5-30-2012 No Fear Shakespeare meets my dog.

Well, as if I wasn't already feeling kind of lukewarm about having a copy of No Fear Shakespeare's Othello in my house...

I found that my dog wasn't thrilled about it either and she took it out on the book.

For those of you that know my dogs... it was Sunshine.  Here she is relaxing after her hard day of work with the script.  This four pound dog actually dragged the script under the bed to work her artistry.

Some good line work today.  I look to be off book for everything except Act II by the end of the weekend.  On a complete side note, we had three hits on the blog from Russia today. Maybe it was because I posted a pic of Stanislavski.  Want to make sure I send a shout out to the Russians.


Hatch

Cassio and Bianca

The play Othello starts out in Venice where we quickly find out that the Turks are planning to attack Cyprus.  Othello heads to Cyprus with an army.  Iago, Cassio, Desdemona and Emilia all head to Cyprus along with Othello.

The Turkish army is destroyed by a storm so they quickly become irrelevant to the plot and all of the sudden there becomes a lot of free time for all of these soldiers.  Cassio apparantly has been spending much of his free time with a courtesan (an intelligent, upscale prostitute) named Bianca. 

The last few days I happen to have been spending a lot of my time memorizing lines from scenes between Cassio and Bianca.  It's a fascinating relationship.  Bianca is clearly in love with Cassio.  Cassio likes Bianca but he certainly is embarrassed to show it in front of his friends.  During one encounter with her, he is trying to get her to leave and says:

 I do attend here on the general;

          and think it no addition nor my wish,

to have him see me woman'd. 

When Iago says that he hears that Cassio is going to marry Bianca, Cassio replies:

  I marry her!  what?  A customer!  Prithee bear some

                     charity to my wit:  do not think it so unwholesome.  Ha, Ha, Ha!

So on the one hand, it appears that he is just toying her along.  He even says to Iago that he "must leave her company."  But there are other times where it appears that he could have real have feelings for her. 

Terms Cassio calls Bianca -

Sweet

Sweet Love

Sweet Bianca

Most fair Bianca

(some of these he uses multiple times)

The character Bianca appears in three scenes, all of which are in the 2nd half of the play, and she is playing off Cassio the entire time but she seems a much bigger character.  Part of this is probably because Iago craftily uses the relationship to his own benefit.  However, the point is that Cassio says an awful lot of sweet things to Bianca in a relatively short amount of dialogue with her... but he also says some not so sweet things.  Their first encounter together actually seems to be a bit of comic relief for the audience.  Bianca and Cassio read almost like a nagging wife and an insensitive husband a la Edith and Archie Bunker or Peg and Al Bundy.

So one of three things might be going on here...

1)  Cassio considers her a convenience (both sexually and in other regards) and he talks a really good game in order to keep her from complaining.  When she becomes too much of a nuisance, he talks of leaving her. 

2)  He actually likes her but he is embarrassed by the fact that he has feelings for a courtesan so he acts one way around his comrades and another way around her.  I'm not supposed to fall for a girl like that.  I'm supposed to fall for someone like Desdemona.

3)  None of the above.

Possibilities 1 and 2 certainly aren't outside the realm of humanity.  I think we see people embody possibilities 1 and 2 all of the time.  I put option 3 out there because it isn't my job to make this decision right now.  I need to see how the rehearsal process goes before coming up with the final answer... and it is probably that the final answer is something I haven't even thought of yet.  Why?  Because I'm not acting in a bubble... I'm acting with other people... so what they do must and will influence what I do... and vice versa.  But, it's fun to think about since I have been spending time with these scenes.

Bianca really has a great moment in Act 5.  Cassio gets attacked and he is injured pretty badly.  She comes running out and it has what appears to be such a pure, loving concern for him. It kind shines when set against all of the jealousy, violence, lying, and schemeing. 

Side note: 

Those of you who have had me in acting class know that much of the acting technique that we center our work on was crafted from the works of Constantin Stanislavski.  Here's a picture of Stanislavski (in some sort of make-up to darken his face) playing Othello in 1896.







