In (toward) a phenomenology of acting, Phillip Zarrilli considers acting as a 'question' to be explored in the studio and then reflected upon. This book is a vital response to Jerzy Grotowski's essential question: "How does the actor 'touch that which is untouchable?'" Phenomenology invites us to listen to "the things themselves", to be attentive to how we sensorially, kinesthetically, and affectively engage with acting as a phenomenon and process. Using detailed first-person accounts of acting across a variety of dramaturgies and performances from Beckett to newly co-created performances to realism, it provides an account of how we 'do' or practice phenomenology when training, performing, directing, or teaching. Zarrilli brings a wealth of international and intercultural experience as a director, performer, and teacher to this major new contribution both to the practices of acting and to how we can reflect in depth on those practices. An advanced study for actors, directors, and teachers of acting that is ideal for both the training/rehearsal studio and research, (toward) a phenomenology of acting is an exciting move forward in the philosophical understanding of acting as an embodied practice.

A must-have resource for aspiring actors: both monologues to audition with and a step-by-step guide on the best monologue audition preparation! Great Monologues: And How to Give Winning Auditions is primarily for actors looking for excellent acting monologues for their monologue auditions. There are original monologues written specifically for auditions, as well as monologues from award-winning playwright Glenn Alterman's plays. There are comedic, dramatic, and serio-comedic monologues for all audition calls. Great Monologues also offers a step-by-step process to prepare for all monologue auditions. The monologues offered run from one minute to five minutes, thus covering all audition times. There are also a number of in-depth interviews with major casting directors, directors, and theatre company artistic directors. If you are an aspiring actor in need of an audition monologue, or want the best advice on how to properly audition with a monologue, Great Monologues: And How to Give Winning Auditions is a must-have in your collection!

Theoretically, the actor ought to be more sound in mind and body than other people, since he learns to understand the psychological problems of human beings when putting his own passions, his loves, fears, and rages to work in the service of the characters he plays. He will learn to face himself, to hide nothing from himself -- and to do so takes an insatiable curiosity about the human condition.
from the Prologue

Uta Hagen, one of the world's most renowned stage actresses, has also taught acting for more than forty years at the HB Studio in New York. Her first book, Respect for Acting, published in 1973, is still in print and has sold more than 150,000 copies. In her new book, A Challenge for the Actor, she greatly expands her thinking about acting in a work that brings the full flowering of her artistry, both as an actor and as a teacher. She raises the issue of the actor's goals and examines the specifics of the actor's techniques. She goes on to consider the actor's relationship to the physical and psychological senses. There is a brilliantly conceived section on the animation of the body and mind, of listening and talking, and the concept of expectation.

But perhaps the most useful sections in this book are the exercises that Uta Hagen has created and elaborated to help the actor learn his craft. The exercises deal with developing the actor's physical destination in a role; making changes in the self serviceable in the creation of a character; recreating physical sensations; bringing the outdoors on stage; finding occupation while waiting; talking to oneself and the audience; and employing historical imagination.

The scope and range of Uta Hagen here is extraordinary. Her years of acting and teaching have made her as finely seasoned an artist as the theatre has produced.

A step-by-step guide to Physical Theatre in both theory and practice - full of detailed exercises and inspiring ideas. In Through the Body, based on twelve years of teaching physical theatre, Dymphna Callery introduces the reader to the principles behind the work of certain key 20th-century theatre practitioners (Artaud, Grotowski, Meyerhold, Brook and Lecoq, among others) and offers exercises by which their theories can be turned into practice and their principles explored in action. The book takes the form of a series of workshops starting with the preparation of the body through Awareness, Articulation, Energy and Neutrality. A section on Mask-work is followed by further work on the body, investigating Presence, Complicite, Play, Audience, Rhythm, Sound and E-motion. The book - and the work - culminates in sections on Devising and on the Physical Text. There is also a thorough bibliography and a contact list of training courses in the UK and abroad. 'This book offers everything you have ever wanted to know about Physical Theatre. It is very detailed but at the same time very easy to understand. It breaks down every topic to short paragraphs which are informative and simple. A must for any theatre student or lecturer for that matter!' Amazon readers review

