Block the Boss

New plan. Based somewhat on what came before, but with an important distinction: if it’s all about status, then the blocking has to emerge organically from the character who has the greatest status at any given time. Find the top of the pyramid, block him or her, and then the rest of the blocking should fall into place.

First, I’ll explain how I got here. Then, I’ll put forward a rehearsal methodology.

Last week, I was feeling once more overwhelmed by the sheer number of all-important concepts. I was reading “The Actor’s Guide to Performing Shakespeare” by Madd Harold, and I kept coming across concepts that all seemed critical. Breath? Yes, of course. Scansion? No doubt. Intention? Well, naturally. Discovery? And so on...

Nearing my saturation point, I sat down and wrote a list. Steps to Mastering Shakespeare. Then I prioritized them, roughly, knowing that I would not have time to cover every point with every actor in every scene. Here’s what I came up with:

• Who are you speaking to?
• What do the words mean?
• What is your status?
• What is your intention?
• What are the important words?
• Are your lines verse or prose?
• How does the verse scan?
• What are your tactics?
• Where are the antitheses?
• Where does your breath fall?
• What sounds are important?

There’s probably more than that, even, but it’s a start. Notice that I put status third, after issues of basic comprehension. I sometimes forget that actors may not have spent much time immersed in Shakespeare’s language, so they may not know what words mean, or how Shakespeare used words differently from us.

Is there an efficient way to get through all of these points and still have time to block a scene? I don’t know. But I realize now that I’ve been coming at the question of status (and blocking) backwards, using points (like scansion) that are way down on the priority list. In the time it would take actors to go through their lines and mark off all the beats and stresses, I could probably block the scene thrice over.

So here’s my proposed methodology. It alternates between actors working individually (with support from me and an AD) and coming into a group.

Step One: Standing Read-Through
In a group, all the actors stand and read through a scene. They should listen carefully to all the language in the scene (not just their own), and mark any words or lines that don’t make sense to them.

Step Two: Comprehension
Individually, actors scrutinize their own lines, and accomplish the following:
• Decide who their lines are directed to;
• Look up the meanings of odd words;
• Highlight the key words in each passage;
• Choose an intention for each line (using the simple, status-based formula which I used to call Step One)

Step Three: Status Steps
The actors reconvene. The director asks the question: who has the most status at the top of the scene? The actors point at who they think is the boss (this will usually be Lear, Regan, or Goneril; towards the end of the play, Edmund may also get fingered). Then, we read through the scene again, with the status character in the centre of the space. As the others play their intentions (vying for status, relinquishing status, supporting the status of others), they step forwards, backwards, or around the high-status character. Just one step per line—no formal blocking yet.

Step Four: Block the Boss
Individually (with help from the AD), actors practice walking their lines. This involves:
• Sorting their lines (verse or prose);
• Scanning their verse lines;
• Walking their lines (using scansion and grammatical strucutre to find a physical movement that reflects the line);
• Incorporating their intention (forwards, backwards, around) into their walk;
While all of this is going on, I would take the high-status character and block his/her scene formally. I’d probably have to work this out in advance, which is fine. This actor would have to do some scansion too, but as I discovered earlier, most of the time the high-status character has clean, smooth verse, so his/her scansion won’t take as long.

Step Five: Balance Blocking
Collectively, the actors read the scene again. They now have movements worked out for each of their lines, and they know how they should move relative to the boss. But, if characters always moved when they spoke (and only when they spoke), the scene would look awful—stagey and stolid.

So I bring in the concept of Balance (I’d prepare them for this with a series of exercises, plus I’ll show them that awesome film). When they read the scene this time, they will imagine that they share a precarious space, and that the angle and movement of the floor is determined primarily by what the boss is doing (he/she’s the heaviest). They have to gauge their own movements on and around the boss’s movements—advance when he advances, circle when he crosses, orbit him if he needs support.

Because they won’t know where or when he’s going to move, the actors will need to stay on their toes. As the “Balance” film shows, if you’re not careful, you can end up getting knocked right off the gameboard. Now the actors have intentions, and ways of moving; but when and where they move will be organic responses to the movements of the high-status character.

I’m sure it will be messy the first few times around. But I’m hoping that, once the actors get the hang of the Balance Blocking, they’ll embrace the opportunity to block themselves with gusto. There are other things to consider—like, what about the many scenes where more than one character has high status?—but it feels like a strong yet flexible method, and I think I can make it accommodate the needs of the play.