The art of acting and public reading; dramatic interpretation

Preface

This book has been written in response to a demand for some text that will outline a course of instruction leading to professional work. It takes up the work of Acting and Public Reading, and presupposes thorough training on the part of the student in common reading and speech mechanics. It is for the advanced student in the normal school, the college, the professional school of oratory, or the private studio.

The purpose of the book is to set forth a comprehensive classification of the different ways of presenting various types of literature, taking into consideration the author's purpose and the class of audience to be entertained. It is my belief that such a classification can be made and that it may become a useful guide in maintaining a standard of consistency among readers, entertainers and actors so that there may be less harsh criticism which the average elocution teacher feels moved to make upon the propriety of this or that feature of an entertainment.

In taking up this classification, let me say that I do not hope to have it accepted as infallible or as the only classification possible, but I do hope that it will give the young platform artist a clearer conception of his field so that he will not encroach upon the actor's art in the name of public reading.

It is my purpose to show among other things that a study of the actor's art is fundamentally essential to

PREFACE

a complete understanding of the reader's art and that no public reader can be truly suggestive unless he has first been given the opportunity to express completely and conscientiously all action that he hopes ultimately to suggest.

One of my best friends in the profession maintains that good taste is the only standard we may safely follow in carrying out our individual styles of entertaining. This might be true were it not for the fact that there are many talented entertainers who lack natural discernment and good taste, and who beUeve that any method of presentation which brings a laugh or hearty applause is acceptable. It is for such that a standard classification is necessary. It may even prove helpful to those champions of good taste who differ with their fellow entertainers as to what is really good taste. While it is true that good taste might govern the majority, it is just as true that there are other determining factors which enter into the presentation of literature and make it more effective.

I am indebted to Miss Mae Belle Adams of Emerson College of Oratory and to Professor H. M. Tilroe and Mrs. Florence Butler of Syracuse University for my early instruction in fundamental principles of interpretation ; to Professor Fredrick D. Losey of New York City, whose technical instruction and whose professional work in Shakespearian readings have always been a source of inspiration to me; to Professor I. L. Winter of Harvard University and to Professor Arthur E. Phillips of Chicago, whose training in voice culture and the principles of practical public speaking

PREFACE

has been invaluable; to Ernest Elton of New York and to Donald Robertson of Chicago, whose instruction in acting gave me the actor's point of view and first led me to see the true relationship that acting bears to public speaking and public reading, and perhaps most of all I am indebted to Professor S. H. Clark of Chicago University for many valuable suggestions relating to the classifications set forth in this book.

I also take occasion here to express my appreciation for the careful reviewing of my manuscript which Professor Ephraim Eisenberg of New York University has given.

R. A. T.

Butler University,

Indianapolis, Indiana.

General Remarks. — All art is suggestive but some is more suggestive than others. There seems to be an assumption on the part of a few teachers of elocution that the more suggestive presentation is the more truly artistic. This is not true. Up to a certain point realism is as artistic as suggestion but in a different way. Acting is much more realistic than Reading but it is no less an art, for with all the attempts at realism, acting is still highly suggestive.

Any art seeks to bring out essentials and to omit all that is not essential. If it were possible to reproduce life on the stage exactly, it would not be art. A photograph untouched by the artist's hand is not art — it is science. It reproduces exactly non-essentials as well as essentials. A good painting of the same object is art for it reproduces only the essentials of color, form and perspective, and gives the impression of a real reproduction. A crayon drawing of the same object leaves out the realistic element of color and depends a little more upon the imagination of the beholder. A line drawing of the same object in pen and ink leaves out shading and depends still more upon suggestion. All these forms of art are suggestive but in different degrees and from different points of view. Similarly the »actor may be compared to the painter, aad the reader to the illustrator. As the painter with the use of color is the most realistic of artists, so the actor with the use of make-up, costumes, scenery, furniture, etc., is the most realistic of his class of artists. As the illustrator eliminating color makes the carefully shaded crayon drawing, so the reader, without make-up, costume, properties, etc., in personating presents his characterization in literal action. As the illustrator in still more suggestive drawing eliminates further the element of shading and by mere pen and ink, broad line suggestion makes a cartoon, or exaggerated comedy sketch, so the reader in impersonative reading eliminates literal action and portrays his comedy or eccentric characters in voluntary vocal adaptation and facial characterization-. As the illustrator in most highly suggestive form and perspective makes the pen and ink sketch for serious rather than comedy effect, so the reader in pure reading eliminates further vocal and facial characterization and becomes most highly suggestive in his portrayal of character moods, and in his presentation of description and narration.