A guide to Psycho-Physical Acting, complete with games and exercises. When Stanislavsky died, he was working on a new system, Psycho-Physical Acting. Previously he had taught that truthful performance can only spring from the actor's imagination (the Method). Late in life, Stanislavsky realised that physical actions can induce emotions just as much as the other way round. Though well-known - and much taught - in Russia, Psycho-Physical Acting is in its infancy in the West. Bella Merlin has studied under three of the best teachers in Russia; this book is the fruit of her time there. 'This is a book which is vital both to practitioners and to all serious students of the theatre' Max Stafford-Clark 'A seminal book for today... an outstandingly lucid account... essential reading' Simon Callow

Masking Unmasked is a basic guide to using the ancient art of acting with masks to develop character and movement in four sections that correspond to mask size: Full-Face Masks, Clowning, Bag Masks, and Half-Face Masks. Each section addresses fundamental acting principles and shows how the ancient technique can be applied to the contemporary stage. It is the perfect book to use as background to traditional, non-masked acting principles. Actors in masks experience the primary goal of acting because they are required to tap into profound physical, vocal, emotional, and psychological transformations in the course of creating a character. In addition, masking promotes honest, believable, and detailed work. Illustrated profusely throughout, the hands-on exercises developed by Eli Simon teach actors to shift cleanly between beats, execute moment-to-moment specificity, unleash creative impulses, take risks, and expand character range, power, and vulnerability. Masking Unmasked is a book of ancient acting techniques that are indispensable for the actor of today.

Acting: The First Six Lessons was first published in 1933 and remains a key text for anyone studying acting today. These dramatic dialogues between teacher and idealistic student explore the field of acting according to one of the original teachers of Stanislavsky 's System in America.

This new edition of an essential text is edited by Rhonda Blair and supplemented for the very first time with documents from the American Laboratory Theatre. These collect together a broad range of exciting unpublished material, drawn from Boleslavsky 's pivotal and unprecedented teachings on acting at the American Laboratory Theatre. Included are:

Filming Shakespeare, from Metatheatre to Metacinema is the first book-length study of Shakespeare film adaptations concerned with metacinematic criticism. The volume offers a thoroughly researched and extensive survey of reflexivity in Shakespeare on screen, providing the reader with comprehensive and easily readable case studies of major and obscure productions from silent era to the present day. Topics include the ontology of the photographic image, the silent era, cinema as death, Hollywood, counter-cinema, ideology, film genre, and theatrical vs. cinematic illusion. Considering Shakespeare criticism as well as film theory and history, the essays are aimed at students, teachers, scholars, and enthusiasts of Shakespeare and film.

Shakespeare's text is packed with clues that help the reader to "hear "and the performer to "act "any speech. He also tells the actor when to go fast and when to go slow and when to accent a particular word.

This book sets out to make going to Shakespeare performances or acting in them a richer experience, and it should have a wide appeal to both actors and audiences.

It also celebrates Sir Peter Hall's fifty years as a director of Shakespeare; from his early days at Cambridge, through founding the Royal Shakespeare Company at Stratford on Avon in the early '60s, and later to his fifteen years as the director of the Royal National Theatre of Great Britain. Throughout these years, Peter Hall worked with the greatest Shakespearean actors of our generation including Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud, Edith Evans, Ralph Richardson, Peggy Ashcroft, Charles Laughton and in later years Judi Dench, Anthony Hopkins, Ian Holm, David Warner, and many others. Through this great line flows a tradition of speaking and understanding Shakespeare that remains as relevant and important today. And it is Hall's experience of working and learning with these and many other actors over the years that underpins the core of this book.

Sir Peter Hall is one of the major figures in theatre today. To date he has directed over two hundred productions, including the world premiere in English of Samuel Beckett's "Waiting for Godot," and the premieres of most of Harold Pinter's plays. His diary and autobiography are published by Oberon Books.

Written by an experienced teacher, and illustrated by line drawings and photographs, this book takes the actor step by step through the crucial process of choosing and performing an audition piece.

