Tboy knew this was going to be hard...

But really, he had no idea it would be so mortifying.

Acting Shakespeare, week 5.  Off book (basically) with the Hamlet monologue, but as an actor I'm what a critic would call painfully self-conscious.  Lotsa fuss with hands. Paralytically aware of the body. (If that seems self-contradictory, well...)

Can't seem to let the voice go, let it do the work of the speech; this may have something to do with how anger and sarcasm, in Tboy's world, get expressed in a flat, cool voice.  "Size," in the vocal sense, is turning out to be something of a problem.

Short lab session this morning with just me and the professor; he had me walk around the room in circles, delivering the speech to a red plastic chair standing in for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.  Seemed to free things up a lot -- the emotion, startlingly enough, started to gather in a big knot in my chest, rather than between the temples, and at "this goodly frame, the earth," the momentum of the circling just built naturally into a big gesture that didn't seem nearly as awkward as even a half-hearted reach did when I was merely standing.  Interesting.

Can't keep walking in circles in performance, though, of course. The trick, apparently, is to use this to get the speech in the body, to find its energy, and then figure out when it's OK to move and when it's OK to be still.

This is much harder than I remember from junior high.

<grin>

Comments

[luckyspinster]

our culture is saturated with self-referential irony, making it nearly impossible to forget yourself and just be authentic. i'd take the fact that you're feeling mortified as a wonderful sign!

regarding that "fuss with the hands"--i'm sure you know this, but it's diverted energy. if you keep the hands still, the energy has no choice but to come up through your body and leave you through your voice, emotion, and intent. your voice is your emotional fingerprint. a free voice and body combined with specific intent--it's so simple and elegant yet so difficult to achieve.

one of the reasons i enjoy teaching kids is they haven't yet succumbed to that stifling self-awareness. adults have to take classes to learn how to play-act, but kids come by it naturally.

[arcticactor]

Wow -- they're really starting you guys off with the hard juicy stuff, hey? I can't imagine switching from keen external awareness (as a critic) to the level of internal awareness (physical, emotional, mental, etc.) they're pushing for in this class. That's so cool you're willing to reverse gears like that and give it a go. Funny: speaking from the other side of the proscenium, most actors just assume they're great at any other profession out there ("I played a Russian shoe cobbler once ... so I feel your pain."), but we don't often dare to have that simple real world life before presuming to bring it to the stage. I bet, in the long run, you'll have an easier time accessing feelings on stage than most conservatory-incubated wonderfucks out there. Enjoy it, dude. You actually had a life before art -- too many artists use Technique as a substitute for the former.

[t-rae]

Hear, hear, arctiactor! And you go, T-boy--work through all the uncomfortable, difficult "speech into movement into emotion" issues and who knows what amazing stuff you'll find? It's all there inside--you just have to clear away the "self-referential irony" (hear, hear lucky spinster) to get to it.

...saw a relic of Buddha this summer--it influences everything I do (or blog) now...

[brittany]

Why is your original premise that you're doing something wrong? The tremulous ghost of Hamlet is whispering in your ear, and you don't realize it. Sure, this is going to evolve as you work on it, but isn't Hamlet a painfully self conscious, nearly paralyzed guy flung into an extreme situation? Then play it as you are, a painfully self conscious, nearly paralyzed guy flung into an extreme situation. What sort of false already-been-done ideal are you trying to measure up to? Be the ball, Danny. It sounds like this scene is as compellingly naked and horrible as it should be. By the way, it won't evolve until the actors playing Rosecrantz and Guildenstern are there, and you can look them in the eye.

[Andrea]

Brittany's advice was right on (and straight out of "True & False").

BTW, do the people in your class know who you are, and are they at all worried that you are going to write some sort of exposé about them in the City Paper?

[theaterboy]

Yup, they know. Not sure how much any of 'em read me, but there was full disclosure all 'round.

And nope, they're not worried. At least I hope not. Come to think of it, they might not have been told, but I'm only blogging this rehearsal journal after getting the OK from the professor. You'll notice I haven't said anything about other students' performances; I assured him I wouldn't, which is the only reason he agreed to allow it.

[oldtoad]

Best suggestion about acting I ever heard: "Learn your words and don't bump into the furniture." Spencer Tracey
Worst review I ever got: " ...a bad impersonation of Peter Ustinov, doing a bad impersonation of Laurence Olivier.

So I direct.

[Fromage]

My hat's off to you T-boy. I don't know what your motivation was to take a crack at acting, but I wish more in your field would try it. They might not be so flip with their comments.

[oldtoad]

Dear boy-Take Hamlet's advice to the players more to heart. :Speak the speech as I told you...trippingly on the tongue". You need to be able to speak it, to yourself, for understanding first. If you don't get it-how will anyone else?