Respiratory Feedback and the Generation of Emotion
Pierre Philippot, Gaëtane Chapelle & Sylvie Blairy
In Cognition and Emotion, 16:5, 605-627 Psychology Press, 2002.

Joy

• Breathe and exhale slowly and deeply through the nose.
• Your breathing is very regular and your ribcage relaxed.

Anger

• Breathe and exhale quickly through the nose; slightly deeper than regular breathing amplitude.
• Your breathing is slightly irregular with some tremors and your ribcage is very tense.

Fear

• Breathe and exhale quickly from the top of your ribcage; with a normal amplitude.
• Your breathing is slightly irregular with some tremors and your ribcage very tense.

Sadness

• Breathe and exhale through the nose with a normal amplitude and pace.
• Your ribcage is slightly tense, and there are some sighs in your expiration.

Key sentences for the vowels and dipthongs of spoken English (1)

The people feel that they can guarantee the suite for sweet Phoebe.

The ability of the English actress was really exaggerated.

Ethel spent seventy-seven cents to get the best eggs and vegetables.

Fancy! The fascinating character Harry Cannon married Anne Hammond.

The athletic man catches ants in his handkerchief for Harriet.

I can’t ask Frances for half the dance.

Rude Ruth’s two rooms are near the school’s pool.

Pull the poor Worcester wool from the good cook’s full cook book.

Oblige the Olympia police and omit Othello.

All orphaned daughters thought they bought straw.

Paul paused, then walked toward the lawn for water.

What horrible foreign correspondent in Washington washed the hot coffee copper pot in Dorothy’s office?

I want a modern model watch.

What was it?

Barbara’s large apartment at Harvard was near the garage of her father’s market.

The absurd girl is a connoisseur of turtles. The Colonel’s nurse rehearses works at work.

Actually contrary to the customary government circumstances in America, the extraordinary secretary offered the actor’s picture.

I wonder if Murray’s mother and brother love the constable.

Hail Yale’s eighty-eight sailors delayed in jail.

Aye, it’s time to acquire the entire choir’s files.

Boyish Roister toils and toils for oil.

Oh no, Joe, don’t go for Mr. Stowell’s coal.

Ring out the towel as you pronounce the vowels in “How now brown cow”.

Were the dear experienced auctioneer and the ideal career cashier really here?

Various parents said farewell to fair-haired airy Mary Carey.

Alluring poor Steward endured the rural tour during the regulated sure cure.

More and more the court ignores an encore.

The landlord bought four more quarts of oil for the worn floors.

The stupid student of Stewart’s Institute sang the Duke’s new tune on Tuesday in the studio.

Will you bring peculiar brilliant Italian William to value Julia’s millions on WWSW?

He thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts.

The singer sang a long song on Long Island.

Merry Mary married Harry.

Key sentences for the vowels and dipthongs of spoken English (2)

The task was the last that the past master could grasp, but one can’t mark his charms harmfully.

The stern learner heard from a bird how to burn the turf in Turkey and Burma.

A bored walker swore talking about the corn was a chore, in the storm-torn store.

She was seen to be evil, in the mean streets where the bees feed.

He moves to lose the clues of astute losers, whose crude boots bruise the loose newts.

The kids were hidden in the middle of the tin bins, where the hit list was still wished to fictionally exist.

The sad man was actually a cad, when marriage was banned and the bad band got splashed by the tacked hash.

The hell-bent hen was speckled and freshly sent by the men of the tenth regiment of the seventh section.

Don’t touch much stuff, said the glum, sun-struck nun who worried over the fun-loving wonders.

She’s got a soft spot in the Grotto for washing tops and bottoms of socks.

Look at the book, said the cook as he took the pullets and put them in the nook.

Actors and authors have a special set of acquaintances above another mezzanine area of the gallery where woman can alert the workers.

I hope you don’t go home alone, moaned the old crone who was holding a cold toasting poker of oak.

It’s how a stout brown owl scolded, mouthed the house mouse, and it’s out with a foul brown trout.

A boy with a coin had a choice of moist soil, and boiled spoilt oysters.

I might if I could try by buying slyly fly from the guile of the white guys.

Stay and wait stated the mate or play stale games in the grey, unmade plain.

A weird fear was here by the cleared mere in the bleary clearing.
There, there, said the scared, caring fairy to the fair glaring pair with the flared hair.

The fluent hewer moved the gruel to the stewer with a poor, cruel, doer.

Consonants

Beat an empty barrel with the handle of a broom.
I sing of brooks, of blossoms, of birds and bowers.

The crystal was packed carefully into a clean crate.
The cat cleaned her kittens with incredible care.

Delia, afraid of the dentist, darted past his door.
Denizens of the deep defied the daring angler.

The far-flung effects of philosophy have not been fully felt.
Frank offered fifty-five dollars for finding his flea-bitten fox-terrier.

The ghastly green glow cast a ghostly glimmer on the grass.
Gray were the geese and green was the grazing.

High heels have been held to be a hazard to good health.
The hotel in the hollow had housed hundreds of historic heroes.

The jaunty major wagered his gems and jewels that the judge would not jail Jerome.
John and Jean jumped for joy over their geology major.

A million lanterns lighted the landscape.
Swallows, larks and quail all love our laurel tree.

Many middle-aged men were employed for the summer months.
Hymns were hummed by the multitude at the memorial tomb.

Nine funny gnomes danced in the shining moonlight.
Ned’s neighbours never noticed his newly numbered notepaper.

Rowing, hiking and swimming gave him outstanding strength.
Young ringleaders of the gang were hanged for killing the congressman.

Presumably the people at the pageant were pleased with the players.
Power politics involve principles that are apt to keep us in suspense.

Quinces of questionable quality make you queasy quickly.

Arid regions of the Rockies are rarely irrigated.
Remove all rats and other rodents from the barnyard.

The sun shines on the shabby shop windows.
Street lights glisten on glossy silver trees.

The youth spoke the truth about his pathological methods.
Thirty-three thugs hid in the thatched hut.
Teething did not bother him, but weather withered him.

Viking victories have been verified in various verse forms.
The visible universe is trivial compared to the vast infinity of space.

The whippet whined and whimpered while the white hunter whistled.
Twelve bewitched dwarfs were walking in our woods.

Yesterday you had a yen for yellow.
Do you yearn for your youngsters to yell yoo-hoo?

Lazy, hazy days are dog days.
Zebras in the zoo are used to the zany gaze of tourists.

Round the rugged rock the ragged rascal ran.
Tom met Tilly for tea on the train to Trenton.

Rehearsing makes Horace hoarse and hoarseness is even more harassing to his humble hobby-horse. Now if this hoarseness harasses Horace’s horse, how it must affect Horace. Actually, it haunts Horace.

The West Wind, by John Masefield

It’s a warm wind, the west wind, full of bird’s cries.
I never hear the west wind but tears are in my eyes.
For it comes from the west land, the old brown hills,
And April’s in the west wind, and daffodils.

 

Say the pairs of words below in rapid succession:

bold-bolt
cold-colt
mold-molt
had-hat
cod-cot
paid-pate
heed-heat
feed-feet
wad-watt

Say:
Five minutes to eight, not five minutes to wait.
His acts, not his axe.
Your two eyes, not you’re too wise.
An ice house, not a nice house.

Say:
Rubber baby buggy bumper.
Red leather, yellow leather.
Rinty-tinty tuppeny bun.
Out in the green fields grazing.
Picture or statue? Statue or picture?
Law and order are the rule of the road.
Length, breadth, height and width.
He asks why we spray the crops for pests.
Six skilful, thrifty shrimp fishers.
A few tulips in the dew.
Clad in gay stripes, the children sing

Difficult consonant combinations

ax
specs
rex
flax
ducks
dicks
sex

Exercises for the soft palate and the back of the tongue

I’m thinking of singing a moving song.

Bring your gong along.

I think he got a drink from the tank.

In the spring the birds are singing and the donkeys braying.

I’m pulling a long length of string.

Rushing along, fleeing from the angry orangutan(g).

Gather the grapes and crush them.

Going and getting granny’s gift.

Ragged beggar was wagering with his dagger.

The car’s gears crashed.

He was greedily grabbing the gravy.

More wagons making mud.

Can you be carrying the carrots from the garden?

Another car needs cleaning.

I’m making threatening noises.

He’s getting the grey gold clubs.

Imagine mending the old thing.

I’m alone at home reading.

Playing a game for cards.

Speeding along the winding road.

Grip Top Sock, by Clifford Turner

Give me the gift of a grip top sock
A dip drape, ship-shape, tip-top sock;
Not your spiv-slick, slap-stick, slip-slop stock
But a plastic elastic grip-top sock.
None of your fantastic slack swap-slop
From a slapdash flash cash haberdash shop.
Not a knick-knack, knit-lock, knock-kneed knickerbocker sock
With a mock-shot, blob-mottled trick tick-tocker clock.
Not a rucked-up, puckered-up flop-top sock;
Not a super-sheer, seersucker pukka sack-smock sock;
Not a spot-speckled, frog-freckled cheap sheik’s sock
Off a hotch-potch, moss-blotched, botched Scotch block.

Nothing slip-slop, drip-drop
Flip-flop or clip-clop;
Tip me to the tip-top
Grip-top
Sock.

I am so Proud, by W.S. Gilbert

To sit in solemn silence on a dull, dark dock
in a pestilential prison with a life-long lock
awaiting the sensation of a short, sharp shock
from a cheap and chippy chopper on a big, black block.

I am the Very Model of a Modern Major General, by W.S. Gilbert

I am the very model of a modern Major-General,
I’ve information vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical
From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical;a
I’m very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical,
I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical,
About binomial theorem I’m teeming with a lot o’ news, (bothered for a rhyme)
With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse.

I’m very good at integral and differential calculus;
I know the scientific names of beings animalculous:
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.

I know our mythic history, King Arthur’s and Sir Caradoc’s;
I answer hard acrostics, I’ve a pretty taste for paradox,
I quote in elegiacs all the crimes of Heliogabalus,
In conics I can floor peculiarities parabolous;
I can tell undoubted Raphaels from Gerard Dows and Zoffanies,
I know the croaking chorus from The Frogs of Aristophanes!
Then I can hum a fugue of which I’ve heard the music’s din afore, (bothered for a rhyme)b
And whistle all the airs from that infernal nonsense Pinafore.

