Course Description
Summary
Shakespeare not only inspires radical staging approaches, but has also provoked contemporary playwrights to reimagine, refashion, and retell his stories to include, as Sarah Mantell puts it, "Everything that Never Happened."
In this course we will dive into some of Shakespeare's classics and read them alongside contemporary adaptations that plunge us into worlds that are both Shakespearean and beyond what he could imagine. We will be working with Patsy Rodenburg's techniques, what she calls "a simple manual to start the journey into the heart of Shakespeare." We will commit to contemporary approaches of fluid casting in which anyone can play any character.
“Hamlet,” “Macbeth,” “Twelfth Night” and “The Merchant of Venice,” will be read along with James Ijames’ “Fat Ham,” Jiehae Park’s “Peerless,” Betty Shamieh's "Malvolio,” and Sarah Mantell’s “Everything that Never Happened.”
We will practice text analysis as well as how to speak and perform Shakespeare in a way to bring the words to immediate life. In this seven-week course, we will explore how to unlock a text in terms of language, imagery, form, structure, rhythm, and sound. Through exercises we will work to expand the actor’s physical and vocal instrument, as well as emotional and dramatic power. We will practice listening, unpacking thoughts, and playing actions. Working on monologues and scenes from a variety of plays, actors will be encouraged to play any role they choose.
