Skip to main content

Theatrical Tuesday - Cold Reading

TuesdayIn theatre, it's quite common to have to read something aloud that one has never laid eyes on before. This is called Cold Reading. The most common times it happens is the first time one gets a script or at an audition.

It's can be a bit uncomfortable. Often, I've felt as if I'm being scrutinized on how well I step into a role I've never seen before. I might not know anything about the character.

This happened a lot during my 9:00AM Monday class that is now complete. We would be given a play to read and I often didn't know anything about it or its characters. I'd get barely a moment to skim and try to get a sense of what the character was about.

Professional actors probably have to do this regularly. It's almost like presenting something you haven't researched. In my limited experience, it's common to do some parts of the read through well and some completely wrong. A good director will help one get the tone right.

I've gotten to a point in my life where I didn't get too uncomfortable about it, but that may have been because the stakes weren't overly high. It wasn't as if I was trying to impress anyone or ensure my bills were going to be paid. No, I was just trying to get the marks I needed for the course and to stave off boredom while others read. It also let me recapture some of my old acting days.

I'm not sure if I will act in the future or not. It's possible. My main focus is writing and I don't see that changing in the immediate future. Stranger things have happened though.

Speaking of my writing, I've made many of the changes I've been wanting to on this site. Many items have been moved under a new portfolio section. I will be filling that out more in the coming months.

School is optional today and I'm thinking about staying home to work on my condo now that my homework is done. I can also use some time to look over notes for my Thursday class that has a quiz. I want to work on my accent wall today and do some painting on the weekend. Plus, it's too gorgeous outside, I need groceries, and my skateboard is available for pickup after 1:00 PM.

R~
Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

2020 Vision

Mostly, I’ve been planning for the new year, but I discovered I know Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. It was a recollection under the influence that brought this to light. I also discovered I still suck at drawing, but I’m okay with that. I used to think I had to be good at everything, and I’ve realized that’s just not so. Some friends and I recently hit up a local board game pub. It was a pretty fun night. The first game was Balderdash and I was terrible at it. Because I was the writer in the group, some of my friends thought I should be more embarrassed about it and hide the fact that I don’t spend all my free time learning advanced vocabulary. But I’m not upset about it. Why? Two reasons: 1. I now know what I don’t know. 2. If one takes a close look at the top selling novels on the market, the level of the language used is not the level of many of the words in Balderdash. Not that I’m comparing my own work to those, but audience is what matters in writing. To me, it is far better to e...
Read more

Merry Monday - Lots To Do And Little Time To Do It In

[caption id="attachment_4711" align="alignright" width="300"] Image created using Bit Strips.[/caption] And thus we return to our regularly scheduled programming. Well, mostly. The colleges are still on strike. We had 21 days that had classes in my program prior to the strike. We've had 18 days worth of strike where we should have had classes. The strike has been longer than that for most students. I don't have Friday classes nor are any of mine on the weekends. I slowly plod on because I don't know what else to do. I watch videos on YouTube from the greats like Syd Field. I read my text books, though I could be doing more of that I suppose. I work on my assignments. I've been working on the first act of my feature film script, but I realized that I have other assignments that were due before that one that I should focus on instead. Namely my short film, my 10-minute play, and my TV episode. I may work on my TV episode today because I'...
Read more

Merry Monday - A beautiful day for taxes

[caption id="attachment_4711" align="alignright" width="300"] Image created using Bit Strips.[/caption] With French done, I have a lot of other things to catch up on. It seems like I have Mount Everest ahead of me, but I'm just going through the list one at a time. I've gotten a couple of things done and some started. Renovations Before the weekend, my new kitchen floor was installed. After the credits that Jiffy gave me, install cost less than $40. The old floor was light grey peel and stick tile, which was peeling itself up on the edges. Because I couldn't get all the glue up from the floor underneath the peel and stick, I needed to put new floor in. Oh, I started peeling it up with a hair dryer. I really don't recommend that. It doesn't get hot enough to work well. It was taking around 20 minutes each tile with the hair dryer. With a proper heat gun, a couple hours for the whole floor. Old floors: [gallery ids="9630,9631" ...
Read more