Then I can write a washing bill in Babylonic cuneiform,
And tell you ev’ry detail of Caractacus’s uniform:c
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.

In fact, when I know what is meant by “mamelon” and “ravelin”,
When I can tell at sight a Mauser rifle from a javelin,d
When such affairs as sorties and surprises I’m more wary at,
And when I know precisely what is meant by “commissariat”,
When I have learnt what progress has been made in modern gunnery,
When I know more of tactics than a novice in a nunnery –
In short, when I’ve a smattering of elemental strategy – (bothered for a rhyme)
You’ll say a better Major-General has never sat a gee.e

For my military knowledge, though I’m plucky and adventury,
Has only been brought down to the beginning of the century;
But still, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.

This exercise is about:

• accepting what’s in front of you
• giving up control
• getting out of your head and into your body
• maintaining rhythm
• group teamwork
• learning to trust your own body impulses in the moment

Impulse Circle 1

• Everyone stands in a circle.
• One person makes a movement and simple sound, preferably using their full body
• Once the movement and sound are complete, the next person to the right makes the exact same movement and sound
• Once that person has completed the sound and movement, the person on their right makes the exact same movement and sound.
• The copying of the movement and sound combination continues around the circle as many times as it takes for the movement to and sound to be as exactly the same as possible, and for there to be no gaps of thinking from person to person, but a smooth cycling around the circle.
• Try this a few times with a few movement-sound combinations

Coaching points:

• The movement creator should follow their body impulse in the moment, not try to plan it or create something clever.
• See with your full being
• Keep the movement and sound exactly the same (the pitch in sound does not have to match)
• You will have to look at the person next to you to be ready, but once the circle gets going, you should be able to see everyone and work off the sound and movement you see all round you
• Let the movement of the person before you complete before you start.
• Let your movement begin right after the person before you has completed, no time/processing gaps.
• Don’t think, do: get your body into it.
• Find a smooth steady rhythm
• The circle can change direction if the instructor so chooses.

Possible take-aways principles:

• The text is a given, you can’t change it
• Pick up your cues
• Rhythm is an important aspect of performance

This exercise is about:

• accepting what’s in front of you
• giving up control
• getting out of your head and into your body
• maintaining rhythm
• group teamwork
• learning to trust your own body impulses in the moment

Impulse Circle 2

• Everyone stands in a circle.
• One person makes a movement and simple sound, preferably using their full body
• Once the movement and sound are complete, the next person to the right makes the exact same movement and sound
• Once that person has completed the sound and movement, the person on their right makes the exact same movement and sound.
• The copying of the movement and sound combination continues around the circle as many times as it takes for the movement to and sound to be as exactly the same as possible, and for there to be no gaps of thinking from person to person, but a smooth cycling around the circle.
• Once the movement-sound combination is established around the circle, with each new iteration it can change slightly with impulse during the movement: extend, expand, shrink, shorten, etc.
• Let your impulse come from the moment and off of what you receive rather than what you plan or decide to do in advance
• The movement should stay essentially the same but there should be a gradual pulse to it as it gradually shifts from one person to the next
• Try this a few times with a few movement-sound combinations

Coaching points:

• The movement creator should follow their body impulse in the moment, not try to plan it or create something clever.
• See with your full being
• Work off what you’re given by the person before you rather than what you see going on in the rest of the circle.
• Let the movement of the person before you complete before you start.
• Let your movement begin right after the person before you has completed, no time/processing gaps.
• Don’t think, do: get your body into it.
• Find a smooth steady rhythm
• The circle can change direction if the instructor so chooses.

Possible take-aways principles:

• Your own impulse gives a unique delivery to the text.
• But it is always off what is going on in front of you in the moment.
• Pick up your cues.
• Rhythm is an important aspect of performance

This exercise is about:

• accepting what’s in front of you
• giving up control
• getting out of your head and into your body
• maintaining rhythm
• group teamwork
• learning to trust your own body impulses in the moment

Impulse Circle 3

• Everyone stands in a circle.
• One person makes a movement and simple sound, preferably using their full body
• Once the movement and sound are complete, the next person to the right makes the exact same movement and sound
• Once that person has completed the sound and movement, the person on their right makes the exact same movement and sound.
• The copying of the movement and sound combination continues around the circle as many times as it takes for the movement to and sound to be as exactly the same as possible, and for there to be no gaps of thinking from person to person, but a smooth cycling around the circle.
• Once the movement-sound combination is established around the circle, with each new iteration it can change slightly with impulse during the movement: extend, expand, shrink, shorten, etc.
• Let your impulse come from the moment and off of what you receive rather than what you plan or decide to do in advance
• The movement should stay essentially the same but there should be a gradual pulse to it as it gradually shifts from one person to the next
• Try this a few times with a few movement-sound combinations

Coaching points:

• The movement creator should follow their body impulse in the moment, not try to plan it or create something clever.
• See with your full being
• Work off what you’re given by the person before you rather than what you see going on in the rest of the circle.
• Let the movement of the person before you complete before you start.
• Let your movement begin right after the person before you has completed, no time/processing gaps.
• Don’t think, do: get your body into it.
• Find a smooth steady rhythm
• The circle can change direction if the instructor so chooses.

Possible take-aways principles:

• Your own impulse gives a unique delivery to the text.
• But it is always off what is going on in front of you in the moment.
• Pick up your cues.
• Rhythm is an important aspect of performance

Check in with how you feel

Don’t put a name on it, just check in, maybe you feel nothing

Stand for two minutes:

• feet shoulder width apart
• hands on hips
• shoulders back, chest out/high
• gaze look slighty up, above the horizon, toward the sky

Hold and breath in this pose for two minutes

Check in with how you feel

Observations: what is the difference?

Learning: your body can affect how you feel

 

 

EXERCISE ONE: Walking around speaking it all together to yourself – muttering it to yourself.

EXERCISE TWO: Look when metre and sense don’t work.

“in the late plays, the lines are very full”

Time and weight are part of stress.  Evenly distributed and weighted iambic would be boring.

EXERCISE THREE:  Walk around doing it for your own sense, changing direction on punctuation marks.  Get the sense of how the thoughts are moving, a sense of how rapidly we change directions in a thought.  Thought is also breath.  Do it with a brisk walk.

EXERCISE FOUR: Be on the word.  “Clumps of sense”  I think the main help here would be thinking to the end of the thought.

EXERCISE FIVE: Caesura.  Cicely Berry via Edith Evans: “a poise”  They help to vary the rhythm, they help the audience understand.

EXERCISE SIX: Read last words in each line.  We hear the through line of its story and the words take use through.

EXERCISE SEVEN: Jostling each other while reading it.  Stops us making the voice behave in the way we think it should.  It releases the inherent violence in the words and the primitive response we have to the language.

Don’t speak it as delicate poetry (unless maybe its lyrical), speak it as it is.  It’s an amplifier, the more you open yourself up to it the more it gives back to you.

 

EXERCISE EIGHT:  Repeat the words that grab you as you hear someone read it.

Rhythms (pp. 89-90)

Using voices, hands and feet, all the actors set up a rhythm together.

After a few minutes, they change it slowly, till a new rhythm emerges, and so on, for several minutes.

Variation

Each actor does a different rhythm, separately till the joker gives the instruction, “Unify”; everyone unites into a single rhythm.

After a few minutes, the joker shouts “Disperse”, the rhythm breaks down into separate parts again.

Variation

At a given signal, each actor takes a particular rhythm and does a movement in time with it.

After a few minutes, each actor tries to get closer to one or more of the others, choosing according to rhythmic affinity.

Little by little, those who have the greatest affinity homogenize their rhythm until practically the whole group has the same rhythm and movement.

It may not happen – which doesn’t matter, as long as the sub groups which have formed have their own well-defined rhythms and movements.

How many A’s in one A? (p. 99)

A circle.

One actor goes into the middle and expresses a feeling, an emotion, or an idea, using only the sound of the letter “A”, in any of its possible inflections, and a movement or gesture.

All the actors in the circle repeat that sound and action three times.

Then another actor goes in and expresses a different idea, emotion, or feeling, and again the circle repeats it three times.

And so on.

Then the same thing with “E”, “I”, “O”, and “U”.

Then with a single word.

Finally with a sentence.

Rhythms (pp. 89-90)

Using voices, hands and feet, all the actors set up a rhythm together.

After a few minutes, they change it slowly, till a new rhythm emerges, and so on, for several minutes.

Variation

Each actor does a different rhythm, separately till the joker gives the instruction, “Unify”; everyone unites into a single rhythm.

After a few minutes, the joker shouts “Disperse”, the rhythm breaks down into separate parts again.

Variation

At a given signal, each actor takes a particular rhythm and does a movement in time with it.

After a few minutes, each actor tries to get closer to one or more of the others, choosing according to rhythmic affinity.

Little by little, those who have the greatest affinity homogenize their rhythm until practically the whole group has the same rhythm and movement.

It may not happen – which doesn’t matter, as long as the sub groups which have formed have their own well-defined rhythms and movements.

How many A’s in one A? (p. 99)

A circle.

One actor goes into the middle and expresses a feeling, an emotion, or an idea, using only the sound of the letter “A”, in any of its possible inflections, and a movement or gesture.

All the actors in the circle repeat that sound and action three times.

Then another actor goes in and expresses a different idea, emotion, or feeling, and again the circle repeats it three times.

And so on.

Then the same thing with “E”, “I”, “O”, and “U”.

Then with a single word.

Finally with a sentence.

Moving the Metre – Stage 1
Houseman, p. 77

• To mark the rhythm, say “ti-tum” out loud and shift your weight from foot to foot to for, shifting on each weak beat and letting your foot hit the floor on each strong beat.
• Commit to the movement with your whole body as you might if you were responding to a rap or any dance music with a strong beat. What ever you do, avoid being tentative or reverent!

ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  [silent ti–tum]
lift-hit   lift-hit  lift-hit  lift-hit  lift-hit

• Practise several lines in this rhythm, with a silent “ti–tum” between each line to separate it from the next.  Continue shifting your weight on the silent beat.
• Note: it is important to separate each line from the next with a silent “ti–tum” to keep each line intact and so that you begin to have a sense of the verse shape, which we will look at in more detail later.

ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  [silent beat]
ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  [silent beat]
ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  [silent beat]
ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  [silent beat]

• Commit fully to the rhythm and to expressing it physically with confidence and sureness.  You’ll find that if you bash the strong “tum” beats out firmly, the weak “ti” beats will take care of themselves.
• Keep playing with this until you feel utterly comfortable with the rhythm. Let it be playful and energetic as it might be if you were dancing or playing a sport.

Stage Two – To explore iambic pentameter rhythm in the text
Houseman, pp. 77-84

• Before you add the text, shift weight to the rhythm again, to remind yourself of it.

ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum [silent beat]
ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum [silent beat]
ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum [silent beat]
ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum ti-tum [silent beat]

• Now, take the first line of your chosen speech and speak it in rhythm, shifting weight as you did on ‘ti-tum‘. Speak the syllables that fall on the strong stresses – in bold – as strongly as possibly, letting the weakly stressed syllables take care of themselves.
• Repeat your chosen line several times until the metric rhythm is clear. The less subtle you are the better; really beat it out.
• Now take the next line and beat that out strongly a few times. Again, focus on the strong beats and let the weak ones take care of themselves.
• Take the next few lines and beat them out strongly a few times, with a silent beat between the two lines that separate them.
• The silent beat separates each line from the next, which makes it easier for you to keep track of the rhythm. It also helps you to begin to have a sense of the line structure which we will further explore later.  Keep moving on the silent beat, and you will find this much easier.
• If you share a line with another character, work together beat it all out as a single line. If you’re working alone on a scene, finish the shared lines yourself.
• Now take the next few lines and beat them out strongly, with a silent beat between each line.
• Continue to take then next lines in batches of four lines, and beat them out strongly, with a silent beat between the lines. Again, wherever a line is shared, make sure you beat it out as a single line working one after the other.
• Now, work through the whole of your speech/scene beating out the rhythm strongly, and ignoring thee sense stress. Remember to focus on the strong beats and let the weak beats take care of themselves. 
• Now speak your speech/scene normally as if you were talking to someone, or your scene partner. Forget about the rhythm; let it take care of itself. 
• As in the last chapter, choose and object to speak to so you have a sense of communicating rather than talking into a void. It’s fine at this point if you are not absolutely sure of the meaning: that will come as we work.

Walking the Sentence: To discover the rhythm, flow and energy of the thoughts in a text.
Houseman, 85-87

• As in the last chapter, walk purposefully around the room as you say the text, treating each sentence as a journey, so that you start walking as you start the sentence and keep walking without pause, ignoring all the commas, dashes, colons, etc., until you reach the first stop.
• Breathe whenever you need to, as long as you keep walking. As you work on this and the other punctuation exercises, your breath will sort itself out.
• At the end of each sentence, stop to have a sense of having completed the journey of the sentence.
• Then, start off in another direction with the new sentence and again keep walking until you come to the full stop.
• As you walk. have a sense of someone in front of you to whom you are talking and really want to communicate with. Avoid ambling or rushing; simply walk with purpose as if you were going somewhere specific.

Using the Colons and Semi-colons
Houseman, 88-89

• Go through your chosen speech, walking the sentences as you did earlier.
• As before, stop at each full stop. Then start off on a new sentence.
• When you come to the colons and semi-colons think: “I could stop my sentence here but I want to add something” – as if you nearly pause and then interrupt yourself to carry on.

Changing Direction: To discover the differing rhythms within each thought and therefore the emotional to and fro in the thoughts of the text.
Houseman pp.90-91

• As before, walk purposefully as you say the text, but this time change direction without stopping, at every punctuation mark – including all dashes, etc. 
• Let yourself loose in this exercise, so that you walk and change direction in a fluid way.

What do you notice?

Can you feel the difference between the short phrases where you constantly turning and the long phrases where suddenly there’s more release?

Do you get an idea of how the character is feeling?

Don’t worry if you lose the sense.  Here we are looking at the emotional back and forth, so it is good if you feel tossed around by the thoughts.

• Go through it again, paying attention to the difference between the short and long phrases and noticing what clues this gives you about how the characters is feeling , about their emotional journey through the speech.

This exercise is excellent for bringing a speech or scene to life emotionally so that it is not too rationally or set. Enjoy the feeling of not being in control, of being tossed about by your thoughts. Allow yourself to be caught by surprise, then there’s a chance you might surprise the audience as well.

Changing Chairs: To discover how each phrase builds on the one before, so creating a ladder of meaning in the text.
Houseman pp.91-92 (credited to Cecily Berry)

• Take two chairs and place them side by side. Sit in one of the chairs and imagine a person in front of you to whom you are talking (or use your partner, with two chairs opposite you, if you are working on a scene). Speak the text, moving from one chair to the other on each punctuation mark.
• You can shift quite rapidly from chair to chair but avoid speaking while you are moving.
• Try the whole speech/scene in this way.

What do you notice?

Did you find the speech/scene more manageable?

Did it make more sense?

Did you feel how one thought was added to another?

In my experience, working through these five exercises – Moving the Meter, Walking the Sentences, Using Colons and Semi-colons, Changing Direction, and Changing Chairs – you have a chance to explore the rhythms of the text and the way they interweave with each other. By focusing on each structure separately you can embed that rhythm clearly and without confusion. Once you go into rehearsal and performance you can then let the rhythms take care of themselves and play together knowing that they are all being honoured without you having to consciously think about them.  And, indeed, the resulting interweaving is far more detailed and subtle than if you attempted to do it consciously.

Phrase by Phrase – To deepen the connection with the text

Stage One – Understanding the text
Houseman, pp.92-93

• Always take each sentence separately and within the sentence take it phrase by phrase.
• Look up any words you are unsure of in a glossary of Shakespeare’s words, such as Shakespeare’s Words by David Crystal and Ben Crystal or A Shakespeare Glossary by C.T. Onions.
• Use the notes in a good modern edition, such as the Arden, Cambridge or Penguin Shakespeare, to help you with phrases or sentences that are confusing. However, be warned: occasionally the explanatory notes are even more confusing than the phrase or sentence you are trying to unravel!
• Use Lemprière’s Classical Dictionary and Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable to look up people and places mentioned by your character.
• Make sure you are absolutely clear who all the pronouns – he, she, it, you, they, etc. – are referring to.
• Feel comfortable asking other people with more experience to help you out. They have been in the same position as you!

Phrase by Phrase – To deepen the connection with the text

Stage Two – Owning the text
(Houseman, pp. 93-94)

• Sit with a plant or lamp in front of you. The plant or lamp represents the person you are talking to in the speech.  This helps you to talk rather than act [see notes on this in the previous chapter].
• Look at  the first phrase on the page – that is, up to the first punctuation mark. Give yourself time to absorb it.
• Then, look up and register the plant or lamp before you speak, as if you are taking a moment to connect with the person it represents.
• Then, speak the phrase really wanting to communicate it.
• At the end of the phrase, pause for a moment as it to check that that phrase has been registered by the person you are talking to.
• Continue through the whole speech in this way, taking the time to absorb each phrase, to look up and connect, to communicate and to check that what you have said has been received.

Note: For this exercise the lines may be temporarily broken up so that you can connect with each phrase. In later exercises, however, we will look at flowing each line through.

Walking the Verse: To experience the verse shape and how it interacts with the sentence shape.
(Houseman, pp.95-96)

• You are literally going to walk the verse line. By this I mean you are going to walk across the room in one direction as you say the first line and then back in the opposite direction as you say the next line and so on, back and forth across the room.
• If you are working with a scene, stand listening while your partner speaks, and be ready to begin walking when they stop speaking and your lines begin, especially in the case of a shared line.
• If the sentence end – that is, the full stop – coincides with the line end, stop after the last word in the line, before turning to start the next line.
• If the sentence does not end at the end of the line, then turn immediately into the next line.
• If there is a full stop in the middle of the line, keep walking, but allow yourself to have time for the thought change into the new sentence.
• Go through the speech again in the same way being aware of where the sentence and line stop together; where the sentence flows over the line ending and the last word of the verse line is given an extra pointing; and in a scene, where lines are shared, how your sentences pick up rapidly in the middle of the line, flowing out of your partner’s.

Clicking the Final Word – To understand how the final stressed word of each line is highlighted
(Houseman, 97-99)

• Walk around the room with purpose as you speak the text.
• Where a full stop and line ending coincide, stop for a moment, before setting out on the next sentence. Where a full stop comes in the middle of a line, keep moving and simply find the new thought as you move.
• As you walk, click your fingers as you say the last stressed syllable of each line.

What did you discover from that?

Did you notice that the words at the end of each line are important within the sense of each sentence?

Did you notice that by highlighting them you were better able to shape each sentence and therefore to find and communicate its meaning more effectively?

As with the previous exercise you have to practise this one over and over again to enable the verse and sentence structures to work together effectively.

Marking the Caesura – To understand how the caesura works within the line and how it can help to shape the text
(Houseman, 99-102)

• Stand or sit as you prefer. You need your hands free, so stick the text on the wall or place it on a table in front of you.
• As you say the first part of the line, lift one hand – palm up – as if offering that part of the line.
• Then, as you say the second part of the line, life the other hand – palm up – as if offering that second part.
• Drop your hands at the end of the line and repeat the same procedure for the next line.
• Continue in this way until you have worked through the whole speech.

How was that?

Did you notice that in some lines the break helped the sense, and that in others the break got in the way and you simply wanted to flow on?

Did the break help you to understand how the second part of the line built on the first?

Did it help you to shape the speech and to feel more in control of it?

Note: Full stops, colons, and semi-colon within lines come at the caesura break. Also, if there is a rhyme, or near-rhyme, within a line it will usually occur on the last word before the caesura break, as in this example from A Midsummer Night’s Dream:

Nor have love’s mind/ of any judgement taste;
Wings and no eyes figure unheedy haste:

• Speak the speech normally now, forgetting about the break and letting the lines flow through. As always, remember to talk the speech to an object.

How did you find that?

Did it help to have worked on the breaks previously?

Could you feel yet more shape in the speech or maybe it simply felt a little easier to say?