Purpose. — The following chapters will give an exposition of the essential factors in the presentation of literature through Acting, Personating, Impersonative Reading and Pure Reading; it will classify the types of literature and the kinds of audiences best suited to various styles of presentation, and it will suggest methods of study.

These types of delivery will be taken up in the order of their progression from realistic presentation on the stage to the most highly suggestive presentation on the public platform.

Explanation of Diagrams. — In order that the

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S relationship which the Actor and the Reader bear to each other and to their respective types of presentation n^ay be clearly understood, it is compared by diagram to the relationship which the Painter and the Illustrator bear to each other and to their respective kinds of art.

(I.) Comparison in Diagram Figure A. It will be observed that a strong dividing line separates the art of the Actor from the art of the Reader, and that the same line extended down the page also separates the art of the Painter from the art of the Illustrator. This heavy line has a special significance in that it represents for the entertainer the point of departure from the use of properties and all stage accessories, while for the artist it represents the point of departure from the use of color.

The Actor is likened to the Painter in that each does his work as realistically as possible. The Actor with all stage accessories does his work through acting with action and characterization complete in every essential detail, first, in the play with fellow actors, and second, in the Soliloquy, a slightly less realistic and more imaginative selection in its purpose, alone on the stage. The Painter by the use of color does his work through painting with realistic representation of nature's colors, form and perspective first, in Detailed Art, and second, in Impressionistic Art, which is slightly less realistic and more imaginative in its purpose. In the actor's art the key-note is the primary necessity for scene, properties and stage effects, while the key-note for the painter's art is the necessity ior color.

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Passing to the right of the dividing line in the diagram, the Reader, who always works alone, without the aid of make-up, properties or stage accessories of any kind, does his work in three ways, namely, through personating, through imp er sanative reading or through pure reading, while the Illustrator, without the use of color, does his work in three ways, namely, through light and shade drawing, through hroad lines in caricature and through detail line drawings. The reader in personating recognizes the key-note, literal action, w^hile the illustrator recognizes as his key-note in light and shade drawing, the necessity for perfectly blended high lights and shadows, perfect form and perfect perspective. For both the reader and the illustrator this is a step toward suggestion and a step away from realism and attention to detail. The reader in impersonative reading departs from literal action and retains only vocal and facial characterization in recognizing the key-note, comedy or eccentric characterization, while the illustrator in broad line, caricature drawing also recognizes eccentric characterization as his key-note and departs from perfectly blended light and shade, using only rough lines without much regard for perspective. The last step toward highly suggestive art and away from realism is pure reading for the reader and detail line drawing for the illustrator. Here the reader departs entirely from external characterization or eccentric comedy and depends solely upon the expression of mood which is recognized as the key-note and is expressed through involuntary vocal changes, suggestive action including subjective gesture and facial expression. The illustrator recognizes mood as his key-note also and expresses it in perfect suggestion of perspective and form in line drawings of a serious rather than humorous nature.

(2.) Comparison in Diagram Figure B. In Figure B the shaded area represents the proportion of realistic presentation in the successive kinds of delivery, acting, personating, impersonative reading and pure reading as it decreases correspondingly with the increase of suggestiveness represented by the unshaded area. The same proportion exists in passing from painting to detailed line drawing. (S-) Significance of Diagram Figure C. Figure C presents to the eye a means of visualizing the two classifications for Action and Voice. It is to be understood that the terms Suggestive and Literal apply to all action including the zonal classification.