5/29/12 Comments...

Wow... there certainly are some people checking out this blog!  I found out from a couple of people that they are having a tough time posting questions/comments/discussions/etc.  I think I've fixed that now. 

Amazing...

Check out this great "teaser" advertisement for the production!

5-28-2012 What am I saying?

Acting in a play with hightened language, such as a Shakespeare play, presents an additional set of challanges than does a play where the dialogue is written with contemporary English.  If I do a play by Tennessee Williams, or David Mamet, or Neil Simon, it is usually fairly apparant what the words mean.  This isn't always the case when I do Shakespeare. 

Yet it is essential that I understand what every single word means in the play.  One of the common comments that you hear about lesser productions of Shakespeare is that the actors didn't really have a grasp of what they were saying.  As an actor, it's not enough for me to just have the gist of the line.  I need to know how to use every single word of the line and with lines as thick and as rich as Shakespeare's, that takes some work. 

So, as I memorize, I am also uncovering meaning.  There is no point to memorizing a line if I don't know what it means.  Throughout this process, I am utilizing six different sources. 

First I have three copies of the play.  None of which are my actual script (which I haven't received yet.)

It may seem bizarre that I am utilizing different copies of the play but there is good reason for it.  While Shakespeare was alive, some but not all of his plays were published.  Sometimes they were published multiple times and different editions could have different lines to them.  Seven years after his death, two of his colleagues went around and collected as many of Shakespeare's scripts as they could find.  Some they had to piece together using old prompt books, manuscripts, etc.  In the end, they came up with 36 of Shakespeare's scripts and they had these published in one large edition.  This was called the first folio (folio had to do with the size of paper being used.)  The scripts as they existed in the first folio weren't always identical to the earlier published versions. 

So, by 1623, there were already multiple variations of some of Shakespeare's plays.

How different could they be?  Well... look at what is perhaps Shakespeare's single most famous line of text....

In the folio we have:  To be, or not to be, that is the question:

But in the first edition of Hamlet, that line actually read:  To be, or not to be, aye there's the point,

Aye there's the point????

So you can see that at some point in time, people have been deciding which version of things should become the accepted version. 

In addition, over time, publishers have taken Shakespeare's scripts and made them user-friendy.  They tweak the spelling of some of the words to make them more readable today.  For example, the word that we know today as "suit" may have been spelled "suite" in the folio.  Editors will also play around with the punctuation so that they are easier to read by today's sensibilities.

Some theatre people argue that if we look at the earliest copies of Shakespeare's plays, like we may find in the folio, we can find acting clues.  Some schools of Shakespeare training say that the punctuation in the folio unlocks the way to say the lines.  Others look at what words happen to be capitalized think that these words deserve extra stress when performed.  There are all sort of ideas about things like this.  I don't buy that there are any strict rules when it comes to things like this.  Any Shakespeare scholar will tell you that many people set the type for the folio when it was printed and they each seemed to have their own style.  So, what we may think is Shakespeare's punctuation might actually be a style choice from one of the compositors of the book.

With all that said, I do think there is value to having the folio copy of a script.  Perhaps there are clues, and it is worth looking at the different punctuations and spellings to see what they might unlock.  So, I have been working out of a folio copy of Othello.

Then, I have a new edition of Othello.  For 400 years, this script as been tweaked every so slightly, this way and that.  It is good to have a new edition to see what the culmination of scholarship has produced.  I like the Arden editions of Shakespeare.  The Arden has good, extensive footnotes about aspects of the play.

So with these two sources, I can uncover meaning by looking at an early copy of the text and a modern edition of the text but what happens when I come to a word that I have no idea what it means?

There are two great sources for that:

1)  The Oxford English Dictionary -  Back in the 1800's this guy decided that he was going to make a dictionary.  In this dictionary he was not only going to define every way that a word had been used, he was also going to find where in liturature that word first appeared!  I mean, that is unreal!  So, if I don't know what a word means, I can look it up in this book and see all of the different ways that a word has been used.  It's pretty fascinating.  Often I find that a word I thought I knew the meaning of, had a completely different meaning in Shakespeare's time. 

