EXERCISE IV: A TREASURE

CREATING A CHARACTER (Need 4 people)

Well through the exercises, you’ve memorized something, written it, and said it out loud to a mini audience. Now it’s time to create a character. An exercise I played with a lot during my times with the Loading Zone in Santa Rosa and as a director for “Skeleton Woman” is perfect for a taste of how to do this. Beginning here can keep you from getting caught in one-dimensional acting which happens when an actor plays the stereotypes and has no interiority or physical truth with the character. When that happens, I’d rather be at the movies.

This exercise was developed by Jerzy Growtowsky a brilliant Polish director who grounded his work in the unconscious and body memory, but did it through precise external tools. This work “the baseball exercise” comes via Stephen Wangh’s “An Acrobat of the Heart”. It was named by one of Wangh’s students and gets its name because it takes the form of a baseball diamond. 3 participants stand around the starting actor who is on the pitcher’s mound. There is an “audience” which is upstage beyond the baseman.

Lets begin:

1. THE BEGINNING ACTOR TURNS TO THE ACTOR IN THE FIRST BASE POSITION AND IS GIVEN A PHYSCIAL STANCE such as head thrown back, chest thrust out, and feet splayed out. Think of statues. The central actor mimics the stance until she feels she’s got it. It can be helpful for the other baseman to give the actor feedback to get the “exact” stance, i.e., how far is the right foot turned out? the left? ( Usually the more precise the stance, the more successful the exercise.)

2. WHEN THE WORKING ACTOR FEELS SHE’S GOT IT, SHE TURNS TO THE SECOND BASEMAN AND GETS A VOCAL CHOICE which should include pitch, intonation, placement and accent while including tempo and rhythm. It can be more fun if the vocal choice doesn’t “fit” the stance. Also don’t get bogged down here if you get too flummoxed with all the details, just throw something out. Or just pick one or two things to work with like high voice, low voice. Husky?? You can just imitate voices you’ve heard. Getting the voice, the actor checks back to first base to make sure she remembers the stance and includes it with the voice.

3. THEN SHE MOVES ON TO THIRD BASE WHERE SHE GETS A MOVING PHYSICAL GESTURE INVOLVING ARMS, HANDS, FACE, OR FEET. She integrates this with the two previous ones.

4. WHEN THE ACTOR FEELS SHE CAN KEEP ALL THE CHOICES GOING AT ONCE SHE ASKS THE AUDIENCE FOR A FIRST LINE. Then taking that phrase and using all of the other elements the actor starts to improvise trusting everything that comes up: thoughts, movement, words, images. If the actor gets stuck she goes back to the first line or asks for another. The basemen support the work if the “pitcher” starts to loose any physical or vocal elements. Of course this should be done on a minimal level. A rule of thumb is only if the actor is stuck or way “off base”.

5. IMPORTANT: AT THE END OF THE EXPLORATION, GIVE YOURSELF
A CHANCE TO DEBRIEF and come back into yourself. Breathe and let the elements and phrases go. It’s important to remember that the content that does emerge is the “character” and not you. The central actor then sits down and the other actors rotate their positions and everyone begins again.

QUESTIONS? e-mail lighttouchtheater@gmail.com