Often the shift is not huge. Each exercise shifts you a little more deeply into a speech or scene so that it becomes more comfortable.

As with all these exercises, you never consciously put the caesura break in the lines in rehearsal or performance. If you have thoroughly explored it and how it supports you then the shape it gives will remain even though you are not focussing on it consciously.

We have now finished the exploration of the structures and rhythms within verse and prose text. Before we go on to look at sound, word, and image, I want to say something about poetry and heightened text.

Connecting with the Vowels – To experience how the vowels give rhythm and ‘music’
(Houseman, 105-109)

• Go through your chosen text line by line saying only the vowels, remembering to commit fully to the different lengths.
• Add ‘h’ in front of each vowel to ensure that you are supporting the sound you are making with breath rather than the sound catching in your throat.
• It is useful to mark the rhythm with your hand – doing quick downward movements for the short vowels, long horizontal movements for the long vowels and big rounded movements for the dipthongs.

 

Note: I have chosen not to use phonetic symbols to identify the vowels because not everyone knows these symbols. Therefore I have used the spelling which is as near as possible to a particular sound. Also, in connected speech we do not fully say all the vowels. Where they are unstressed they can be reduced to a more neutral ‘er’ or ‘i’.

Do you notice how committing to each vowel, to its specific sound and length, creates a music in the text?

Do you get a sense of how the character might be feeling from this music?

It may be at this point that you can’t pick up on the music or emotion.  This is often the case at first. As you practise the exercise, it will become more and more comfortable.  For now, choose for yourself whether you want to have another go at the vowel exercise or return to the whole speech.

• Speak the text normally, letting the vowels take care of themselves.
• If you have used a marked up version to help you remember the vowels, use an unmarked version.

This exercise is an excellent way of becoming aware of the specific music of each text. The point being, as I hope you have begun to discover, that the music of a piece may be harsh and abrupt just as often as it may be beautiful or lyrical.  It reflects the feelings of the characters and can change as those feelings change: it is not a single overlaid melody.

You may have already begun to notice patterns of sound in the text, where certain sounds are repeated. We will look at such patterns and the clues they give you after the next exercise.

Connecting with the Consonants – To become aware of physically forming the consonants and how they add to the sound pattern of the whole
(Houseman, 109-112)

• Speak the consonants only, allowing the vowels to be reduced to a neutral grunt. 
• If a word has only vowels, simply click or clap on them to acknowledge there is a word there.

Working with consonants in this way can feel very frustrating as if you can’t quite get going. This is because it is the vowels that carry the flow, and the consonants that define and shape that flow. At the same time you are probably aware of the amount your lips and tongue are working. This gives – as Cecily Berry calls it – muscularity to the words.  It gives energy and bite.

• Now speak the whole text, letting the consonants take care of themselves.

Does the text feel easier to say, does it feel more defined?

Do you get a more muscular sense of the words as you say them?

Working this way gives you a physical sense of the words and makes them much more comfortable and authentic to say.

If you practise the vowel and consonant exercises regularly you will find that you become more responsive to sound in all texts and therefore more able to honour it and make it your own.  This in turn will help you to find the particular size and energy of a text in a way that is truthful and engaging. So, even if you you’re not sure what you’re getting out of these exercises, they are worth persevering with.

When we repeat a sound, or indeed a word, in everyday speech we are usually aware  of repeating it, and that causes us to say the repetition in a different way: to give it a little more energy or emphasis if you like; and each time we repeat, we build the energy or emphasis a little more. Repetition of sound in text builds in the same way and further supports both sound and sense. (p.112)

Alliteration 
(Houseman, 113-114)

• Speak the line or lines being aware of the repetition in the alliteration.
• Notice how the repetition gives energy and therefore emphasis to the words that are alliterated.
• Now try again, letting the repetitions build in energy and therefore emphasis as you go.

Do you notice how the emphasis given by the repetition supports the feeling and meaning of the lines?

There can also be different threads of alliteration going on at the same time. These give energy and emphasis in a much more subtle way than would repeating the same sound four times in close proximity.

• Try phrases with more complex alliterations a few times, letting both (or the many) threads of repetitions build and feeling how they weave into each other.

Focussing on and using the patterns of sound helps to bind emotion and sense together in a way that is satisfying both for you and the audience.

When we repeat a sound, or indeed a word, in everyday speech we are usually aware  of repeating it, and that causes us to say the repetition in a different way: to give it a little more energy or emphasis if you like; and each time we repeat, we build the energy or emphasis a little more. Repetition of sound in text builds in the same way and further supports both sound and sense. (p.112)

Assonance
(Houseman, 114)

• Try out phrases with assonance and notice the build and emphasis for yourself, and again, how it supports the feeling and the meaning.

As with the earlier work on Connecting with the Vowels, focussing on the repetition of the vowels gives you a sense of the emotional build and release. It encourages you to be much braver and it connects you much more deeply to the text.

You may have notices that some of the phrases have both alliteration and assonance. This gives the text as complexity and intensity that allows the hearer to received the essence of the speech at a sound level as well as a scene level.

You may be wondering how you are going to weave these different threads of sound repetition together, but as always you won’t have to focus consciously on them if you have explored them individually and raised your awareness of them.  They will look after themselves and weave together far more subtly and effectively than if you tried to weave them consciously.

Focussing on and using the patterns of sound helps to bind emotion and sense together in a way that is satisfying both for you and the audience. (p.114)

When we repeat a sound, or indeed a word, in everyday speech we are usually aware  of repeating it, and that causes us to say the repetition in a different way: to give it a little more energy or emphasis if you like; and each time we repeat, we build the energy or emphasis a little more. Repetition of sound in text builds in the same way and further supports both sound and sense. (p.112)

Consonance
(Houseman, 114-115)

• Try the lines and notice how paying attention to the repetition of the consonants encourages you to commit to the sounds and therefore to the words.

Sometimes the consonant near or at the end of a word will be the same consonant that starts the next word; whilst this is not strictly consonance it is worth considering here. Both Viola and Claudio have examples: ‘deadly life’, ‘warm motion’. This repetition tends to make us separate the two words and therefore give them emphasis through giving them more space and time.

• Try phrases like those for yourself, notice how separating the words gives each phrase greater power and allows you to use the sound to convey the sense.

Focussing on and using the patterns of sound helps to bind emotion and sense together in a way that is satisfying both for you and the audience. (p.114)

Exploring Alliteration, Assonance, and Consonance – To explore the sound patterns effectively in a text
(Houseman, 115-116)

• Go through a speech or scene marking all the alliteration. The characters may share alliteration so be aware of this.
• Then, speak the scene being aware of each threat of alliteration and allowing the energy to build.
• Then, do the same with the assonance.
• Then, do the same with the consonance.
• Then, speak the text, letting the sound patterns take care of themselves.

Focussing on the sound patterns in this way helps you to connect more deeply with the sound shape or music in a text and also helps you to find the key words in terms of the argument of a speech or scene. Together with the key words in terms of the argument of a speech or scene. Together with the earlier work on the vowels and consonants it will draw you closer to understanding how the sounds support the feeling and meaning. It is then much easier to commit to the language and because you ave ore sense of how it works, it becomes more fun to speak: you can really get your teeth into it. You will also begin to feel far more confident because you will get a clear sense of the clues that Shakespeare gives his actors and of the specific journey on which he takes the character.

Exploring the Rhyme – To understand how to work with the rhyme
(Houseman, 117-120)

Let’s start with [rhyming couplets].

• As you say the lines, indicate the setting-up and completion of the rhyme physically by turning out one of your hands palm upwards on the set-up of the rhyme and closing that palm on the completion of the rhyme.
• Then, turn the other palm upward on the next set-up and close it on the completion.

How was that?

Did you notice that the rhymes give and extra energy, so you spring off the set-up of the rhyme into the completion and then the completed couplet gives you an energy which springs you into the next couplet and so on?

Also, the rhymes make both the listener and speaker more aware of the verse structure, as they highlight more strongly the end of the verse line. This gives a tighter framework for the content of the speech to push against. It also highlights even more strongly the last word in the line.

Now let’s look at [alternate rhymes].

• Again, indicate the set ups and completions with your hands as you say the lines On the first set-up again turn one palm upwards and on the second set-up turn you other palm upwards. Then on the first completion close your first palm and on your second completion close your second palm.

How was that?

Did you notice how different that feels?

The rhyming is less obvious and you have to wait longer for the completion. With the rhyming couplets, each is a complete entity in itself, whereas with the alternate rhymes there is no completion until the fourth line.

• Try the examples [you’re working with] again in the same way and notice how they feel different for you and how they might lead to different thought and emotional energies.

There is no right answer. As always, what is important here is to notice that there is a structural difference which is likely to lead to a difference in feeling and thought.

So how does rhyme interact with sentence structure? Where the completing rhyme and the full stop coincide, you get a greater sense of ending. Where there is no full stop you move straight from the completions of one rhyme into the set-up of the next. In this way variety is achieved, as one structure is played off against another and so predictability is avoided and tension increased. If you have separately explored the sentence, verse, and rhyme structures through doing Walking the Sentences, Walking the Verse, and Exploring the Rhyme you will naturally find the variety and tension when you rehearse and perform.

What happens when the whole or part of a scene is written in rhyme with the characters possibly sharing rhyming couplets?

The same tension between verse structure and sentence structure will be in evidence in scenes as it is in speeches. The added extra is the possibility of shared rhymes and also of breaking into or out of rhyme and therefore coming together with or moving away from the other character or characters.

A word of warning: If you try to ignore rhyme it will stick out like a sore thumb. If, however, you immerse yourself in it and use it fully, it will seem wholly appropriate and real. This is true of every so-called artificial device or structure in a play – the more you embrace it, the more it will fit; the more you ignore or try to hide it, the more obvious and clumsy it becomes. Where a whole speech is in rhyming couplets, returning to Walking the Sentences and Clicking the Final Word will help you balance the rhyme structure with the scene structure and keep the speech flexible rather than emphatic.

Rhyming couplets at the end of speeches and scenes help to finish the speech or scene firmly and give and extra energy to that end. Often they occur when a character has come to a decision: the  rhyming couple shows the decision, and the energy it releases takes the character forward into the action.

