ABSTRACT

Performing Shakespeare Unrehearsed: A Practical Guide to Acting and Producing Spontaneous Shakespeare outlines how Shakespeare’s plays can be performed effectively without rehearsal, if all the actors understand a set of performance guidelines and put them into practice.

Each chapter is devoted to a specific guideline, demonstrating through examples how it can be applied to pieces of text from Shakespeare’s First Folio, how it creates blocking and stage business, and how it enhances story clarity. Once the guidelines have been established, practical means of production are discussed, providing the reader with sufficient step-by-step instruction to prepare for Unrehearsed performances.

This book is written for the actor and performer.

chapter 1|6 pages

Why Unrehearsed?

chapter 2|16 pages

Meter in Shakespeare

chapter 3|21 pages

This, That, Here, and There

chapter 4|20 pages

We, Us, and Our

chapter 5|26 pages

Thou and You

chapter 6|28 pages

Following and Throwing Stage Directions

chapter 7|18 pages

Cross to the Character . . .

chapter 8|23 pages

Action to the Word

chapter 9|18 pages

Overlapping Speech

chapter 10|30 pages

Preparing for Unrehearsed Performance