Playing Shakespeare: Voice, Text, Clown

PLAYING SHAKESPEARE: Voice, Text, Clown with Jane Nichols and Dave Demke

Learn to play once again with the heart, mind, and imagination of a giant!

This workshop will immerse you in the world of Shakespeare through an integration of voice, movement, clown, and scene work, experiencing the power and beauty of Shakespeare’s language and engaging with the text in deeper, more meaningful ways.

MORNING SESSIONS will focus on freeing your voice and body in order to build new habits of emotional courage, unlimited imagination, and spontaneity. Over the 6 days, a progression of Linklater Voice work will take you from breath impulse, through the pleasure of vibration, and into the joy of speaking Shakespeare text. Movement work will take you on a journey from poised stillness to ecstatic physical expression, freeing you from physical tension, and opening pathways for breath and energy to fuel your creativity.

AFTERNOON SESSIONS will focus on using a free voice and body to unleash the full size of your imagination and humanity. We’ll begin with Games. We’ll run, shout, dance: we’ll play; fiercely, with conviction and abandon. From Games we’ll move into Comic Play, where you’ll come face-to-face with the Clown in you. Here, you’ll play from all in you that is vulnerable, unknowing, simple, and full of truth and desire.

EVENING SESSIONS will be spent on scene work, using short scenes from Shakespeare’s canon, where the skills and discoveries you are gaining from voice, movement, and clown work will be put into practice. The focus will be on using the structure of the verse to enlighten thought and intention, on speaking in order to move and on listening in order to be moved.

DATES: August 28-September 2, 2018

TUITION: $1,000 USD (union, alumni and student discounts available)

SCHEDULE: 10:00am to 9:30pm each day

LOCATION: Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, Massachusetts

HOUSING: $35 per night single occupancy, $25 per night double occupancy

APPLY HERE: https://shakeandco.wufoo.com/forms/shakespeare-company-actor-training-application/

INSTRUCTORS:

JANE NICHOLS is an actress, director, and teacher. She first studied with Shakespeare & Company in 1983, and has taught and acted with the Company off and on since then. Inspired by the work of Merry Conway at the 1983 workshop, Jane developed a passion for Clowning. Her teaching today brings together skills and techniques of Le Jeu, Physical Comedy, Clown, Bouffon, Improvisation, and Mask.

In addition to Merry Conway, she has studied with Philippe Gaulier (Ecole Gaulier), Clive Mendes (Theatre Complicite), Ronlin Foreman (DellArte School of Physical Theatre), Michael Kennard (co-founder of Canada’s Mump & Smoot, and Master teacher of the Richard Pochinko native American mask/clown technique), Avner Eisenberg (Avner the Eccentric), Davis Robinson (author of Physical Comedy Handbook), Keith Johnstone (Impro and Impro for Storytellers), and world-renowned Czech clown, Bolek Polivka.

In addition to S&Co, Jane has held teaching positions at the Yale School of Drama; Juilliard; Harvard University; ART; ACT; Brown University; the Actors Center in NYC; Stella Adler Conservatory; Emerson College; Simon’s Rock College of Bard, and University of Washington.

DAVE DEMKE is a Shakespeare & Company Senior Faculty member and a Designated Linklater Voice teacher. He received his BA in Theatre Arts from Minnesota State University, and MFA in Performance from the University of Maryland. He was the Artistic Director of Stark Raving Theatre in Portland, OR; the Associate Director of Training for Shakespeare & Company; and principle dancer/choreographer for the Red River Dance Company in Fargo, ND. As an actor he has appeared in productions in New York and regionally, as well as performing at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and in Beijing, China. Directing credits include theaters in Portland, OR, Shakespeare & Company, Tennessee Shakespeare Company, and guest directing credits at Purdue University, Skidmore College, and Northeastern University. He has guest taught at various universities, at the Linklater Center in New York, at the National Theatre of Ghana, and continues to teach Shakespeare & Company workshops in cities around the country.