[Examples from Macbeth, Measure for Measure, Twelfth Night and Richard III]

Notice rhyming couplets at the end of speeches and scenes and use them with confidence. They give tremendous energy, which is vital in transitions between speeches and scenes. They are also great fun for the actor and the audience whether in a light hearted or a blacker moment, so embrace them fully and let them help you and the audience on your way through the journey of the play.

The amount of rhymed or blank verse used in Shakespeare’s plays varies. What is important, as with all the other patterns and structures in Shakespeare is to notice the shifts. As yourself: ‘Why do I start or stop rhyming here? What difference does it make? What difference do I notice as I speak it?  Is there a shift of thought or feeling or relationship?’

(pp.123-4)

• Sit comfortably in a chair or on the floor with the text in front of you.
• Look at the first chunk, then close your eyes and say it slowly and quietly three times, allowing a slight pause between each time.  Avoid deciding how to say the chunk, simply allow yourself to keep connecting more with what you are are saying. […without overemphasis and without deciding how to say it (p.61)].
• [Note: This is the only exercise where you do not focus on talking to or communicating with anyone else. Instead you focus inward, allowing the words to resonate within you. (p.61)]
• [Take your time so that the words have a chance to sink in. (p.61)]
• Once you have said the chunk three times, open your eyes and look a the next chunk. Take your time to absorb this new chunk and then close your eyes and allow yourself to say that chunk three times. […again, taking your time. (p.61)]
• Continue through the speech the same way, taking one chunk at a time.  There is no need to add the chunks together. Simply explore them separately.
• [Work quietly but avoid whispering. Take your time so that you can absorb the words and allow them to register and resonate. Connection will happen automatically. (p.62)]
• Work through at least the first half of your chosen speech before you move on.

What did you discover from that exercise?

Did you notice how deeply you were able to connect with each chunk when you gave yourself the time?

This exercise is great to do at any stage in rehearsal or a run.  If you do it at the beginning of rehearsals it will help you connect with the text quickly. It will also take you deep into the world of the character: since the language a person sues comes from their internal imagery and reflects their internal world, their internal psychology.  This exercise will also help you to learn the text, although that should never be your focus of attention when you’re doing the exercise. It is simply that you will make a deep and accurate connection early on and because you hav associated the words with your own experience they will be easier to remember.

Later in rehearsals, this exercise takes you even deeper into the text, and brings to your attention words and phrases that may be crucial but that have, somehow, slipped by unnoticed.

During a run it can freshen up your connection with the words and bring the whole text alive for you again.

Physicalizing the Words – To further explore, connect with and commit to the words
(Houseman pp.124-125)

• Prop up a copy of the speech you have chosen to work on, on a window ledge or suchlike so that you are free to move, rather than having the text in your mind.
• [Stand in front of the text and explore each word separately. As you say each word make a physical movement that, for you, expresses the meaning of that word. The movement does not have to be clear, creative or witty, and it does not need to make sense to anyone else. This is exploratory work for you, so you simply have to fully commit, with your whole body, to whatever physical movement you make. (p.63)]
• Take each word individually and make a movement, large or small, which expresses that word for you.  This is a private exercise for you, so it doesn’t matter whether the movements would make any sense to anyone else, as long as they make sense to you.
• Some words you may find you only need to explore once whilst others need to be explored several times, using either the same or different movements until you feel that you have connected with the word for yourself.
• [Some words you may find you only need to say them and do the movement once and you feel you have made a connection; with others you may find you need to explore them several times. Always explore by saying the word simultaneously with the movement rather than sopping and thinking! (p.63)]
• Include all the words – “a”, “in”, “and”, “the”, etc. – since these are also important in the journey of the speech […for these have their plan in the journey of the sentence and the thought. (p.64)].  Also, pay particular attention to pronouns – “I”, “you”, “they”, etc. since it is important that you are crystal clear about who you are referring to.
• Also, make sure that your movements, however large or small, are fully committed.
• [Accept the face that the text will be broken up – you are exploring each word rather than working on the speech as a whole. (p.64]
• Work through at least the second half of your speech before you read on.

Note: Sometimes you may find that you can’t completely connect with a word and you may have to leave it hanging and perhaps go and look it up in a dictionary or talk to someone about it. (p.64)

• Keep the exercise light and playful, make your gestures big and fully commit to them and ignore your inner critic [see page 24]! (p.64)

How was that? (p.64)

Did you find that you had to search more deeply for what a word meant to you in order to find any movement at all? (p.64)

Did you notice how even the small words were important and moved the speech on? (p.64)

This exercise is excellent for exploring the journey from word to word as well as for deepening the connection with each word. It can be a very liberating exercise that help you to be much braver with the text. Play with it as a child might: enjoying the physical movement and the exploration of the word. (p.64)

Three Times Through and Physicalizing the Words allow you to make deep connections with each word so that when you flow the text together you can access those connections at speed and colour the words without being laborious or overemphatic. (p.64)

Geography Exercise – To anchor the places and people and ideas , which you refer to in a text, giving them a reality and a relationship
(Houseman pp.125-126, 67-68)

• Gather a group of objects with different [sizes, weights, shapes and (p.67)] textures – a scarf, some keys, a pen, a book, a hairbrush, a plastic bottle, a purse or wallet, etc. – and set them out in front of you on the floor or on a table. [The more arbitrary the choice, the better. Just make sure that nothing you use is breakable! (p.67)]

Note: Even to ten objects is sufficient since they can be used to represent more that one word or phrase.

• If you need the text, place it beside the objects so that you can see it clearly without having to hold it.
• Imagine that there is someone sitting opposite you that you want to communicate the speech to and that the objects in front of you represent the people and places and ideas you refer to in the speech.
• Say the text picking up an object to represent the first key word or phrase as if the object is the word or phrase and you are showing it to the person you are talking to. Then, put that object down and pick up another to represent the next key word or phrase. [Imagine you are showing the word or phrase to the person you are talking to. (p.67)]
• [Make no attempt to choose relevant objects, simply pick up whatever comes to hand. (p67)]
• [As before, imagine someone in front of you whom you are truly trying to communicate with. (p.67)]
• For example, in Juliet’s speech you might pick up a first object for ‘Gallop apace’, a second object for ‘fiery footed’ and a third for ‘steeds’. In Henry’s speech you might pick up a first object on ‘Once more’, a second object  on ‘unto the breech’, third on ‘dear friends’, and fourth on ‘once more’.
• Continue through the whole speech in the same way.
• There is no need to make the objects fit what you are talking about; simply pick up whatever comes to hand. 
• [The more playful you are with this exercise, the more you use the objects to represent the words and communicate what you mean to the person you imagine talking to, the better. (p.67)]

How did you find that?

Did you find that the words become more specific and that you could see the relationship they had with one another?

Did you notice that you have more sense of the words in relationship to each other? (p.67)

Did you notice how the objects helped you to be more specific? (p.67)

This exercise works because it physically recreates the mental act of choosing a word or phrase and using it to communicate with another person, to show them what you mean. Suddenly, the word or phrase becomes specific; it has a relationship with you and with the other words or phrases in the text. (p.67)

This exercise is easier to do once you know the text, but you can use it in the early stages if you take it very slowly. (p.68)

This exercise is great to do with a scene partner or partners. You begin to have a sense of the to and fro between the characters and of how each persons’s words relate to the others’.

Sit with a collections of objects between you and take it in turns to use the objects as each person speaks their lines. In the way you really find out how the language goes back and forth between the characters. (p.68)

Like many of the exercises this is worth coming back to at various points in rehearsal and even performance.

 

Museum Visit – To further anchor the place, people and ideas, which you refer to in a text, giving them a reality and a relationship
(Houseman pp.126-127, 68)

• Prop up a copy of the speech you have chosen to work on, on a window ledge or suchlike so that you are free to move, rather than having the text in your mind.
• [Stand in front of the text and explore each word separately. As you say each word make a physical movement that, for you, expresses the meaning of that word. The movement does not have to be clear, creative or witty, and it does not need to make sense to anyone else. This is exploratory work for you, so you simply have to fully commit, with your whole body, to whatever physical movement you make. (p.63)]
• Take each word individually and make a movement, large or small, which expresses that word for you.  This is a private exercise for you, so it doesn’t matter whether the movements would make any sense to anyone else, as long as they make sense to you.
• Some words you may find you only need to explore once whilst others need to be explored several times, using either the same or different movements until you feel that you have connected with the word for yourself.
• [Some words you may find you only need to say them and do the movement once and you feel you have made a connection; with others you may find you need to explore them several times. Always explore by saying the word simultaneously with the movement rather than sopping and thinking! (p.63)]
• Include all the words – “a”, “in”, “and”, “the”, etc. – since these are also important in the journey of the speech […for these have their plan in the journey of the sentence and the thought. (p.64)].  Also, pay particular attention to pronouns – “I”, “you”, “they”, etc. since it is important that you are crystal clear about who you are referring to.
• Also, make sure that your movements, however large or small, are fully committed.
• [Accept the face that the text will be broken up – you are exploring each word rather than working on the speech as a whole. (p.64]
• Work through at least the second half of your speech before you read on.

Note: Sometimes you may find that you can’t completely connect with a word and you may have to leave it hanging and perhaps go and look it up in a dictionary or talk to someone about it. (p.64)

• Keep the exercise light and playful, make your gestures big and fully commit to them and ignore your inner critic [see page 24]! (p.64)

How was that? (p.64)

Did you find that you had to search more deeply for what a word meant to you in order to find any movement at all? (p.64)

Did you notice how even the small words were important and moved the speech on? (p.64)

This exercise is excellent for exploring the journey from word to word as well as for deepening the connection with each word. It can be a very liberating exercise that help you to be much braver with the text. Play with it as a child might: enjoying the physical movement and the exploration of the word. (p.64)

Three Times Through and Physicalizing the Words allow you to make deep connections with each word so that when you flow the text together you can access those connections at speed and colour the words without being laborious or overemphatic. (p.64)

Moving the Metre – Stage 1 (p. 77)

• To mark the rhythm, say “ti-tum” out loud and shift your weight from foot to foot to for, shifting on each weak beat and letting your foot hit the floor on each strong beat.
• Commit to the movement with your whole body as you might if you were responding to a rap or any dance music with a strong beat. What ever you do, avoid being tentative or reverent!

ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  [silent ti–tum]
lift-hit   lift-hit  lift-hit  lift-hit  lift-hit

• Practise several lines in this rhythm, with a silent “ti–tum” between each line to separate it from the next.  Continue shifting your weight on the silent beat.
• Note: it is important to separate each line from the next with a silent “ti–tum” to keep each line intact and so that you begin to have a sense of the verse shape, which we will look at in more detail later.

ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  [silent beat]
ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  [silent beat]
ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  [silent beat]
ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  ti–tum  [silent beat]

• Commit fully to the rhythm and to expressing it physically with confidence and sureness.  You’ll find that if you bash the strong “tum” beats out firmly, the weak “ti” beats will take care of themselves.
• Keep playing with this until you feel utterly comfortable with the rhythm. Let it be playful and energetic as it might be if you were dancing or playing a sport.

How many A’s in one A? (p. 99)

A circle.

One actor goes into the middle and expresses a feeling, an emotion, or an idea, using only the sound of the letter “A”, in any of its possible inflections, and a movement or gesture.

All the actors in the circle repeat that sound and action three times.

Then another actor goes in and expresses a different idea, emotion, or feeling, and again the circle repeats it three times.

And so on.

Then the same thing with “E”, “I”, “O”, and “U”.

Then with a single word.

Finally with a sentence.

(pp. 164-166)

PRESS is Heavy, Sustained, and Direct.

• Practice by pressing against a wall or down on a table.
• Derivative Actions: crush, cut, squeeze.
• Notice the heaviness this action has, that it can be done continuously and that your attention has a directness of focus.

PUNCH is Heavy, Sudden, and Direct

• Practice by punching an imaginary punching ball in front of you.
• Derivative Actions: shove, kick, poke.
• Notice that this action is also heavy and that your attention is again directly focused. However, since you have to pull your arm back after each punch before you can punch again, this action as a staccato quality.

WRING is Heavy, Sustained, and Indirect.

• Practice by wringing your hands together.
• Derivative Actions: pull, pluck, stretch
• Notice that this action is also heavy, that it can be sustained without interruption, but that your attention is less directly focussed.

SLASH is Heavy, Sudden, and Indirect

• Practice by slashing out to the side with your arms one after the other, almost as if you were fighting off an attack.
• Derivative Actions: beat, throw, whip.
• Notice that this action is also heavy, that it has a staccato quality like Punch, and that, like Wring, your attention is less directly focussed.

GLIDE is Light, Sustained, and Direct.

• Practice by stretching your arms out to each side at shoulder level, with your shoulder blades relaxed, and moving around as if you were a glider.
• Derivative Actions: smooth, smear, smudge.
• Notice that this action is lighter than the previous four, that the movement can be sustained and that you have regained the focus of attention you had with Press and Punch.

DAB is Light, Sudden, and Direct

• Practice by imagining that you are dabbing gently with a cloth, perhaps to clean a fragile object.
• Derivative Actions: pat, tap, shake.
• Notice that this action is also light, that it has a staccato quality like Punch, and that again your attention is focussed.

FLOAT is Light, Sustained, and Indirect.

• Practice by imagining that you are a piece of paper or a leaf being gently blown about by the wind.
• Derivative Actions: strew, stir, stroke.
• Notice that this action is also light, that it has a sustained quality like Glide, but that, as with Wring, your attention is less focussed.

FLICK is Light, Sudden, and Indirect

• Practice by imagining you are flicking fluff off your clothes or swatting away flies.
• Derivative Actions: flip, flap, jerk.
• Notice that this action is also light, that it has a staccato quality like Dab, and that, like as with Float, your attention is less focussed.

(pp.166-167)

To experience different rhythms and how they affect thought rhythms, physicality and voice

• Once you have a sense of the quality of each rhythm, take the time to explore each one more thoroughly, starting with the movements as described above, then involving more of your body.
• Keep checking with the chart to make sure that you have the correct weight, flow and focus for each one.
• Then, still doing the movement, say some lines of text, noticing the effect of the the movement on your thought.

It is worth noting which rhythms are more alien to you and then taking the time to explore them further physically until they become more familiar and available to you.

These rhythms are not tied to particular emotions.  Any emotion can be expressed through any rhythm.

• Take and emotion and explore expressing it thought each of the different rhythms.
• Notice how different rhythms change the quality of emotion.

This is extremely useful work, since it is often difficult to comprehend how a particular emotion could be expressed differently from the way you express it.

(p.167)

Apart from exploring any rhythms which are alien to you and working with the emotions, as suggested above, it is a good idea to play with all the rhythms regularly so that it becomes easy to access them and to switch from one to another.

When you are playing with rhythms it is important to go back to the chart and check the weight, flow and focus so that you know the rhythms are precise.

Here is my suggestion for a regular rhythm workout.

• Take each rhythm and begin to move in that rhythm, ensuring that the weight, flow and focus are accurate.  Have the chart on hand so you can easily check.
• Work with your whole body committing to the rhythm you are exploring completely and with great ease.
• Once you have worked on each rhythm individually then alternate between them.
• Alternate slowly at first so that you are sure that you are getting accurate shifts of weight, flow and focus.
• Then, speed up so that you can change swiftly between the rhythms without losing accuracy.

Working in this way will give you a great deal of flexibility – physically, mentally and vocally – and it will help you access those characters whose rhythms are radically different from yours.

(pp.167-169)

• Imagine that you character can only have one rhythm, choose which, from Laban’s eight, it would be. For the moment, choose instinctively rather than considering weight, flow or focus.
• Once you have chosen one rhythm, choose a second one in the same way.
• Then, choose a third in the same way. Make sure that you have noted these three rhythms down.

Note: I usually find three rhythms are a good, workable number, but if you feel you need more, fair enough.  I choose them one at a time because I find this the simplest and most effective way.  As with the motivation there is no one right answer. Choosing the rhythm is a device for helping you to identify the differences between you and the character.

• Now consider yourself for a moment. Again, imagining that you can only have one rhythm, choose which it would be. As before, choose instinctively.
• Then, pick a second rhythm.
• Then, pick a third. Again, note these three rhythms down.

Now that you have the two lists of possible rhythms you can analyze and then compare them. Start with your character’s list and refer to the chart as necessary.

• Note whether the character is predominantly heavy or light.
• Note whether the character is predominantly sustained or staccato.
• Note whether the character is predominantly focused or unfocussed.

For example, if for Petal we chose Glide, Float, and Dab, that would make her completely light, predominantly direct, and predominantly sustained.

If for Claudio we chose Punch, Wring, and Glide, that would make him predominantly heavy, direct, and sustained.

• Now go through the same process with your own list.

For example, if the actor playing Petal identified her own rhythms as Glide, Wring and Slash, she would be predominantly heavy, indirect and sustained.

If the actor playing Claudio identified his own rhythms as being Punch, Float and Dab, that would make him predominantly light, direct, and staccato.

• Now compare the analysis of yourself and your character, Look for differences in weight, flow, and focus between the two.

For example, the actor playing Petal would notice that Petal is lighter than her and more direct.

The actor playing Claudio would notice that Claudio is heavier and more sustained than he is.

Simply identifying the differences can be very helpful and is often enough for the actor concerned to make the necessary rhythm changes.

(pp.169-170)

This stage allows you to take the rhythm work further by physically exploring the rhythms you have chosen for your character and what clues they give you about the character’s external and internal movement.

• Start by taking each of the character rhythms individually and exploring it physically, ensuring that you are committing fully to the specific combination of weight, flow, and focus of that rhythm.
• Then, move between the different character rhythms exploring how they work together.
• Rest for a while and consider what you have learnt about the character and the way he/she moves, thinks, feels, etc. Make notes or draw images if that is helpful to you.
• Then, return to the strong physical exploration of these three rhythms and begin to speak the text, shifting from one rhythm to the next as feels instinctively appropriate.

Always keep the choice of which rhythm you use for which part of the text free, rather than setting it in any way. You are simply exploring possibilities: “What if these were the rhythms I used?”

Working with rhythms is particularly useful when you have to play more than one character.

• First, establish the rhythms for each character.
• Then, look for the main differences in rhythm between each of the characters you are playing.
• Focus on these differences and explore them physically.
• Then, still working physically, practice switching from one character to another, slightly exaggerating the rhythmic differences.

As always, this is exploratory work, which you then allow to take care of itself once you are back in rehearsals and performance.

(pp.170-171)

There can be two layers or rhythm in play at the same time: with one, if you like, covering, and so hiding, the other. Typical examples of this are where there is internal Press or Wring, with Glide or Float overlaying. This might be the case where someone was attempting to hide an intensity of thought or emotion by appearing to be lighter on the surface.

Any rhythm may be either a hidden or covering one and can be different at different points in the play.

Exploring Double Layers of Rhythm

To discover you the double layers of rhythm interact

So once you have done your initial character work, ask yourself the following questions:

• Are any of the rhythms I have identified and explored hidden either all or some of the time?
• Are there any other rhythms that the character might have hidden beneath the ones I have explored?

If it is not possible to answer these questions immediately, carry them with you as you rehearse and not what arises.

Once you have identified that there is an underlying or hidden rhythm you can work on it in the following way:

• Take the hidden rhythm first and explore it fully physically, committing to its specific weight, flow and focus.
• Then, allow that hidden rhythm to be expressed simply by your hands as if they were showing what is occurring internally.
• Now, explore the covering rhythm fully physically, committing to its specific weight, flow and focus.
• Then, explore the two rhythms together: expressing the hidden rhythm with your hands and the covering rhythm with the rest of your body.
• Explore how these two rhythms work together. For example, allowing the hidden rhythm to grow so it threatens to be revealed and then allowing the covering rhythm to exert itself and drive the hidden rhythm deeper.

By working in this way you are exploring possibilities, which will allow you to make accurate choices subconsciously during rehearsal and performance.

It is a good idea to return to the physical exploration of your character’s rhythms regularly in order to strengthen the shift away from yourself and your way of being and doing to that of the character. The more you explore this work the more you will find that you make discoveries that are fresh and authentic rather than clichéd and superficial.

(pp.171-173)

The final area to explore is the language the characters uses. This reflects the inner world of the character.