Performing the work of William Shakespeare can be daunting to new actors. Author Herb Parker posits that his work is played easier if actors think of the plays as happening out of outrageous situations, and remember just how non-realistic and presentational Shakespeare's plays were meant to be performed. The plays are driven by language and the spoken word, and the themes and plots are absolutely out of the ordinary and fantastic-the very definition of outrageous. With exercises, improvisations, and coaching points, Acting Shakespeare is Outrageous! helps actors use the words Shakespeare wrote as a tool to perform him, and to create exciting and moving performances.

The actors of the commedia dell'arte (the sixteenth-century Italian professional theater) usually did not perform from scripted drama. They improvised their performances from a shared plot and thorough knowledge of individual character roles. Robert Henke analyzes commedia dell'arte texts to demonstrate how the spoken word and written literature were combined in performance. Henke examines primary sources including performance accounts, actors' contracts, letters and other documents.

Working with a Jungian analyst, Janet Sonenberg has re-interpreted the ancient practice of "incubating dreams"; in this technique, the actor seeds the dream with materials of the play and then uses the resulting dream.
Acting calls upon inner powers and perceptions, but most of all it calls upon the actor's imagination. This revolutionary book, offers an entirely new technique for exploring the imagination. No other acting technique offers the performer's own dreams as a means to imaginative and artistic expression. Drawing upon her experience as actor and director, Sonenberg shows what dreamwork can do. The result is a new tool with which actors can explore their psyches and enrich their performances.

Hollywood Remains to Be Seen is a fascinating, gossipy guide to the fourteen most significant Hollywood-area cemeteries and the final resting places of the movie stars who are buried in them. Arranged as easy-to-follow tours of the properties, the fourteen chapters -- one for each cemetery -- include histories of the cemeteries, directions for finding them, and a detailed listing of exactly where more than three hundred stars are buried.

Strange as it may seem, cemeteries are becoming one of the most popular destinations for tourists to Hollywood and for film fans who want to pay their respects to the rich and famous and passed-on. Every year, millions of people from all over the world visit the graves of the legendary film stars buried in Hollywood, and the interest in these places grows from year to year.

Hollywood Remains to Be Seen highlights the legend and lore of celebrity graves, from Rudolph Valentino's mysterious "Lady in Black" to the regular delivery of one red rose to Marilyn Monroe's grave, to the strange journeys made by the body of John Barrymore immediately after his death in 1942 -- and again thirty-eight years later. Also included are information and images of Hollywood's most lavish and majestic graves, from the huge mausoleum of Douglas Fairbanks Sr., complete with Roman pillars and a giant reflecting pool; to Liberace's flamboyant tomb, with a musical score set on white marble; to the spectacular domed monument of Al Jolson, featuring a life-sized statue of the entertainer atop a 120-foot cascading waterfall.

Heavily illustrated with nearly one hundred photographs, Hollywood Remains to Be Seen includes photographs of the celebrities as well as photographs ofthe cemeteries, mausoleums, and graves, maps of the burial grounds and gravesites, and a final section fitly titled "Exit Lines" made up of celebrities' last words.

Auditioning for Musical Theatre demystifies the process of giving the best possible professional audition for a role in a musical. It is the result of Denny Berry's own experience, sitting "behind the audition desk" for 30 years of professional Broadway auditions, as well as teaching newcomers and coaching established actors. The book coaches performers on how to be their best selves-and avoid the pitfalls of nerves and poor preparation. To do so, it offers: An in-depth, practical approach to a professional audition that gives readers detailed suggestions about how to identify their vocal strengths, choose the material most suited to it, and present the entirety of their "product" with confidence. Rules to guide the actor through the audition process, along with sample homework assignments. A comprehensive list of musical material, genres, and commonly-referred-to categories of songs designed to help auditioners select the right material for any given audition. The book is intended for the talented newcomer as well as the experienced actor who wants to deliver a more effective audition. Ultimately, Auditioning for Musical Theatre takes the reader through the parts of auditioning that they can control, and helps them tailor every situation to show their individual best.