PART ONE Acting chapter page

I General Discussion ...... 1

Definition 1

Relationship to Reading 3

Limit of Discussion 6

Types of Literature Suitable for Acting 7

II The Play * 8

Definition 8

Kinds of Plays ....... 8

Limit of Discussion 11

Technique of Presentation .... 12

1. The Setting ...... 12

2. Kinds of Furniture . . . .13

3. Properties 14

4. Grouping of Characters . . 15

5. Mechanical Effects . . . . 15

6. Lighting Effects .... 16

7. Concerning Make-up and Cos-

tumes 20

III The Play (continued) 23

Technique of Presentation (continued) 23

8. General Stage Business ... 23

9. Detailed Business .... 36

10. Individual License in Business 39

11. Silent Acting 39

a. Unobtrusive Silent Acting 40

b. Aggressive Silent Acting 41

12. The Speaking of Lines ... 41

13. Asides 45

14. Soliloquies 47

Literary Presentation of Plays ... 48

IV The One Character Play^ or Soliloquy 50

Definition 50

Comparison of the Soliloquy and the

Aside within the Play .... 51

The Relative Importance of Scenery

and Furniture . 52

Excerpts from Plays for the Platform 53

Technique of Presentation .... 55

V Illustrative Matter 57

From the Play Requiring Two or More

Characters 57

Illustration from the One Character

Play 59

Brief Summary .63

VI Rehearsing Beginners ..... 65 General Remarks . . . . . .65

Selecting the Cast 66

Reading Rehearsal — General Business

Given 68

Act by Act Procedure 69

Memorizing Lines and Cues .... 69

Detailed Business 69

Property Rehearsal 71

Polish . , . 73

Dress Rehearsal with Effects ... 79

Final Rehearsal 80

A Final Word 81

PART TWO VII General Discussion 87

Definition of Reading 87

The Relationship of Reading to Acting 87

C0NTE1<^TS— Continued

1. The Arts Themselves ... 87

2. The Artists Compared ... 88 The Three Types of Presentation for

the Reader 95

1. Personating . . . . . .95

2. Impersonative Reading ... 95

3. Pure Reading 96

The Determining Factors in Making the

Subdivisions ....... 96

1. The Author's Purpose ... 96

2. The Literary Composition . . 97

3. Method of Qassifying a Selec-

tion Quickly 99

General Limitations in Attitude and in

Sex 101

1. Bearing in Reading (Pure or Impersonative) Compared to Bearing in Personating .... 101 2. Sex Limitation in Personating and

in Reading 103

VIII Personating . ....... 105

Definition Elaborated 105

Type of Selection for Personating . . 105

1. The Personation 105

Vocal Features of Personating . . 112 1. Voluntary Adaptation of Voice

to Characterization . . . .112

a. Conscious Change in the

Four Elements: Quality, Force, Pitch and Time . 112

b. Conscious Imitation of

Speech Mechanics in Producing Dialects . . .115

c. Conscious Imitation of Lo-

cal and Provincial Speech 117

CO^TENTS—Continued d. Conscious Imitation of

Speech Defects . . .120

e. Song Imitation . . . 121 2. Involuntary Change of Voice Expressing the Varying Moods . 121

Actional Features of Personating . .122

1. Literalness in All Action . . . 122

2. Technique of Action in Personat-

ing 124

The Use of a Chair and Personal Properties 128

Treatment of Personation within Personating 130

The Treatment of Vocal Imitation within Personating 132

The Use of Literal Song in Personating 133 Relation of Personating to Impersonative Reading 134

