Resources
Quiz
Quiz Handouts
This is the only acting class I teach where I give quizzes on almost every chapter (all but 1 and 2) since the text is so content-rich with much information to absorb. I have yet to find something more motivating insofar as taking in this amount of material than a forthcoming quiz. I factor quizzes into final grades only if a student is consistently getting top or bottom scores.
Download Quizzes
Downloadable Handouts
Schedule
In this particular schedule, the term is interrupted for an entire week while much of our department attends a regional theatre conference so periods devoted to coaching for those still present seems the best solution. Students work on one scene for the first half of the term, presented in a midterm showcase and another for the second half, also showcased. While many instructors use the text over a more extended period of time than one quarter or base a class on fewer chapters than all, this schedule is provided to show that, while less than ideal, it can be done.
Syllabus
This sample is for a one-term, ten-week course, meeting for six hours (three two-hour sessions) a week in which the entire text is covered. The strict attendance requirements are based on the assumption that these class meetings are impossible to make up and the document informs students of the requirements to locate period costume pieces and music for their scenes, responsibilities to which they are not accustomed.
Sign-in Sheets
I find using a sign-in sheet simplifies taking attendance considerably. To amuse the class, I vary the sheet as the term progresses, sometimes, for example, assigning them Style in a Nutshell or Restoration names so they are never quite certain which version of themselves they will be asked to autograph.
Sample Agenda
I find that starting the period with a quiz on the reading assignment, which leads to discussions, then getting everyone up on their feet for warm-ups and exercises, prior to scene presentations, critiques and additional group activities, helps the class move from a cerebral impression of the material to a more kinesthetic sense of what it really feels like to live in the plays of each era.
Assistant Duties
Frequently graduate students enter their degree program with no style training from their undergraduate degree. They are eager to serve as pedagogue in this class to fill in gaps and to prepare themselves for teaching a course of this kind in the future. This also serves as directing preparation, since coaching period style scenes is as close as some of them will come to a first-hand, supervised experience, prior to directing such plays as part of their future profession. Also, because students in the class focus on two specific style scenes, it is not uncommon for undergraduates to return as pedagogue, not only to review material but to focus on periods they did not experience first-hand the first time around.
A Scenes
B Scenes
I assign a full historical range of scenes in each half of the term, moving from Greek tragedy through some displaced or contemporary -isms. I find that placing the various styles next to each other right out of the gate makes the contrasts and connections more vivid than if we simply worked our way through. I give each actor two scenes from highly contrasting styles on the first day of class, so while primary energy will be devoted to one scene before midterms, the other is clearly on the horizon. This also means that we never really leave any period behind, as long as actors in the class are still working on material from it. Work is expected to be much faster on the second scene because it is now so much more informed. Particularly in showcase, when the lights go down at the end of one scene and come up on an entirely different world, it illuminates the whole concept of styles for both performers and audience members.
Scene Full of Asides
I have actors work on this scene in pairs and then volunteer to demonstrate the technique of the aside with the class responding and coaching to make the work more precise. Discussion is generated as to whether an individual aside is a simple turn of the head, a leaning in to the audience, or a short run downstage to confide in them more overtly.
Showcase Set-up
For several years I had assistant teachers/pedagogues run the showcases as crew, but found the actors not engaged unless their own scenes were involved and becoming somewhat ‘diva’ in terms of demands. The minute I switched to requiring classmates to crew showcases on the days they were not performing, this immediately turned around. We keep these relatively low-tech — lights either on or off; quick changing of boxes and minimal furniture during blackouts. Staff includes a stage manager, light person, hosts to welcome visitors and hand out programs, stage crew to shift furniture and a sound person who plays the music actors in a scene have provided.
Mood-wise, nothing is more important than these musical selections. If a rowdy, chatty crowd arrives and the first scene is Medea, music that will grab their attention, pull them into a serious frame of mind and get them attentive is essential between lights down and up. If that scene happens to be followed by Shrew, in blackout the music needs to kick in lively, up tempo, and playful to pull the audience out of the dark of scene one into the light of scene two.
The actors are required to identify their floor plans and any additional technical information in writing as per these forms.
Because this course is the last in a basic sequence, students in preceding classes are required to attend. This gives them a vivid sense of what is ahead.
Costuming/Staging Logistics
This is a description of how our class deals with getting students into appropriate garments and for placing parameters on how detailed or suggestive are the visual elements of scene presentation.
Because so much of style acting is done through costumes that present challenges, it is important to give students some exposure to what it is like to face and work through these tricky maneuvers. In our department, we have a costume storage area which checks out garments to students as well as other theatres in the community. For Styles class we handle this one of two alternate ways:
- Students are responsible for visiting storage, pictures in hand (from the text or other sources) showing what they are seeking, sifting through what is there and putting together a costume.
- A teaching assistant, with costume history knowledge, checks out a series of garments from each period, transports them to class on a rolling rack and students check them out from this person under supervision. This second approach is likely to produce greater accuracy. We then store the rack somewhere near class and have check-in and check-out parts of class periods throughout the term.
For wigs, corsets, panniers, and other accoutrements, I have acquired a stash of basic items I store in filing cabinets in my office and check out to students as needed. I also have a stash of swords, daggers, feather pens, masks, fans and other personal props that may be used. I provide students with photos of make-up and wig-styling options to assist their work. The first time scenes are presented, we simply require something akin to rehearsal costumes, appropriate footgear, wigs if they are likely to affect movement and focus, and something approximating the silhouette of the look of the period. For showcases, a far more detailed complete look is required.
Because of the high maintenance aspect in all this, we strive to keep the emphasis entirely on the actor with nothing else onstage that is not essential. No set