2)  Shakespeare Lexicon - Some other guy decided he was going to make a list of every word that Shakespeare used and what that word meant every time it what used.  This body of work is known as the Shakespeare Lexicon and comes in two volumes.  So if I look up the word "suit" for example, it will list every single place in every single play that Shakespeare used the word "suit" and what it means each time he used the word.  Crazy.

So I have both of those sources by my side.  Well, that is a lie, I use the Oxford English Dictionary online.  But I do have the Lexicon.

So, I've got the Folio version of Othello, The Arden edition of Othello, The Shakespeare Lexicon, and The Oxford English Dictionary.  I also have an app on my phone that has all of the Shakespeare plays on it.  So, if I am bored and I have my phone, BAM... bust out some Othello on the i-phone and I am off!  I was using that two nights ago.  It's very convenient. 

Finally, I have a copy of the No Fear Shakespeare edition of Othello.  This line of Shakespeare editions are interesting.  They have the original text on one page, and on the adjacent page they have a modern paraphrasing of the text.  On the one hand it is horrible...  sometimes the paraphrasing is either really bad or really wrong.  However, there are times where it helps to see how someone else puts a particularly challenging stretch of text into their own words.  I look at this as a last resort... but it is handy to have around.

If I don't know exactly what I am saying... how in the world can I expect the audience, who only gets to hear what I say once... to know what I am saying?  It is not enough to know what the paragraph kind of means.  It is not enough to know what each sentence kind of means.  I need to know exactly what each word means and how they are all working together to form these complex thoughts.  If I don't know what each word means... there is no point to memorizing the line. 

So, in order to do all this, I draw from a variety of resources, in order to make, hopefully, informed decisions about meaning.  When it comes down to it, the most important thing is that the audience gets it, so I say use many of the resources that are at your disposal in order to achieve better success.

Happy Memorial Day.


Hatch

5-24-2012 My brain hurts

Memorizing is not fun.  I mean, I guess it's a little fun, but it hurts my head.  Some people memorize very quickly with very little effort.  I am not one of those people. haha

When I teach acting, I often have students coming to me asking me if I have any tricks for memorizing.  Not really.  There's no secret shortcut to learning lines... at least not that I've learned.  Later, when some students get in front of the class for the first time and unsuccessfully try to say their lines without their script, I hear this:

"I was memorized when I said it in my dorm!"

I believe them.  It's real easy to remember lines when you are all comfy in the confines of your own room.

I ask them if they were saying their lines out loud when the worked on the memorization...

Nope.

I ask if they were moving around when they were working on their lines...

Nope.

So, if they could do this in their room, and didn't have to move, and didn't have to speak out loud, they'd be memorized.  To be fair, this doesn't just happen in classrooms.  I don't suspect there are too many theatres in the country that haven't hear a frustrated actor say something like:

"I knew these lines at home!"

The fact of the matter is that every time we add a new stimuli to the acting experience, it temporarily becomes harder to remember lines.  A classic example of this is the first day actors wear costumes.  Often, during first dress, you'll see actors struggle with lines that they hadn't had problems with for weeks.  Why?  Because all of the sudden there is a new thing to deal with... the clothes.  If it's not the clothes, it's the mics, or the move from the rehearsal space to the performance space or the rehearsal where the producers come to watch.  I remember when I was in grad school, when one of my professors came to watch a rehearsal I had a harder time holding on to my lines.  Heaven forbid it happens when that new stimuli is the first actual audience!

So as I start learning lines, I immediately try to add performance values and outside stimuli to my memorization process.  I'm not trying to craft my performance but I am trying to add performance values.  Here's what I mean...

First, I always memorize while saying lines out loud.  Saying lines in your head doesn't work for most people.  I've got to be saying these lines out loud.  It is very hard to memorize lines silently and then expect to be able to say them successfully out loud.

Second, I encorporate a lot of movement into my memorization.  I won't be standing still throughout the show saying my lines so why should I learn them in stillness?

