Not a subject for battered persons, I should hasten to say! No, no, dear friends. I was with one of my talented clients the other day - a new actor - and we were working over Portia (The Merchant of Venice) - figuratively speaking. The beating thing again. Forgive me. And even though this lovely young woman was doing lovely things, there was something awry. Amiss. Eureka! The after beat.
For those of you who might have missed this in an earlier post, the after beat (my own term, I think - being a brilliant coiner of terms)is what you play after the last word leaves your mouth and which either helps you to demand a response from the other character, yourself or which connects you to the next word that's about to come out of your mouth. Making sure you play the after beat, guarantees you won't drop out of the scene. Guarantees it!
When doing Shakespeare, Iambic Pentameter in particular, the problem for the actor is amplified because there are no pauses for transition available. Real pauses would break the rhythm of the line. So the after beat is played as a "breath beat", usually at punctuation marks. Thus the integrity of the line is maintained.
My young friend knows all this, but was still beaten off (I'm really sorry - can't resist. Pun-ish me!)by after beat issues. I learned something important. What she hadn't done in her study of the monologue was to actually write the after beat down, in colloquial terms, and learn it as she learned the text.
I then insisted that after doing this, she rehearse the monologue at half speed, making sure the lines and the after beats were joined together into a consistent whole and only then, bring it up to speed. I love it when I learn something new. And I love my students for giving me the opportunity!
No comments:
Post a Comment