The exercises in Part Two exploring connection – Three Times Through, Physicalizing the Word, Geography Exercise and Museum Visit – all help you to explore your character’s language and imager. It’s also revelatory to list the key language your character uses throughout the play and the threats of words and images that run through that language.

Finding the Threads

To connect more deeply with the inner world of the character through the language and imagery they use

• Go through each scene, noting down the key words and phrases that the character uses.
• Trust your instinct and simply note down whatever jumps out at you, even if you’re not sure why.

Again, below is a possible list of Petal’s key words and phrases from the first twenty pages of Shimmer to give you some idea.

Petal’s key words and phrases

I’m used to things to turning out the way I want.
Most people…
Statistically speaking…
A lot of people
…lot of people
…try to smooth things over:
I’ve been smoothing things over…
…been mostly statistics.
…interventionist, I’m told.
…intervention comes in many forms.
That was gentle intervention…
…empirically…
It’s empirical.
Something in the way I say…
…which is a bland statement of the obvious,
…has hit the right button in the two of them.
Something in my voice…
You can’t tell strangers I’m dying…
…or miracle. Don’t say miracle.
Do you have to say that?
I do actually need a pee and it’s not as if I can hold myself in. You know that.
Some things are best forgotten.
You exaggerate.
Already it’s falling apart.
It’s not as if they don’t remember.
…if only they’d have faith.
And now I’m going to burst apart at the seams; the fear that I would wet myself, would make a public show of myself, is secondary to the burning that’s starting to grip me.
I need to go.
He doesn’t say that out loud.
Drip.
Drip.
One minute, desperate. Next minute, dripping. One measly drop at a time as if it’s liquid gold that can only be extracted by burning an acetylene torch on the pocket of the tissue that’s keep it back so that it trickles out with a red bodyguard and a cry of relief.
Did I cry out loud?
He didn’t say that out loud.
I’m sure he didn’t mean it that way.
There are faces in those rocks.
She didn’t say that.
Is that really true?
But she doesn’t say that out loud. Believe it or not.
They don’t all want to go [about people who leave]
Everybody knows now.
I don’t mind.
I really don’t mind.
I found myself imagining the top of his thighs. I didn’t say that out loud, did I?

• Read through the language your character uses, giving yourself time to build up the images behind the words and phrases where they are particularly descriptive. Ask yourself: “What if this were the language and imagery I used?’

How did you find that? It’s likely that any discoveries and resulting shifts will come slowly and gently, and that often your won’t be able to articulate them. That is fine. Simply trust that regularly reconnecting with the language your character uses will inform your work in a profound and useful way.

 

SPACE SUBSTANCE

(Spolin, Viola, Improvisation for the Theatre, p. 81-84)

After the preliminary exercises in object involvement have been used, SPACE SUBSTANCE should be introduced and repeated for at least eight more sessions as a warm-up.  It is valuable for freshening up groups at all times.  Since there are many possible variations of this exercise, what to use in subsequent sessions should be determined by the teacher-director.  The oftener it is used, the more perfect student-actors will become in creating, finding, and building objects “out of thin air” and “letting things happen.”

A EXPLORATION

Large group (no audience necessary).

Ask student-actors to move around the stage, giving substance to space as they go.  They are not to feel or present space as though it were a known material (water, mud, molasses, etc.) but are to explore it as a totally new and unknown substance.

SIDE COACHING: Move through the substance and make contact with it. Don’t give it a name – it is what it is!  Use your whole body to make contact!  Feel it against your cheeks!  Your nose! Your knees!  Your hips!  Let it (space) feel you!

If players tend to use hand only, have them keep their arms close to their bodies so as to move as a single mass.

Keep side coaching: Push the substance around.  Explore it!  You never felt it before.  Make a tunnel!  Move back into the space your body has shaped. Shake it up!  Make the substance fly.  Stir it up!  Make it ripple.

 

1. SUPPORT AND EFFORT

Large group with audience.

Start players walking around the stage, pushing through the space substance.

SIDE COACHING:  Let the space substance support you.  Lean on it.  Rest on it.  Let it hold your head.  Your chin.  Your arms.  Your eyeballs.  Your upper lip, etc. [82]

After the players are in motion and responding to the problem, give a new understanding to the space substance they are contacting.

SIDE COACHING: You are holding yourself up.  You would fly into a thousand pieces if you quit holding yourself up. You are hanging on to your arms.  Your mouth.  Your forehead. (Call out the various parts of the body that the students hold rigid.)  Now have the students go back to having the space substance “support” them.  Change back and forth until the student actors obviously feel the difference.  While calling out parts of the body, help the students to release the muscle holds. (One student who customarily had a tight expression on his face that gave him what might be called a “mean” look first became aware of his rigidity through this exercise.

EVALUATION:

To players: how did you feel when space was supporting you? When you were your own support?

To audience: did you notice a difference between support and no support in the way the players walked and looked.

POINTS OF OBSERVATION:

1. When players hold themselves together, are their own gravity line, so to speak, some shrink up, some seem to be afraid of falling, while others appear anxious, lonely, and still others look aggressive. In fact, many “character qualities” appear.  When, on the other hand, the players lean on space, an expansion and fullness can be noted as they move through the environment.  Smiling faces, peacefulness, and an air of gentleness appear.  It is as if they know the environment will support them if they allow it to.
2. “Put your signature in space” is a good side-coaching remark to place the player in the environment. The object is for the player to leave a mark in space – a footprint, the outline of his head, etc. – and then see that mark.

 

1. SHAPING SPACE

Single players.

Ask players one by one to find any object they wish out of [83] the space substance.

POINT OF CONCENTRATION: to find an object from the space substance.

POINT OF OBSERVATION:

Most players gather the pace substance and handle it as they would any other pliable mass. With confidence and certainty the student finds his object with incredible exactness and reality.  Where in the earlier creating of objects only a few students achieved this, this exercise is successful with almost all. Perhaps this is so because the player intuits; he does not construct (invent) the object from the imagination but discovers it as it comes up out of space.

Next ask each player to pull the space substance around as thought it should not be separated from itself. This sometimes results in the presentation of elastic or ribbony material. Side-coach the players to experiment with it.

 

1. ENSEMBLE SPACE-SHAPING

Two or more players.

Ask players to find one object animate or inanimate, together out of space substance and then use it., Then have the players pull the space substance about, keeping it attached in space, swing on it, let it pull them up, wind it around each other, etc.

POINTS OF OBSERVATION:

1. Players move out of the immediate environment with ease after this exercise. (In manipulating space substance, a group of players once ended up doing a maypole dance, and the reality was so sharp for the players that when the ribbons became tangles, the student audience “saw it.”
2. Be certain the platers are making contact with the space substance and not imposing upon it.

 

E: TRANSFORMATION OF OBJECTS

Large group of players.

First person creates and object and passes it on to the next player.  This next player is to handle the object until it changes shape and then pass it on. The exercise differs from TRANSFORMING [84] THE OBJECT (p.214) in that here the player is not to make a story or situation around the object but is simply to handle it until something happens. If nothing happens, he is to pass it to the next player and so on down the line, For instance, if a player is handed a yo-yo and used it, it might transform itself into a bird or an accordion. Following this: two players create together (as in ENSEMBLE SPACE-SHAPING) a continuous flow of changing objects.

This is a tricky exercise and must be clearly understood by the players. They are not to change the object – it either transforms itself, or they do nothing about it. No associations should be used to lead to a story. If a player is handed a comb, for instance, he is not to make a mirror and use the comb.

POINT OF OBSERVATION:

A great deal of excitement is felt if an object seems to transform itself. When a student has this experience, it should be pointed out to him that this is exactly what POC must do for players.

TOUCH AND BE TOUCHED/SEE AND BE SEEN

SIDE COACHING:

Allow the space to flow through you and you flow through the space.

Allow your mind to flow through your brain.

Allow your sight to flow through your eye.

Allow the space to flow through you and your fellow player.

Take a ride on your own body and view the scenery around you.

Touch an object in the pace – a tree, a cup, a piece of clothing, a chair.

When you touch the object, fell it, allow it to touch (feel) you! (vary objects).

Touch a fellow player and allow your fellow player to touch you. Touch and be touched! (vary players).

Flow through the space and allow the space to flow through you and your fellow players. See an object. The moment you really see it, allow the object to see you! (vary objects).

See a fellow player. Allow the fellow player to see you.

Look full face at your fellow player and occlude: do not see him or let yourself be seen.

Change! See and be seen.

Repeat several times. Vary players.

POINTS OF OBSERVATION:

Remember to keep players moving and to allow time between each side coaching. Was it difficult to allow yourself to be touched… to be seen?  Avoid analysis.

How many A’s in one A? (p. 99)

A circle.

One actor goes into the middle and expresses a feeling, an emotion, or an idea, using only the sound of the letter “A”, in any of its possible inflections, and a movement or gesture.

All the actors in the circle repeat that sound and action three times.

Then another actor goes in and expresses a different idea, emotion, or feeling, and again the circle repeats it three times.

And so on.

Then the same thing with “E”, “I”, “O”, and “U”.

Then with a single word.

Finally with a sentence.

(pp. 164-166)

PRESS is Heavy, Sustained, and Direct.

• Practice by pressing against a wall or down on a table.
• Derivative Actions: crush, cut, squeeze.
• Notice the heaviness this action has, that it can be done continuously and that your attention has a directness of focus.

PUNCH is Heavy, Sudden, and Direct

• Practice by punching an imaginary punching ball in front of you.
• Derivative Actions: shove, kick, poke.
• Notice that this action is also heavy and that your attention is again directly focused. However, since you have to pull your arm back after each punch before you can punch again, this action as a staccato quality.

WRING is Heavy, Sustained, and Indirect.

• Practice by wringing your hands together.
• Derivative Actions: pull, pluck, stretch
• Notice that this action is also heavy, that it can be sustained without interruption, but that your attention is less directly focussed.

SLASH is Heavy, Sudden, and Indirect

• Practice by slashing out to the side with your arms one after the other, almost as if you were fighting off an attack.
• Derivative Actions: beat, throw, whip.
• Notice that this action is also heavy, that it has a staccato quality like Punch, and that, like Wring, your attention is less directly focussed.

GLIDE is Light, Sustained, and Direct.

