Between 1965 and 1975 there was an intense debate in Italy about theatrical culture, which encompassed theatre building and the urban, social, and political roles of theatre. It was articulated around three terms that imply three ways of relating the theatrical building and the city: the temple, the machine, and the caravan. This unusually rich debate has been largely ignored in the historiography of Italian and European architecture, despite its intensity and the importance of its protagonists for the architectural culture of the twentieth century.