Friday, November 13

Happy Friday the 13th!


VOICE
So as it turns out, RP (the British dialect we're learning) is going to be a battle for me. I understand all of the rules, as we're learning them, but it's hard to keep them all in your head at once.

Voice Professor made sure to tell us that, although RP requires a lot more pitch-changing than General American, we should not change pitch at random. Pitch only changes on operative words.

Our homework it:
- Practice "Signature Sounds" of RP in sentence context
- Listen to the RP dialects on the IDEA site.
- Make an RP "Cheat Sheet"


MOVEMENT
We did contact improv. There were a lot of great ones. Thrill & Two-Shots-Up, Iceman & Two-Shots-Up, and Iceman & O.D. were some favorites.

Thrill's girlfriend, Hollywood, came to take pictures of us doing Contact Improv. If she allows me to do so, I'll put some up here.


ACTING
Newbie gave a Great Actors Series Presentation on Henry Irving and Ellen Terry, who were the "Duo of the Century". He played all of the great male roles in Shakespeare, and she was his leading lady.

We started reading Cymbeline out loud as a class. We're in the middle of Act I, Scene vi right now.

Acting Professoressa took a moment to talk further about the concept of an "Actor's Secret". She said that having something like a tiny ornate key in your purse could do a lot for you as an actor if you endow it properly. That key could have belonged to your deceased mother and might still have her DNA on it. It could unlock a little box that contains the evidence that could ruin someone's life. You can get your subconscious to play a game with you.

She also said that if you have something like a purse as a prop on stage, you shouldn't let it be empty except for the lipstick that your character uses from it. A handbag (usually) contains a person's life.

Another thing we discussed was the point of "sensual doings" (metaphorical action verbs) is to make actions that are not "thought" but "felt".

Acting Professoressa recommended we look up the Barbican and see what's going on in the summer so that we can try to attend things while we're in London. (Especially the Russian company)