• Practice by stretching your arms out to each side at shoulder level, with your shoulder blades relaxed, and moving around as if you were a glider.
• Derivative Actions: smooth, smear, smudge.
• Notice that this action is lighter than the previous four, that the movement can be sustained and that you have regained the focus of attention you had with Press and Punch.

DAB is Light, Sudden, and Direct

• Practice by imagining that you are dabbing gently with a cloth, perhaps to clean a fragile object.
• Derivative Actions: pat, tap, shake.
• Notice that this action is also light, that it has a staccato quality like Punch, and that again your attention is focussed.

FLOAT is Light, Sustained, and Indirect.

• Practice by imagining that you are a piece of paper or a leaf being gently blown about by the wind.
• Derivative Actions: strew, stir, stroke.
• Notice that this action is also light, that it has a sustained quality like Glide, but that, as with Wring, your attention is less focussed.

FLICK is Light, Sudden, and Indirect

• Practice by imagining you are flicking fluff off your clothes or swatting away flies.
• Derivative Actions: flip, flap, jerk.
• Notice that this action is also light, that it has a staccato quality like Dab, and that, like as with Float, your attention is less focussed.

(pp.166-167)

To experience different rhythms and how they affect thought rhythms, physicality and voice

• Once you have a sense of the quality of each rhythm, take the time to explore each one more thoroughly, starting with the movements as described above, then involving more of your body.
• Keep checking with the chart to make sure that you have the correct weight, flow and focus for each one.
• Then, still doing the movement, say some lines of text, noticing the effect of the the movement on your thought.

It is worth noting which rhythms are more alien to you and then taking the time to explore them further physically until they become more familiar and available to you.

These rhythms are not tied to particular emotions.  Any emotion can be expressed through any rhythm.

• Take and emotion and explore expressing it thought each of the different rhythms.
• Notice how different rhythms change the quality of emotion.

This is extremely useful work, since it is often difficult to comprehend how a particular emotion could be expressed differently from the way you express it.

(p.167)

Apart from exploring any rhythms which are alien to you and working with the emotions, as suggested above, it is a good idea to play with all the rhythms regularly so that it becomes easy to access them and to switch from one to another.

When you are playing with rhythms it is important to go back to the chart and check the weight, flow and focus so that you know the rhythms are precise.

Here is my suggestion for a regular rhythm workout.

• Take each rhythm and begin to move in that rhythm, ensuring that the weight, flow and focus are accurate.  Have the chart on hand so you can easily check.
• Work with your whole body committing to the rhythm you are exploring completely and with great ease.
• Once you have worked on each rhythm individually then alternate between them.
• Alternate slowly at first so that you are sure that you are getting accurate shifts of weight, flow and focus.
• Then, speed up so that you can change swiftly between the rhythms without losing accuracy.

Working in this way will give you a great deal of flexibility – physically, mentally and vocally – and it will help you access those characters whose rhythms are radically different from yours.

(pp.167-169)

• Imagine that you character can only have one rhythm, choose which, from Laban’s eight, it would be. For the moment, choose instinctively rather than considering weight, flow or focus.
• Once you have chosen one rhythm, choose a second one in the same way.
• Then, choose a third in the same way. Make sure that you have noted these three rhythms down.

Note: I usually find three rhythms are a good, workable number, but if you feel you need more, fair enough.  I choose them one at a time because I find this the simplest and most effective way.  As with the motivation there is no one right answer. Choosing the rhythm is a device for helping you to identify the differences between you and the character.

• Now consider yourself for a moment. Again, imagining that you can only have one rhythm, choose which it would be. As before, choose instinctively.
• Then, pick a second rhythm.
• Then, pick a third. Again, note these three rhythms down.

Now that you have the two lists of possible rhythms you can analyze and then compare them. Start with your character’s list and refer to the chart as necessary.

• Note whether the character is predominantly heavy or light.
• Note whether the character is predominantly sustained or staccato.
• Note whether the character is predominantly focused or unfocussed.

For example, if for Petal we chose Glide, Float, and Dab, that would make her completely light, predominantly direct, and predominantly sustained.

If for Claudio we chose Punch, Wring, and Glide, that would make him predominantly heavy, direct, and sustained.

• Now go through the same process with your own list.

For example, if the actor playing Petal identified her own rhythms as Glide, Wring and Slash, she would be predominantly heavy, indirect and sustained.

If the actor playing Claudio identified his own rhythms as being Punch, Float and Dab, that would make him predominantly light, direct, and staccato.

• Now compare the analysis of yourself and your character, Look for differences in weight, flow, and focus between the two.

For example, the actor playing Petal would notice that Petal is lighter than her and more direct.

The actor playing Claudio would notice that Claudio is heavier and more sustained than he is.

Simply identifying the differences can be very helpful and is often enough for the actor concerned to make the necessary rhythm changes.

(pp.169-170)

This stage allows you to take the rhythm work further by physically exploring the rhythms you have chosen for your character and what clues they give you about the character’s external and internal movement.

• Start by taking each of the character rhythms individually and exploring it physically, ensuring that you are committing fully to the specific combination of weight, flow, and focus of that rhythm.
• Then, move between the different character rhythms exploring how they work together.
• Rest for a while and consider what you have learnt about the character and the way he/she moves, thinks, feels, etc. Make notes or draw images if that is helpful to you.
• Then, return to the strong physical exploration of these three rhythms and begin to speak the text, shifting from one rhythm to the next as feels instinctively appropriate.

Always keep the choice of which rhythm you use for which part of the text free, rather than setting it in any way. You are simply exploring possibilities: “What if these were the rhythms I used?”

Working with rhythms is particularly useful when you have to play more than one character.

• First, establish the rhythms for each character.
• Then, look for the main differences in rhythm between each of the characters you are playing.
• Focus on these differences and explore them physically.
• Then, still working physically, practice switching from one character to another, slightly exaggerating the rhythmic differences.

As always, this is exploratory work, which you then allow to take care of itself once you are back in rehearsals and performance.

(pp.170-171)

There can be two layers or rhythm in play at the same time: with one, if you like, covering, and so hiding, the other. Typical examples of this are where there is internal Press or Wring, with Glide or Float overlaying. This might be the case where someone was attempting to hide an intensity of thought or emotion by appearing to be lighter on the surface.

Any rhythm may be either a hidden or covering one and can be different at different points in the play.

Exploring Double Layers of Rhythm

To discover you the double layers of rhythm interact

So once you have done your initial character work, ask yourself the following questions:

• Are any of the rhythms I have identified and explored hidden either all or some of the time?
• Are there any other rhythms that the character might have hidden beneath the ones I have explored?

If it is not possible to answer these questions immediately, carry them with you as you rehearse and not what arises.

Once you have identified that there is an underlying or hidden rhythm you can work on it in the following way:

• Take the hidden rhythm first and explore it fully physically, committing to its specific weight, flow and focus.
• Then, allow that hidden rhythm to be expressed simply by your hands as if they were showing what is occurring internally.
• Now, explore the covering rhythm fully physically, committing to its specific weight, flow and focus.
• Then, explore the two rhythms together: expressing the hidden rhythm with your hands and the covering rhythm with the rest of your body.
• Explore how these two rhythms work together. For example, allowing the hidden rhythm to grow so it threatens to be revealed and then allowing the covering rhythm to exert itself and drive the hidden rhythm deeper.

By working in this way you are exploring possibilities, which will allow you to make accurate choices subconsciously during rehearsal and performance.

It is a good idea to return to the physical exploration of your character’s rhythms regularly in order to strengthen the shift away from yourself and your way of being and doing to that of the character. The more you explore this work the more you will find that you make discoveries that are fresh and authentic rather than clichéd and superficial.

(pp.171-173)

The final area to explore is the language the characters uses. This reflects the inner world of the character.

The exercises in Part Two exploring connection – Three Times Through, Physicalizing the Word, Geography Exercise and Museum Visit – all help you to explore your character’s language and imager. It’s also revelatory to list the key language your character uses throughout the play and the threats of words and images that run through that language.

Finding the Threads

To connect more deeply with the inner world of the character through the language and imagery they use

• Go through each scene, noting down the key words and phrases that the character uses.
• Trust your instinct and simply note down whatever jumps out at you, even if you’re not sure why.

Again, below is a possible list of Petal’s key words and phrases from the first twenty pages of Shimmer to give you some idea.

Petal’s key words and phrases

I’m used to things to turning out the way I want.
Most people…
Statistically speaking…
A lot of people
…lot of people
…try to smooth things over:
I’ve been smoothing things over…
…been mostly statistics.
…interventionist, I’m told.
…intervention comes in many forms.
That was gentle intervention…
…empirically…
It’s empirical.
Something in the way I say…
…which is a bland statement of the obvious,
…has hit the right button in the two of them.
Something in my voice…
You can’t tell strangers I’m dying…
…or miracle. Don’t say miracle.
Do you have to say that?
I do actually need a pee and it’s not as if I can hold myself in. You know that.
Some things are best forgotten.
You exaggerate.
Already it’s falling apart.
It’s not as if they don’t remember.
…if only they’d have faith.
And now I’m going to burst apart at the seams; the fear that I would wet myself, would make a public show of myself, is secondary to the burning that’s starting to grip me.
I need to go.
He doesn’t say that out loud.
Drip.
Drip.
One minute, desperate. Next minute, dripping. One measly drop at a time as if it’s liquid gold that can only be extracted by burning an acetylene torch on the pocket of the tissue that’s keep it back so that it trickles out with a red bodyguard and a cry of relief.
Did I cry out loud?
He didn’t say that out loud.
I’m sure he didn’t mean it that way.
There are faces in those rocks.
She didn’t say that.
Is that really true?
But she doesn’t say that out loud. Believe it or not.
They don’t all want to go [about people who leave]
Everybody knows now.
I don’t mind.
I really don’t mind.
I found myself imagining the top of his thighs. I didn’t say that out loud, did I?

• Read through the language your character uses, giving yourself time to build up the images behind the words and phrases where they are particularly descriptive. Ask yourself: “What if this were the language and imagery I used?’

How did you find that? It’s likely that any discoveries and resulting shifts will come slowly and gently, and that often your won’t be able to articulate them. That is fine. Simply trust that regularly reconnecting with the language your character uses will inform your work in a profound and useful way.