Third, I have a focal point when I work lines.  I will be delivering many of my lines while looking at someone, so why should I let myself practice my lines while starring at the ceiling or while aimlessly looking down at the floor.  I say my lines to something specific.  Today a wooden elephant was Desdemona.  A cupboard door handle was Iago.  (The actor playing Iago is definitely taller than I am so I often place focal points a little higher up when I am working on lines to him.)

Here are a few of my favorite ways to learn lines.  I mix it up depending on the day.

1)  The reward system -  If I have to learn lines I am going to doing something fun or relaxing or rewarding while I do it.  So, perhaps I'll get some great food and spend an hour working on lines while I eat.  I love hot baths... especially after I work out or run.  So I'll sometimes learn lines while I do that (not too often because I can't move around much.)  Sometimes I'll work lines while enjoying my favorite adult beverage however, I'm not doing that this time around (more on that on a later day.)  If I were rich, I'd hire a massage therapist and drink 30 year tawny port while I worked lines.

2)  Cardio line learning - Learning lines while working out is one of my favorite ways to memorize.  Hopping on an elliptical or stationary bike with your script in front of you is a great way to "get your lines in your body."  The only downside to this is you can't usually go full voice while you are at the gym... but you can use a soft voice... and when people look strangely at you, flash the script... they'll get it.

3)  Walk across the room -  Sometimes I'll put the script on one end of the room and I'll work lines on the other end.  Every time I need to look at the script it means I have to walk across the room to get the script... look at it... think about the line... walk back to the other side of the room... and then start working lines again.  Sometimes it's too easy to hold the script in my hand and steal quick glances every time I am unsure of a line.  Then, I don't really think about it before plowing on to the next line.  The walk across the room technique really forces me to think about my stumbling points before I move on to the next line.

4)  Dropping in -  Sometimes I'll find that I have a section of text that I just can't seem to memorize for the life of me or a section of text where I really don't feel like I have a good grasp of it.  Here's where dropping in really helps.  I lay on the ground with the script in hand so that I can see it.  I look at the very first word of the line and then inhale the word in.  As I exhale, I say the word in an elongated fashion.  With a lone inhane and a long exhale, that cycle may take 20 seconds.  Then I look at the second word and inhale it in.  Then I say the first and second word in an elongated fashion.  I continue in this fashion until I can say the entire sentence.  Then I move on to the next sentence.  This technique really forces me to linger with every single word of a line for an extended period of time. 

Today was a "walk across the room" day.  I worked Act 3 today and, with the exception of a monologue in scene 4, things are looking pretty good.  I should have the whole thing pretty solid by tomorrow.

I'd love to hear from others... have any great line learning techniques?  Also, if anyone has questions about anything, feel free to ask away!

5-23-2012 Words, Words, Words...

If you've acted a decent amount, you've no doubt been a part of a post-show talk back.  This is when the actors come out on stage after the show and the audience can ask them questions for 15-30 minutes. 

Without fail, one of the first questions that is asked is:

"How did you learn all of those lines?"

A few years ago I started pondering why that question always comes up and I sort of developed a theory.  The process by which a human being pretends to be another human being is one that, at first, can seem rather distant or etherial.  Most people don't spend hours and hours trying to pretend like they are someone else... particularly after the age of six.  Most people HAVE had to memorize things on a fairly regular basis.  The challenge of memorization is something that people have a solid grasp of.  So when people see a show and are then confronted with the opportunity to discuss the craft of acting with the actors, they jump to what they know.  They know what it is to memorize... so they ask how we learn all those lines.

The truth of the matter is that Acting has almost nothing to do with Memorizing.  That would be like saying that learning a football playbook is what it is to be a football player.  (Side note... I was just at a big sports dinner in Rochester tonight where Eli Manning was the keynote speaker, so the sports analogies may come fast and furious tonight.)

The truth is, Acting is what you start to do only AFTER you are memorized.  If you don't know your lines or if you are reading your lines, you really aren't acting.  Acting is about connecting to your fellow actors or to the audience.  You aren't connecting if you are looking down at your script. 

