Theatre 320 Acting in Shakespeare

The course explores the relationship of Shakespeare’s uses of language and form to action and acting.  The student will be guided in the process of bringing the self to the specific demands of formally structured material and in identifying the tools for action-playing in various text structures and styles.  Beginning with the imaging process underlying spoken thought, the course will examine the methodologies of Elizabethan rhetoric and prosody, the development of blank verse drama, scansion, the relationship of metrics and prosody to actor intention, the relationship of imagery to character circumstances, and the implications of verse structures for character action.

Theatre 228 Acting 2: Creating the World

The course examines the work processes used by the actor in reorganizing the self into another human being existing in the circumstances and world of the play. The emphasis is on organic work in which the actor utilizes the raw material of her/his own being, reshaping aspects of him/herself that connect with the life experiences of the character. Areas explored will include sense memory and sensory endowment to bring moment-to-moment physical life to an environment; the discovery and development of immediate and historic given circumstances from textual clues; techniques of particularization, research, and personalization to bring these circumstances to the life experience of a character through journal work, affective memory, transference, and substitution.

Theatre 227: Playing the Action

This course examines the actor's persuit of objectives through spontanteous interaction with others. Techniques explored will include recieving and sending; eliciting response; identifying progressive change in one's partner and in one's self through what is recieved from the partner; discovering and being prompted into actions in the moment while maintaining objectives evolved from given circumstances; the influence of object concentrations, activities, and place; the use of personalized super-objective; scoring a role in preperation for discovery; and further development of intention, objectives, action and super-objective from moment-to-moment involvment in rehearsal. Excersises will investigate action utilizing vocalization, physicalization and improvisation. Scene work will concentrate on contemporary American realizm.

Theatre 229 Voice and Diction 

This course focuses on the development of the the human body’s expressive and communicative potential. Particular emphasis is placed on acting, although nearly all of the concepts apply to other types of communication, including other areas of performance. This course acknowledges that voice and speech are physical actions. Therefore, voice and speech will be explored physically and experientially. Physical and vocal exercises focus on the release of unhelpful tensions in order to enable greater freedom and spontaneity, developing awareness and skills that enhance the body’s expressive potential, then using these tools in aid of communication and performance.

Theatre 126 Acting in Song

This course explored the relationship of singing to the process of acting, examining the dramatic intention of a vocal line, including phrasing and text, and its interaction with the full musical score as both relate to the fundamentals of acting technique, particularly circumstances, inner monologue, and action. Assignments will include solos, duets, and scene work. The class will be equally suitable for singers seeking to understand acting and actors seeking increased comfort with singing.

Larry Singer Workshop 05/04/2013

Theatre Studies hosted a workshop with Larry Singer, hailed by BACKSTAGE theatre weekly as New York's best acting teacher and coach. Larry described the many programs offered year-round at his studio and led participants in exercises.