Orson Welles likened acting to sculpture, saying, “It’s what you take away from yourself to reveal the truth of what you are doing that makes a performance,” and while that may be true, we must determine the general shape it will take before we even take up our tools.
If acting is the ability to live truthfully under imaginary circumstances, then we must not only give ourselves up to our imaginations but also see the potential in the unhewn block before we strike the first blow.
We lift the author’s words from the page and give them form, yet if the life of that character was lived in a different time and/or place, we must make that a new home in our minds.
Their origin and subsequent journey set the basis for the voice that will give the emerging figure life.
This program sets out to broaden the actor’s awareness of the layers of speech and seeks to make sense of what may appear as chaotic audio chisel strokes so that any speech system may be approached, embraced and wielded with the confidence that a sculptor wields a chisel, embedding the process alongside a character’s development.