So the first step of my process with this role is to memorize all my lines and have them memorized well before rehearsals even start.  Rehearsals are precious.   Usually, there is very little time in a professional rehearsal process to get a show together.  In this case, we will probably have around 90ish total hours of rehearsal before the show has an audience.  90 hours to have a 3 hour play ready for an audience... that is a challenge.  So I don't want to waste a single moment of the time I have with my fellow actors, looking down at my script.  There are far too many other things I will want to be working on.  Memorizing is something I can do without my fellow actors so I might as well get it done now.

Plus, this is Shakespeare.  These lines are hard.  The quicker I know the words, the quicker I can start to figure out how to make those works work for me and in a way that the audience can understand. 

Some people say to me "I learn lines better when I am in rehearsal with the other people who are in the scene."  OF COURSE YOU DO!  It is much easier to memorize in rehearsal.  However, every moment you spend in rehearsal working on memorization is a moment you could have spent working on acting had you already been memorized! 

Plus, when you are looking down at your script during rehearsal, not only does it mean you aren't connecting with other actors, it means that other actors can't connect with you.  So not only are you hurting your own performance, you are hurting the performances of everyone who is trying to act with you.  For the most part, if I have my script in my hand after the first day that I work on a scene in rehearsal, I feel embarrassed because I know I am hindering the growth of not just my performance in that scene, but the entire scene.

Alright, so I need to get memorized.  What is the plan for memorizing this role?

First, I like to break things up in terms of acts and scenes so I have an idea what my line distribution is.  Every Shakespeare play has been broken down into 5 acts.  Each act is broken down into smaller scenes.  In the play Othello, there are 15 scenes.  Cassio has lines in 9 of the 15. 

(Side note... one tricky thing about Shakespeare is that an individual line might be made up with a single sentence or a line might be a huge monologue.  So, this is a bit of an inexact process but it does give me an idea of my line distribution.)

ACT - SCENE - NUMBER OF LINES FOR CASSIO

Act 1 - Scene 2 - 6 lines

Act 2 - Scene 1 - 14 lines
Act 2 - Scene 3 - 35 lines  (this scene has stage combat)

Act 3 - Scene 1 - 8 lines
Act 3 - Scene 3 - 4 lines
Act 3 - Scene 4 - 9 lines

Act 4 - Scene 1 - 12 lines

Act 5 - Scene 1 - 12 lines  (this scene has stage combat)
Act 5 - Scene 2 - 5 lines

Alright... so looking at that, I see that Act 2 is going to be the the hardest act to memorize.

I like to memorize one scene at a time and then one act at a time.  For instance, I already memorized Act 1 - Scene 2.  Now I know that I am off book (memorized) for all of Act 1.  Any time any scene for Act 1 is called in rehearsal, I know that I am ready to go. I can also run that scene with Jenny(my wife.) 


Plus, I can always quiz myself now...

"Ok... I've got 6 lines in Act 1 - Scene 2... what are they?"  I do this a lot when I am running.  And yes, I say them out loud.  And yes, people look funny at me.  But who cares...

A)  I'm running. 
B)  I'm speaking Shakespeare.

Pretty sure whatever they are doing as they walk down the sidewalk is not at cool as that combo. 


Because Act 2 is going to take the most work, I think my gameplan is going to be to skip Act 2 for a while and memorize all of the other scenes.  I would guess that within a week or two, I should be able to work Acts 1, 3, 4 and 5 with Jenny or while I'm running, etc.  Then I can go back and focus on Act 2.

Two notes here...

1)  This is just memorizing.  I am not working on acting yet.  Were I doing acting work, I wouldn't jump around chronologically.  I'd go line-by-line, scene-by-scene.  And now is a good time to say that it is important to separate memorizing from acting as much as possible.  Young actors often start to lock in acting choices as they are memorizing.  Instead of memorizing words, they memorize words and (usually bad) acting choices that they are making completely on their own.  This is bad because we want to choose our acting choices based on what we are doing to our scene partners and what they, in turn, are doing back to us.  You can't do this on your own.  Learn your lines on your own but don't start locking in acting choices until you start rehearsing with your fellow theatre artists.