IX Impersonative Reading 135

Definition Elaborated 135

Type of Selection Suitable for Impersonative Reading .135

1. The Character Reading . . .135

Vocal Features of Impersonative Reading 137

Actional Features of Impersonative Reading 137

Stationary Position of the Reader in Impersonative Reading .... 140

Treatment of Personation within Impersonative Reading 141

Treatment of Vocal Imitation within Impersonative Reading .... 142

The Use of Song in Impersonative Reading 143

The Treatment of First Person Narrative 144

CONTEISITS— Continued

X Pure Reading 146

Definition Elaborated 146

Type of Selecton for Pure Reading . 147 1. The Interpretative Reading . .147

Vocal Features of Pure Reading . . 148

Actional Features of Pure Reading . 150 Treatment of Mood Representation

within Normal Characterization . 153 Treatment of Vocal Imitation in Pure

The Suggestion of Song in Pure Reading 156

First and Third Person Narrative . 158

XI The Varied Treatment of Types . . 161 Selections for Either Impersonative or

Pure Reading 161

Selections Unmistakable in Classification 162

Selections Impossible to Classify as

Readings 164

1. The Burlesque 164

2. The Inconsistent Composition . 165

3. Stunts, or Imitations .... 166

4. Ventriloquism 166

PART THREE Method of Study

XII General Discussion 171

Introductory Statement 171

The Development of Human Expression 174 The Development of the Art of Pure

The Law of Suggestive Action . .178

The Law of Vocal Changes . . . 180

CONTENTS — Continued

XIII Suggestions for Study 182

In the Play with Others .... 182

In the SoHloquy Alone 184

The Soliloquy for Personating . . . 185 The Monologue for Personating . .187 The Eccentric Address for Personating 188 The Character Series for Personating 189 The Character Soliloquy and the Character Monologue for Impersonative

The Character Play for Impersonative

The Character Narrative for Impersonative Reading 192

Interpretative Readings, Including Sub-forms for Pure Reading .... 192 How to Work out Any Selection for Public Presentation . . . . . 193

XIV Choice of Selection 196

The Student's Difficulty .... 196

New Selections or Old 198

Where to Find New Material ... 199 How to Recognize Good Material for

Adaptation 199

Cutting the Selection 201

Preparing the Selection for Delivery . 202

XV Choice of Professional Training . . 208

Introductory 208

Suggested Course for the Actor . . 209 Suggested Course for the Reader . . 210 Suggested Course for the Public

Speaker 210

A Word about the Preliminary Courses 211

CONTENTS— Concluded

PAGE

Definition of Class Types . . . .215

1. The Artists Defined . . . .215

2. The x\rts Defined . ... 216

3. Types of Literature Defined . 217 Definition of Voice and Action . .219

1. Action Defined According to

Bodily Zones 220

2. Action Defined According to its

Literalness and Suggestiveness 221

3. Voice Defined 222

Definition of Forms of Composition . 222

Definition of Mood and Atmosphere . 224

Chapter I General Discussion

Definition. — The term acting must not be confused with the term action which refers to all bodily expression including gesture, facial expression, poise and carriage. Acting is the art of presenting literature in the form of a Play or a Soliloquy. The characters are here assumed by an equal number of persons and are played in appropriate make-up, wigs, beards and costume while making use of essential properties and furniture in a setting of special scenery. The situations are made as realistic as possible with the aid of mechanical devices imitating wind, rain and thunder, together with the electrical appliances that furnish the different light effects.

In acting, as little as possible of detailed action is left to the imagination of the audience, for its purpose throughout is to make the scene realistic, although there are necessarily many elements that must make their appeal through the imagination. This is due to the fact that acting is an art instead of a science. A

I good painting, no matter how detailed in execution, is art because it can only approach realism and can never be exact. A photograph is an exact reproduction impossible of accomplishment by human agency and is therefore not art but science. The ability to grasp all the essential details and omit non-essentials in reproducing different phases of life, whether in painting or in acting, constitutes art, but any means that can possibly reproduce these phases with exactness is science and can not be called art.

The imagination is called upon in acting, to suggest the passage of time. The lowering of the curtain, dark changes, change in the period or style of costume, or a change in the lighting effects are all means of suggesting to the audience the conception of minutes, hours, days, months or years which are supposed to have passed during the progress of the play.

