Ocean State Libraries

"Presents the romantic falsifications of love and warfare in a comedy that reveals the author's skilss as an acute social observer and witty provocateur." --

Shakespeare knew more about the art of acting and the art of theater than any other playwright-but there is no general consensus about how Shakespeare should be played. There are no rules. While the Bard created superhuman characters and placed them in situations that stretch the imagination to its limits, he also provided his actors with the keys to playing them. Discover his secrets in this remarkable guide. In A Shakespearean Actor Prepares, actor,...

Together with Royal Shakespeare Company actors including Patrick Stewart, Judi Dench, Ian McKellen, Ben Kingsley, and David Suchet, director John Barton demonstrates how to adapt Elizabethan theater for the modern stage. Barton begins by explicating Shakespeare's verse and prose, speeches and soliloquies, and naturalistic and heightened language to discover the essence of his characters. In the second section, Barton and the actors explore nuance...

Clues to Acting Shakespeare has become a popular guide for actors, directors, teachers and Shakespeare enthusiasts, selling over 15,000 copies of previous editions. This third edition retains the second edition's unique solutions to challenges that face directors and actors at advanced levels and is expanded to include an entirely new section for amateur and community theatre groups. In this new edition, readers will be delighted to find: New section...

"'Creative and Successful Set Designs' is a helpful resource for set designers, theater teachers, and performing arts directors to use to help avoid common pitfalls when creating the world of their production. Muffatti takes examples of sets from some of the best known works of drama and details the best ways to fully bring the set to life"--

In Speaking Shakespeare, Patsy Rodenburg tackles one of the most difficult acting jobs: speaking Shakespeare's words both as they were meant to be spoken and in an understandable and dramatic way. Rodenburg calls this "a simple manual to start the journey into the heart of Shakespeare," and that is what she gives us. With the same insight she displayed in The Actor Speaks, Rodenburg tackles the playing of all Shakespeare's characters. She uses dramatic...