2)  Note that I marked if a scene has stage combat in it.  You simply HAVE to be off book for a scene that has stage combat in it when rehearsals start.  It is ridiculous to see actors try to hold a script in one hand and a sword in the other and learn a fight when they don't know the lines to the fight.  And if you are fighting rapier and dagger, or cloak and dagger, or sword and shield, situations where both hands are occupied with weapons, you don't have the liberty of holding your script at all.  Were I to only have one week before rehearsal started, and I knew that I couldn't be off book for the whole show by the time rehearsals began, the two stage combat scenes would be my top priority in terms of memorization. 

So, I know what the line distribution is.  Act 1 is taken care of.  A minimum of an hour a day of line work.  I should have Act 3 fairly solid by Friday.

Key points from today:

-Acting is what we do AFTER we are memorized.

-Be careful not to memorize acting choices while you are memorizing words.

-Always be off book for scenes that involve stage combat before rehearsals begin

-DON'T WASTE PRECIOUS REHEARSAL TIME WITH YOUR NOSE IN YOUR SCRIPT!




I hope all is well with all of you!

Hatch












 



 

5/22/2012 - Two months until closing night.

Hello everyone!  As many of you already know, this summer I am working on another Shakespeare production.  This time around I'll be playing the character of Michael Cassio in Othello, for a theatre company in Indianapolis.

I've never done a blog before, and I thought some of my theatre students might be interested in occasionally checking in on the day-to-day process that I'll be going through over the next two months as I tackle this role.  Throughout the two months, I'll write about my prep work, my struggles, probably some fears mixed in there along with some joys too.  I'll talk about my thoughts on how to handle the first day of rehearsal, tech rehearsals, and how to wrap up a run of a show.  Heck, who knows what will come up?  In the end, it might give you a little bit of insight into how one particular professional process works so that you can be better prepared when you do your own professional productions (or you work with me on a show at HWS!) 

I then realized that I have a lot of family and friends that have no real idea about what it is that I do as an actor.  Many of you have seen me in shows or heard that I've been doing shows, but I've never really taken the time to explain to you all that goes on in the process.  So, I thought I'd invite you all to view this too. 

So I figure day one, I should give a very brief synopsis of the play and how my role works within that play since I will be referring to the play an awful lot over the next two months!

In the play Othello, the character Othello is a General in the Venetian military.  As the play begins, Othello has just done two things:

1)  Othello, who is black, has just married Desdemona, who is white, without her father's permission.

2)  Othello, has promoted Cassio to second in command instead of the older, more experienced soldier named Iago.

These are four of the largest characters in the play... Othello, Iago, Desdemona and Cassio.  These four, along with Desdemona's attendent Emilia (who is also Iago's wife) make up over 82% of all the lines spoken in the show.  Iago and Othello alone make up 56% of all the lines in the show.  Those two roles are HUGE.  They are two of the five biggest roles that Shakespeare wrote and they are in the same play!  Who are the other three?  Maybe you've heard of them... HAMLET, RICHARD III and HENRY V.  Yes, Iago and Othello are that huge and we have two great actors playing those two roles. 

Enough with the stats... back to the synopsis...

Iago is livid that he wasn't given the promotion and vows revenge.  Over the course of the play Iago slowly works to destroy the lives of many of the other characters.  Iago gets Cassio demoted.  Iago then convinces Othello that Desdemona and Cassio are having an affair.  After a variety of twists and turns, Othello kills Desdemona out of jealousy and when he finds out it was a set-up crafted by Iago, Othello kills himself.  Iago is arrested and Cassio is placed in charge.

If you'd like a slightly more detailed synopsis you might try this link...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Othello

If you'd like to actually read the play for free online try this link...

http://www.opensourceshakespeare.org/views/plays/playmenu.php?WorkID=othello


Thanks for joining me on this wild ride.  Feel free to start discussions, ask questions, etc.  Now, I have to start memorizing some lines!


-Hatch-


6/24/2012 - Rehearsals begin in Indianapolis

7/20/2012 - Opening Night

7/22/2012 - Closing performance