Text In Action: A Definitive Guide To Exploring Text In Rehearsal For Actors And Directors

by Cicely Berry

Following on from the widely acclaimed The Actor and the Text - which was addressed directly to the actor - Text in Action is drawn from Cicely's group work experiences, encompassing the viewpoint of the director as well. To begin with, the author explores language from a cultural and personal perspective. In these days of management jargon and internet technology are we losing touch with the ability to communicate fully?' Is the deeper imaginative world being left unexpressed? The main body of the book contains detailed, practical exercises for actors and directors during the rehearsal process. All exercises will be tied to specific scenes, leading to a fuller exploration of the rext. Text In Action analyses the imagery of plays, speech structures, the physicality of language and emphasises the importance of finding a collective voice. Cicely's guidance on the matter of voice will help actors find relationships and situations through the text in a unique way, in order to make it more dynamic and creative.

Genres: Nonfiction, Shakespeare, Theatre

288 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 22, 2001

Reviews

[Claudio Yáñez Valenzuela · Rating 4 out of 5]

Es un trabajo (y un manual) interesante. Merece la pena leerlo.

[MK · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book, found it really helpful in preparation for shows.

[Indu Muralidharan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an excellent book for playwrights, actors and indeed anyone interested in drama, on how an actor communicates the text of a play to the audience while expressing it on the stage. The examples are mainly drawn from Shakespeare's plays and a section of contemporary drama. There are a number of exercises that bring out the various nuances of the text expressed by the actors - the language itself, punctuation, pauses, tone, modulation and emoting, which bring out fresh insights into familiar plays. For a writer, this book provides a wealth of awareness about the effect of language in the text, and valuable guidance on how to effectively play with it in their own work.