Performer Training is an examination of how actors are trained in different cultures. Beginning with studies of mainstream training in countries such as Poland, Australia, Germany, and the United States, subsequent studies survey:
? Some of Asia's traditional training methods and recent experiments in performer training
? Eugenio Barba's training methods
? Jerzy Grotowski's most recent investigations
? The Japanese American NOHO companies attempts at integrating Kyogen into the works of Samuel Beckett
? Descriptions of the training methods developed by Tadashi Suzuki and Anne Bogart at their Saratoga International Theatre Institute
? Recent efforts to re-examine the role and scope of training, like Britain's International Workshop Festival and the European League of Institutes of Arts masterclasses
? The reformulation of the use of emotions in performer training known as Alba Emoting.

Each chapter of this book presents a single day of the twenty-day training which Ruth Zaporah developed into "Action Theater," her investigation into the life-reflecting process of improvisation. This book shows through exercises, stories, anecdotes, and metaphors how to focus attention on the body's awareness of the present moment, moving away from preconceived ideas. Improvisations move through fear, boredom, laziness, and distraction to a sustained awareness of creative options.

In the tradition of the medieval cycle plays performed for education, enrichment, and entertainment, A New Corpus Christi: Plays for Churches presents 25 short plays and skits with one or two scripts for each of 21 events in the church year. The scripts range from celebratory pieces to problem plays to liturgical dramas to plays that call for no worship setting accouterments. The scripts will also provide discussion starters for Sunday school classes or small groups. And some of the plays might be grouped together as programs on particular topics such as poverty and homelessness or death and dying. This book also provides a resource for university and seminary courses in liturgics and worship.

Ever feel like the only hurdle between you and your dream role are the outmoded audition (and let's face it gender) norms that many casting agents presumably adhere to? Tired of stale and lifeless soliloquies that leave your mouth dry and your spirit in tatters? Sick of feeling hamstrung by both your material and your imagined audience? In EBreak the Rules and Get the Part: Thirty Monologues for WomenE Lira Kellerman will help you infiltrate navigate and obliterate the arbitrary guidelines that keep you tethered to dull flaccid monologues and a disembodied stage personality.THCharacterized by EBroadway WorldE as a complex combo of prude and seductress Kellerman knows the ins and outs of both sides of an audition. Onstage she boasts extensive experience as an actress and dancer a experience that in tandem with her skill as a writer and proud embrace of her inner dork (despite said dork's predilection toward words like hella and dude in moments of emotional intensity) led to the creation of this palpably empathetic book. Behind the table her many gigs as an acting coach and casting director have taught her what your most important critics expect a and exactly how you should surprise them.THShe brings this knowledge to bear on each original (that's right original!) monologue in EBreak the Rules and Get the PartE. Every one-minute piece is emotionally self-contained featuring a clear internal narrative arc sharp turning points and several beats to choose from each of which can make the text your own. These comedic serio-comedic and dramatic monologues are also followed by what Kellerman terms Helpful Direction: a list of key points that highlight character objectives and intents several ideas on which emotions you should hit (and how and where to hit them) and multiple comedic and dramatic suggestions that heighten your individuality and personal essence within a piece.THEBreak the Rules and Get the PartE is the sort of book a showbiz vet at the top of her artistic game wishes she had when she first entered the field. Don't fret about getting your foot in the door a kick it down stride in and make your wildest dreams a reality!

Gail Marshall looks at actresses on the English stage of the later nineteenth century, and argues that much of their work was determined by the popularity at the time of images of Classical sculpture. They were often encouraged to look as much as possible like statues, and thus to appear to their audiences as sexually desirable objects rather than creative artists. The book draws for its evidence on theatrical fictions, visual representations, and popular culture's assimilation of the sculptural image, as well as on theatrical productions.

What are the key elements that go into creating a work of art for the stage? Which are the most productive conditions and methods of rehearsal? In this collection of interviews, 18 international artists share their experience and offer practical advice on the creation of performance work. Their answers provide a goldmine of tried and tested approaches as they discuss the common problems and difficulties of creative work, their turning-point experiences, and ways in which they have challenged performers and themselves to go beyond conditioned reflexes to create groundbreaking new work.

Co-written by Tina Packer, founding artistic director of the company. Focus on the company's practical processes makes the book ideal for students, teachers and professionals. Includes comprehensive coverage of the company's core actor training curriculum.