forms
2. Narrative need not be complete but can be broken, paradoxical and imagistic. There is a movement away from linearity to multiplicity (to inter-related 'webs' of storying), where acts and scenes give way to a series of peripatetic dramatic moments.
3. Existing ways of seeing the world are subverted and questioned, including conventional methods of portraying character and human experience
4. Each new performance of a theatrical pieces is a new Gestalt, a unique spectacle, with no intent on methodically repeating a play. This can be linked to philosophical ideas based on Chaos Theory about how meaning systems evolve and impossibility of ever creating an identical system because the initial conditions can never be replicated.
5. The audience is integral to the shared meaning making of the performance process and are included in the dialogue of the play
6. The rehearsal process in a theatrical production is driven more by shared meaning-making and improvisation, rather than the scripted text

Postmodern theatre works tend to be challenging for an audience who are used to the time-honoured conventions of theatre and have expectations. The breaking of these expectations and the finding of new boundaries and sensibilities is the very point of this theatrical movement.