The character of the scenery representing luxury or poverty ; indoors or outdoors ; summer, winter, spring or fall ; the style and quality of the furniture ; the taste of the decorations and the general coloring of the scene, stirs the imagination of the audience to a conception of definite location.

The unreality of the footlights and the absence of the fourth wall to an interior set stimulate the mind of the audience to imagine the whole scene, characters, dialogue and all to be, not within the narrow limits of a theater building, but out in the real world. Other appeals to the imagination are made through the backing sets to the exits, the adjoining room and out-ofdoors ; through the use of the telephone which induces the audience to imagine a person at the other end of the wire, and through the mentioning of characters and events not actually represented before the audience. From these instances it may be seen that acting approaches the realistic representation of life but still retains hold on the imagination to a very great extent. It has chosen the essential details necessary to give a conception of real scenes and incidents and is therefore art.

Acting is art for another reason. The actor who can so admirably adjust himself to another's point of view that he can assume his likeness in action, make-up and speech, and adapt himself to the essential characteristics of the character in the dialogue, is an artist, for he has aroused the imagination to a point at which the auditor forgets he is listening to a play and for the time being believes he is witnessing a bit of actual life.

Relationship to Reading. — There has grown up a prevailing idea among literary students, particularly among those who make some attempt at the public reading of plays and classic literature, that reading, because it is suggestive, is much more worthy of the name Art than is acting. An audience is thought to be uplifted and ennobled if the imagination is appealed to, and since acting is realistic and does not constantly stimulate the faculty of imagination, it is not so high an art as reading. The error in this reasoning lies in the false assumption that acting can not be suggestive as well as realistic. Acting is suggestive, but in a different way.

Acting is just as essential to the ultimate building of suggestive power in reading as food is to the ultimate making of blood which feeds the brain and produces thought. There must first be a broad experience of realism before the mind can begin to create imaginative or ideal pictures. The individual who has the genius to adapt himself to other points of view and reproduce accurately the essential vocal and bodily expression of the character is as great an artist as the finished reader who has learned to play almost wholly upon the imagination. The two arts are different, but their difference lies in the manner of development. Acting is realistic in that it tries to reproduce every essential detail in order that the picture created may be to every one the same in degree of vividness or impressiveness. It is suggestive in its larger connotation to the auditor and in the fact that it actually brings out only essential details whereby the auditor can get the real picture without being obliged to accept the non-essentials. Acting does not require the scene to be actually in somebody's front yard or in the barroom of a New York dive, but it requires painted scenery to suggest these places. It does not go out on the city streets and bring in on the stage a real Italian organ grinder to represent "Mr. Antonio," nor does it conscript a country minister to give a life-like imitation of himself before the public, but it employs Otis Skinner and Ernest Elton to represent in essential detail these characters necessary to the play. There is realism, to be sure, and yet back of it all there is a great inherent suggestion.

The power of reading lies in the fact that by voice and suggestive action it inspires in the minds of the audience the essential details of a theme sufficient to allow them to create their own complete picture and draw their own conclusions. Public reading, however, is impossible of accomplishment by one who has not first a real conception of what he wants to suggest so that he may choose the essentials necessary for imaginative inspiration. In order to be a great public reader, one must first be naturally a good actor, although he may know very little of the technique of acting. After a reader has been developed along the imaginative lines of his particular art, he very often becomes a poor actor because he has developed the suggestiveness at the expense of detailed realism. Conversely an accomplished and successful actor is rarely able to excel in the reader's art, because he has developed the detailed realism of acting at the expense of his suggestive powers. It is this one-sided development that causes so much inconsistency on the part of the actors and the so-called readers when they present their work for public approval.

