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If you are a current member of the Prague Playhouse Acting Studio, then you are welcome to come by the Studio on July 10th at 21:00 for a photo shoot. We will be taking pictures of exercises to put online (there will be a redesign of the website as well) as well as up at the studio.

We will also be taking headshots for actors to use in getting work.

Please bring a black or white button down shirt for the photos and possibly one other change for the headshot photos.

A student just sent in this thought about what the repetition exercise feels like:

This exercise is becoming like taking shower. You go in that room 3-4 times a week, sometimes the water is ice cold, or doesn’t flow enough, sometimes it is cut in the middle leaving you cold and sudsy, or you slip on the wet floor and get injured, or you just go in that tub to take a warm, pearly bubble bath which you want to submerge, melt in it and get lost. No matter which way you do it, you get out clean at the end.

Do you agree? What are you experiences like? Share in the comments!

Presented in cooperation with the Prague Playhouse and led by Guy Roberts, Artistic Director of the Prague Shakespeare Festival and director of the PSF productions of King Lear and As You Like It, this is a performance focused workshop exploring the unique demands of taking the next step in Shakespearean character creation–out of the classroom, into the rehearsal hall and onto the performance stage.

Shakespeare’s characters express themselves moment to moment through language, not action, to convey thought. The workshop will explore the link between the structure of the language and the thought the structure expresses as the principal means of characterization. Once the actor fully understands and commands the tools of Shakespeare’s language the possibilities are limitless. The aim is to empower actors to make Shakespeare’s language roll “trippingly” from their tongues.

Space in the workshop is limited. The workshop will be in English although care will be taken to ensure that non-native English speakers are welcome as well.

Friday June 3rd – 18:00-22:00
Saturday June 4th – 10:00-14:00
Sunday June 5th – 10:00-14:00

Cost: 3.000cz total or 1.000cz Daily

For more info and to register for Performing Shakespeare email:
Guy Roberts
guy@pragueshakespeare.cz

We are going to be having auditions for our upcoming production of “You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown” on March 19 and 20. The show is a fun, silly musical based on the Peanuts cartoon. All of the characters are children played by adults. We are looking for singing actors: there is quite a bit of harmony in the group numbers. There is some dance/movement as well. All actors should be fairly fluent in English.

If you are interested, please write to me (brian@pragueplayhouse.com or 608 577 012) for an audition time (please state whether you would like to come Saturday or Sunday). Prepare a 1-2 minute comedic monologue and 32 bars of a song. There will not be a piano at the auditions so please be prepared to sing A-Capella or bring an instrument with you.

The roles are:

Charlie Brown: Baritone
Lucy: Alto
Snoopy: Tenor
Linus: Baritone
Schroeder: Tenor
Patty: Soprano

Rehearsals will begin at the end of March and there will be 6 performances in May (May 13,14,20, and 21).

Thanks and hope to see you at the audition!

Brian

The Prague Shakespeare Festival, Guy Roberts Artistic Director, will be holding open call auditions on Sunday October 10th 2010 at the Prague Film School Attic Studio from 13:00 – 16:30 and also on Monday October 11th 2010 at the Prague Film School Acting Studio from 17:00 – 20:00 for PSF’s rotating repertory productions of As You Like It and King Lear playing April 14 – May 1, 2011 in Houston, TX USA and May 11 – 29, 2011 in the Czech Republic.

All actors should bring a photo and resume and present one memorized Shakespeare monologue, performed in English, not exceeding 2 minutes. Actors should be prepared to stay immediately following their audition in the event

they are called back for Rehearsals for the production will begin March 7, 2011 in Houston, TX. This project is an international collaboration between the Prague Shakespeare Festival, located in Prague, Czech Republic and the

Classical Theatre Company, located in Houston, TX. (more…)

Schedule of Acting Classes

 

 

Schedule of Acting Classes

We’ve been looking at what happens to an actor when we introduce more and more meaningful circumstances and the students are talking about working with text.

One of the challenges of working with text is that you have an automatic expectation of how the scene or interaction is supposed to go. It’s written down, isn’t!? I know what I’m supposed to say next and I know where the scene ends. The problem with having expectations is that you stop being available to what the other actor is doing. When we’re given the choice between going with what is actually happening with the other actor and going with what we’ve worked out in our heads beforehand, we unconsciously hold onto the way we think the scene should go. This leads to actors who stop listening to each other, who aren’t allowing the other person to really affect them, who are basically stimulating themselves and working themselves up instead of letting the other person stimulate them.

One of the best things we can do as actors is be surprised by what is happening on stage around us. It is wonderful to watch, it is exhilarating to be a part of, and it is crucial for the scene to progress as naturally as possible.

So, what to do when you find yourself holding onto your preparation, whether an imaginary circumstance, an emotional preparation or a script? Let it go. Focus on your partner. Very simply take in what they are doing and how they are doing it. We cannot force ourselves to feel the “right” way or say the text “correctly” when we’re in the middle of it. It will just pull you further away from the moment and from the other person and make you more conscious of yourself.