An Actor's Companion by Seth Barrish

Author:Seth Barrish [Barrish, Seth; Hathaway, Anne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781559367974
Publisher: Theatre Communications Group

Connect the Dots

The following tip will help you shape performances without sacrificing spontaneity:

Build your performance by stringing together a series of activities. These activities can be physical tasks (making a cup of tea, writing a letter, etc.) or social business (telling a joke, flirting, interrogating someone, schmoozing, etc.). Then move from task to task without worrying about anything else.

I’ll give you an example of how I might apply this technique. Let’s look at a small portion of a scene from Arms and the Man by George Bernard Shaw. I have included the playwright’s stage directions in italics and listed my planned activities in brackets.

I am playing Captain Bluntschli. Raina, a beautiful young woman who at this point I think is a teenager, has been flirting with me mercilessly:

RAINA: Do you know, sir, that you are insulting me?

BLUNTSCHLI [write letters and stuff envelopes]: I can’t help it. When you strike that noble attitude and speak in that thrilling voice, I admire you; but I find it impossible to believe a single word you say.

RAINA: Captain Bluntschli!

BLUNTSCHLI: Yes?

RAINA: Do you mean what you said just now? Do you know what you said just now?

BLUNTSCHLI [seal envelopes]: I do.

RAINA (Gasping): I! I!!! (A complete change of manner) How did you find me out?

BLUNTSCHLI [joke around with her]: Instinct, dear young lady. Instinct and experience of the world.

RAINA: Do you know, you are the first man I ever met who did not take me seriously?

BLUNTSCHLI [get tea]: You mean, don’t you, that I am the first man that has ever taken you quite seriously?

RAINA: Yes: I suppose I do mean that. How strange it is to be talked to in such a way! You know, I’ve always gone on like that.

BLUNTSCHLI [sit next to her and cozy up]: You mean the . . .

RAINA: I mean the noble attitude and the thrilling voice. (They laugh together) I did it when I was a tiny child to my nurse. She believed in it. I do it before my parents. They believe in it. I do it before Sergius. He believes in it.

BLUNTSCHLI: Yes: he’s a little in that line himself, isn’t he? [sip tea]

RAINA: Oh! Do you think so?

BLUNTSCHLI [choke on tea]: You know him better than I do.

In the preceding example, you’ll notice that the activities are simple and concise. They require very little mental energy. This leaves me a ton of time between activities to do whatever I like. I can say the lines any way I choose, and I can feel whatever I feel. Also, I can perform the activities differently each time (there are thousands of ways to joke around and choke on tea).

I call this technique “Connect the Dots” because it reminds me of the children’s game you see in coloring books (see illustration below).

When you perform, you move from activity to activity as you would move from dot to dot. In doing so, you create a performance without even trying, just as you would create a picture in the children’s game.

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