Training the Actor’s Body: A Guide

Description

A practical guide to the principles of teaching and learning movement, this book instructs the actor on how to train the body to become a medium of expression. Starting with a break-down of the principles of actor training through exercises and theatre games, Dick McCaw teaches the actor about their own body and its possibilities including: the different ways it can move, the space it occupies and finally its rhythm, timing and pacing. With 64 exercises supported by diagrams and online video, Dick McCaw draws on his 20 years of teaching experience to coach the reader in the dynamics of movement education to achieve a responsive and articulate body. Cover Contents Preface: My Education in Movement The International Workshop Festival (1989–2001) Learning Laban and Feldenkrais (2001–2007) Tai Chi (2010–2016) Notes Introduction What is an actor’s body? The reading and writing of this book About an exercise Documentation: Developing an eye for detail Documentation and conversation: Developing an ear for training Word and action The currency and exchange of exercises What are we training? Circles, lines and loops: The process of learning A book in two parts Notes PART ONE AN ACTOR’S TRAINING: WHY, WHAT, HOW 1 Why Actor Training? Aims, Visions, Priorities and Principles 1.1 Why train? 1.2 Actor training is different to other trainings 1.3 The aim of training is to develop choice and range 1.4 The moment of attention Summary of principles and main points Why train? Notes 2 What is Actor Training? What goes into a curriculum? 2.1 An articulate body 2.2 Is training about adding or taking away? 2.3 A heuristic approach to training 2.4 Visible and invisible, conscious and unconscious 2.5 Attention must be paid! 2.6 Readiness Summary of principles and main points Things which we need to negotiate or eliminate Notes 3 Exercises (How Training is Delivered) Introduction: What is an exercise? 3.1 Exercises as memes, training as bricolage 3.2 Theatre games: The actor at work and play 3.3 An exercise as an empty structure 3.4 The exercise as a work of art 3.5 Exercises and embodied meaning Summary of principles and main points Notes PART TWO TRAINING THE ACTOR’S BODY 4 Starting to Work Together Introduction 4.1 Exercises in ensemble 4.2 On passing games 4.3 Ball games 4.4 On ball games and actor training 4.5 Throwing and catching sticks 4.6 On sticks in actor training Summary of principles and main points Notes Introduction to Chapters 5 and 6 Learning about your body Working on or warming up the body? Plasticity, suppleness, malleability in body and mind Notes 5 Learning about Your Body: Weight and Gravity, Breath and Voice 5.1 Gravity and weight, standing and walking 5.2 A note on the skeleton 5.3 The physics of breathing 5.4 The physics and physiology of breathing 5.5 Teaching breathing and vocal production 5.6 The (mouth) shape of consonants and vowels Summary of principles and main points Notes 6 Learning about Your Body: Rotations and Swings Introduction 6.1 The skeletal body: Articular and articulate 6.2 Reflections on arm swinging exercises 6.3 Reflections on successive movement Summary of principles and main points Notes 7 Ways of Seeing Movement, Ways of Moving 7.1 Introduction 7.2 The how or the why of movement 7.3 Movement observation (Chekhov, Barker and Laban) 7.4 Elements of movement 7.5 Warren Lamb: Movement is process of variation 7.6 Michael Chekhov’s movement qualities 7.7 Daniel Stern: Vitality affects and forms of vitality 7.8 The practice of the theory 7.9 An example of effort analysis 7.10 Movement qualities and the actor 7.11 Tuning in to a group activity or process Summary of principles and main points Notes 8 A Sense of Space 8.1 Notions of space 8.2 Together in space 8.3 Sending a gesture across space, physical projection 8.4 Laban’s sense of space 8.5 The directions and metaphors for movement Summary of principles and main points Notes 9 Rhythm, Timing, Pacing 9.1 What is rhythm? 9.2 Objective time (iterative or metronomic time) 9.3 Musicality and rhythm 9.4 A practical example: At the train station 9.5 Readiness to move: The rhythm of standing 9.6 The time over which a performance unfolds 9.7 Exercises in the light of rhythm Summary of principles and main points Notes Conclusions The body is not a finished thing Exercises Attention and awareness Readiness Last questions Notes List of Games and Exercises Used in the Book Bibliography Links to Supplementary Video Acknowledgements Index