The actor is always a character on the stage whether speaking or silent, and must always be doing something consistent with the character he represents. Great attention is paid to apparently trivial details of business. Every move is important. The picking up of a pin, the closing of a door, the lighting of a match, or the supposedly unconscious drumming of the foot on the floor ; all these have a composite significance in making up the general effect of reality. But this fact must be remembered : nothing that is unessential may be brought in. Herein lies the art. If it were true to life, the action would be burdened with a thousand accidental details that have no significance, and the time of playing would have to be exactly as long as actually living the story. In fact it would be impossible for human beings to reproduce with scientific accuracy even ten minutes of the life of one person ; but an artist can choose the essential acts and movements of one person throughout a lifetime and reproduce them in the space of three hours on the stage. It is not, therefore, the number of details wrought in a piece of reproduction that makes it good or bad art, but in the choice of details. Again, to bring up a comparison, photography is scientifically exact because nature and not the human mind has accomplished it, but painting is artistically discriminating because the human mind is able to reproduce essential details.

Limit of Discussion. — In this discussion of acting no attempt is made to produce a professional guidebook for staging plays, but there will be an endeavor to give suggestions for training the student in acting to a sufficient extent that he may have his mind, body and voice thoroughly accustomed to being adapted to the expression of different points of view (characterization). Then, later in his study of Public Reading, he will have a fundamental experience upon which to build his more suggestive work. The discussion will not touch on make-up, costume, or scenery effects in detail, but will lay emphasis on literal action with properties, stage business, silent action and spoken lines including vocal characterization.

Types of Literature Suitable for Acting. — In

Part One, acting shall be discussed first, with regard to the Pky in which two or more characters are in conversation, and second, with regard to the Soliloquy, or play written for one character only. The Soliloquy marks the natural transition point for the actor to develop into the reader. He still has practice in the use of properties and in literal action, but he has added one new note to his work — that of having the attention of the audience centered wholly upon himself.

Chapter II The Play

Definition. — The Play is a piece of literature written in pure dialogue form for two or more characters in which costume, make-up, properties and appropriate stage setting are employed, and in which as many persons as there are characters to be represented act. The Play, of course, may be read by one person, but it is referred to in this chapter solely as a vehicle for acting.

Kinds of Plays. — Plays are regarded as to their character under the head of farces, farce-comedies, comedies, comedy-dramas, dramas, tragedies and poetic dramas, and progress in their imaginative and connotative power proportionately from the farce to the poetic drama.

The Farce is an almost wholly surface play with no depth of thought or suggestion and with no appeal whatever to esthetic or ennobling motives. It abounds in exaggerated comedy and impossible situations which serve merely to entertain for a couple of hours and thereafter be forgotten. The Magistrate, by Pinero, and Jane, by Leskocq and Nicholls, are notable examples of the farce.

Farce-Comedy is one step in advance of the farce in that, while its situations are not actually impossible, yet they are highly improbable, so that the humor resulting is as exaggerated as that of the farce. The Great Adventure, by Arnold Bennet, is an example of the farce-comedy. While it might be said that the farce-comedy does leave something for the auditor to think about, it is nevertheless, like the farce, essentially lacking in appeal to any of the higher feelings.

The Comedy makes a decided step in advance in its appeal to real lasting thought. It is not exaggerated. The situations are, of course, unusual, but not at all improbable, and the humor is so compelling that it is at once uplifting and connotative of beauty and of the real joy of life. It stirs not deeply but gently and is much more far-reaching in its imaginative influence than many who are more sober-minded are willing to admit. The comedy is more difficult to present than either the farce-comedy or the farce, for to bring out the essentials of humor in life without overdoing and employing a number of accidentals requires the highest type of art. To play a tragic role does not demand more discriminating ability, and it is easier to tell the culture of an actor through the quality of his humor than through the power of his pathos or his magnetic appeal to the sentiments. The comedy then, has much to do with the imagination and it is therefore the best of all types for the early students study and practice. The Fortune Hunter and The Boomerang, both by Winchell Smith, are notable examples of pure comedy.

The Comedy-Drama is a pleasantly humorous play, with a mildly amusing plot balanced by serious thought and sympathetic mood. The humor is present lo DRAMATIC INTERPRETATION