Suit the Action to the Word
Objective: the learner will improve voice and diction by physicalizing words, phrases and lines from Shakespeare.
Project Outline:
Each actor will select 4 (or more) lines from any Shakespeare play or poem to memorize.
Actors will circle all words they not understand, and will look them up in the Shakespeare Glossary, writing each word and definition in their journals.
Actors will give an initial reading outloud for pronunciation and comprehension.
Warm-ups: vowel and consonant practice.
One Word Games:
Word Propulsion Game -- each actor selects their favorite word from their Shakespeare selection. Practice finding a movement that suits the word. Exaggerate movement and voice, allowing the movement and sound to propel them about the space. Do this all at once, then freeze the group. Have one actor start a word movement path to another actor, the sound and action traveling the distance to the next actor. The first actor freezes, and the second actor moves off using her/his own word action to move to the next actor, and so on. Work to build tempo, stick landings, maintain freezes.
Word Tennis -- in pairs, actors face each other at varying distances (face to face, 3 feet, 5 feet, 10 feet, 20 feet) and toss their words back and forth through the space, experiementing with vocal qualities and projection levels. They must take care to alter each toss, so that the word is never sounded the same way twice.
One Word Scenes -- in pairs, actors improvise a scene (agreeing upon Who/What/Where) using only their one favorite word from Shakespeare.
Thesaurus Game:
Still using their favorite word, actors find the word in a thesaurus and make a list in their journals of all words in that category. Practice reading the list of words aloud, as if it were a poem. Since the words are similar in meaning, the actor's task is to find a vocalization that is particular to each word.
Memorize list, and find an action to suit each word. Perform the list with actions.
Introduce Shakespearean insults. In pairs, toss insults, taking care to sound out each syllable. Physicalize the emotions involved with insulting and being insulted.
Developing Material for Performance:
Repeat above One Word Games with a phrase from the Shakespeare selection.
Follow up with an entire line, building up to the entire memorized passage.
Word Tennis using each word from all four lines in sequence.
Word Tennis using lines in sequence. Develop into a scene for two players, using lines from 2 selections.
Final project: build a sound/movement montage using words, phrases, lines and scenes from the memorized Shakespeare passages.
