This Sits Not Well With Me

“I'll prove mine honour and mine honesty

Against thee presently, if thou darest stand.” – Comedy of Errors (5.1. 1453-1455)

Day 3                                                             (7-7-2016)

We’ve done many great – if frustrating – exercises that work on movement, breathing, and team-building in our intern ensemble. And many that require working together and thinking quickly.

One of the most memorable ones was with three balls. In this exercise, we got in a circle and tossed Ball 1 stating as the ball traveled to another person in the circle our Name with a positive adjective with the same beginning letter or sound as our name, along with our Hometown and Hobby. Meanwhile, we were kicking Ball 2 stating the name of our first crush as it went to the person next to us, and bouncing Ball 3 with the name of our favorite fruit to another person. At times, one person had to manage all three balls at once.

Less memorable were the lines that I had to bring in today.

On Day 1, Tim and Doug asked me if I knew any verse from any of Will’s plays because I was going to need it. I searched my memory but came up mostly with one-liners mostly like “To be or not to be, that is the question” and “Out, out damn spot” or “Luke, I am your father” (okay, so that last one’s not right, but the relationship seems Shakespearean, no?).

I finally settled on Iago’s soliloquy when he reveals his villainous “double knavery” plot against Othello and Cassio. It was the only one I remembered for more than a couple of lines. (Actually I remembered 5.) Our homework was to memorize 12-14 lines of verse. I knew I had some work ahead of me. I spent a couple hours at my kitchen table committing each line to memory. I practiced it over and over in the car today on the 75-minute ride to Skidmore.

When I got there, Doug made us recite one line at a time while walking across the room, then taking a deep breath and turning 90 degrees before walking the next line. And I thought the 3 Ball Exercise was difficult. If I had been chewing gum while I was walking, breathing, turning and reciting, I might not have been able to remember any of the lines this time.

“When you practice your lines, don’t do them sitting down. That’s not the way you’re going to perform them,” Doug advised. Great. Now you tell me.

But I have to let that go. One of my goals is to live the lines, not just memorize them. And today’s theme is Release.

We begin in a different studio with mats on the floor. After stretching, we partner up and have to give each other a massage. My partner is Tommy. We’re encouraged to make sounds to let our partner know that we appreciate this. Feels a bit weird, but it works on communicating with your partner, works on breathing instead of holding your breath, and it adds to the release.

We then work with something called the Fitzmaurice Technique. This is a vocal technique developed by Catherine Fitzmaurice that deals with destructuring and restructuring. A couple of the interns had done some work with this technique before. It was completely new to me, and I had looked forward to learning more about voice because that is the least developed tool in my teaching arsenal.

Tim gave us a copy of an American Theatre article explaining the technique. I was surprised to find more prizes for the Teacher Me in the article. “It is primarily about getting rid of what’s familiar, what is habitual, what makes logical sense, what other people are asking you to do. And the restructuring is putting things back together from a more aware place, coming back to a very strong sense of focus, intention, functionality and structure in the work – but in a way that is simple, healthy and effective, while remaining organic.” I love that. It’s exactly what I do with my students with the Index Card Test (see previous post entitled All’s Well That Begins Well).

Fortunately, we didn’t have to do anything more with our lines today. (That’s the Student Me talking there, if you couldn’t tell). That work will begin tomorrow. Breathe.

You can see the full blog of my experiences this summer on the Saratoga Shakespeare Company website at www.saratogashakespeare.com and on my own Out of the Centrifuge blog at www.outofthecentrifuge.blogspot.com.