UTA HAGEN
Acting Workshops
• “Theatre should
contribute to the spiritual
life of a nation“
• "There should not be the
tiniest thing around you
which you have failed to
make personal or relate
to yourself if you want to
soar into an exciting new
life. "
Background
• Born 1914 – Died 2004
• German born, American Actress who, after
gaining high acclaim (3 Tony Awards),
gave up acting to pursue a career in
directing and teaching
• Taught actors such as Jack Lemmon,
Mathew Broderick, Sigourney Weaver and
Al Pacino
Background cont.
• Emotional Memory but….
Avoid examining experiences that you’ve never wanted to talk about — this
isn’t psychotherapy!
• Sense Memory
• Using ‘I’ whenever you begin to become a
character – ask questions of the text –
‘How old am I?’, ‘What do I look like?’
• Entrances - What did I just do? What am I doing now?
What’s the first thing I want?
Transference
• 1. If I were… (characters name)
• 2. You want to feel as if you're wearing the
underpants of the character
• 3. Tap into your own life experiences
• 4. Run through the backstory and place the
characters name with "I"
• 5. Begin to make transferences from your own
experiences to those in the play until they
become synonymous with them.
• 6. Start to ask yourself questions like "where
was I born? And answer.
Transference cont.
• 7. Take each moment by moment and place a personal event or
person to each one
• 8. Particularization - make each event, person and place down to
the smallest physical object as particular as possible, exploring
these things in detail to discover in which way they are relevant to
the character.
• 9. Nothing should be left general or taken for granted. Everything
must be specific.
• 10. Examine all objects you will interact with in detail, down to exact
specifics.
• 11. These personal finds are simply possibilities or considerations.
Don't be inflexible. Be open to other actors/director's suggestions
and allow them to develop with others.
• 12. You can construct elements of your past with friends or family
members. Improv parts of your past.
PURPOSE
•
To explore the feelings and emotions of a character within ‘Antigone’ in a
different setting and time from the original text.
•
This would help an actor prepare in their performance of the role, to seek
meaning in the emotion underneath the text, helping to portray a character
of depth and in depth. This will be done through a ‘Telephone Conversation’
TASK
You are having a telephone conversation as the character – if you
choose to play Antigone, the person on the other end is Ismene and
vice versa, if you choose to play Creon, the person on the other end is
the Sentry. Using normal language you need to devise a conversation
that expresses how you are feeling at the time. You must use your
voice and your movement to convey this message. (All based on
Prologue and Episode One)
EXAMPLE
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Antigone:
It’s me, are you alone?
Ismene (on other end of phone): Yes hun, what’s wrong?
Antigone:
What do you mean what’s wrong? Have you not heard what’s
happened? After everything else that’s gone on in our family, dad
dying, mum killing ourselves and now this our two brothers dead?!
Ismene:
I know Antigone, it’s awful, but it’s happened we just need to accept
things and move on.
Antigone:
Move on, move on! If you think I’m going to let that bastard bury
Eteocles and just leave Polynices to rot because some stupid law
says so, you can forget it!
Ismene:
But there’s nothing we can do!
Antigone:
Speak for yourself, I don’t care what the law says, some of us care
more about their family than others!
Etc. etc.
Before you pick up the phone, you must communicate how you are feeling through
your movement – how can you do this?
You must use your voice and movement to help portray your emotions throughout the
conversation but keep this as natural as possible. Think of experiences you can
relate to.