Advice to the players Tips on auditioning (getting ready for Austin Shakespeare's upcoming Season)

To be successful today means to be present, relaxed and connected during your audition.  I want to a sense of who YOU are… at first very simply: your voice and body, spirit and personality.  Try to be relaxed enough to not use a “stage” voice, speak from your truthful voice. I am very interested in the uniqueness you bring to character.  So, don’t try to guess “what the director wants.” In fact, sometimes I see “something” in someone that I hadn’t anticipated and changed my vision of a character.

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What is important is:

Be clear about what the words mean, ie what you are saying each moment.  Don’t anticpipate.  Discover with each phrase. 

If you are doing a speech, SHARE what you are saying with me. Mean what you are saying.  The words will get you what the character wants.  What is the result you want in this moment from saying these words?

And you want to get it NOW as the immediate result of your speech.  Did you get what you want or not by the end of your speech? Show that at the conclusion of your lines.

If you working in a scene, LISTEN to your scene partner.  Acting is re-acting.

Plunge into the moment.  Take Risks, surprise me. Surprise yourself…. And enjoy it all your can. 

NERVES.  It is natural to feel stress at auditioning.  Envision a relaxed environment before you come into the room.  Tell yourself that relaxing will help you perform better.  Breathe, drink water.  Be present.  Seeing the audition as a playful game is probably the best framework.   Again try to enjoy, relax and be present.  Let all your tension turn into that energy that is excitement. 

Coach yourself with kindness to do that. 

summer refreshing...

My job directing and teaching for Austin Shakespeare is kinda done for this season.  Now looking forward to planning for upcoming shows which start in Sept.

Also thinking about my own playwriting this summer.  Planning Late Aug. Auditions for actors for upcoming CYRANO starring Marc Pouhe.  Interviewing designers, planning budget for entire year … but most of all taking moments every day to refresh and renew.  Listening to new music classical (Vaughn Williams) and pop ((Ed Sheeran).  Gardening… sometimes just taking enough time to water plants and look at birds.  Of course reading, looking forward to Frances Mayes autobio Under Magnolia.  you can always check out Austin Shakespeare for upcoming info!

Shakespeare camp!

It's not too late to enroll in Summer Shakespeare Camp! June 23-27 For ages 11-15. A week-long session presents a series of workshops designed to tap into campers’ natural abilities (no previous experience needed here!) and to engage their creative intelligence. Workshop classes include:   Acting---Stage combat---Text analysis---Movement---Design Each session finishes with a mini performance of Shakespeare scenes from A Midsummer Night’s Dream staged and acted by campers for an audience of family and friends. Austin Shakespeare Camp will focus on three major aspects of theatre production:   Exploring Shakespeare introduces students to the beauty and meaning of Shakespeare's language and to what life was like in Elizabethan times.   Basics of Acting uses voice and movement exercises to challenge students to use the power and expressiveness of their voices and bodies when conveying thoughts, moods and character traits.   Ensemble & Collaboration allows campers to experience the power of ensemble work.   Actor and AISD Teacher Nancy Owens leads the workshop. Camp is 9:00 am - Noon, Monday – Friday. Workshop performance Friday. St. Michael’s Catholic Academy 3000 Barton Creek Blvd.   For information and enrollment, email Nicole at nic625@hotmail.com or call Alex at austin shakespeare.org

Rehearsing Othello with Austin Shakespeare... what an amazing play.  Stands proudly next to the great tragedies of Macbeth and Hamlet.  The cast is super smart and talented.  We open on Feb. 13 at the Long Center just in time for Valentine's Day.  Smother your love with kisses.

Belle of Amherst Act 1 Clip

The Hamlet Weblog featuring Shakespeare Blogs: 'Shakespeare on Stage: Thirteen Leading Actors on Thirteen Key Roles' by Julian Curry.

The Hamlet Weblog featuring Shakespeare Blogs: 'Shakespeare on Stage: Thirteen Leading Actors on Thirteen Key Roles' by Julian Curry.

thinking about playwriting

Getting ready to put together an Artist's Way group at the Austin Museum of Art and journaling and thinking about my own playwriting or lack thereof. I am thinking abt doing a reading for Austin Shakes of my version of Antigone. That "should live" .... I have lots of drafty stuff for a play about American/freedom and the Middle East, mainly Turkey. But soo much more to do on that. Weekends are really the best time for playwriting if we don't have a show in rehearsal and that won't be for months... so ... time to dig into the journal more and do some soul searching. What do I really want to write about. what subjects do I want to live with a year or two or three. Old friends like Jason Phelps ask me about playwriting and I just have to shrug and say I haven't been doing it seriously in the three years I have been at austin shakes. But that is part of the reason the Artist's Way group can help me.. give me the jump start I need.

Thinking about Shakespeare ... and Schiller

This is Helen Merino as Mary Stuart in Schiller's play. I am now working on Midsummer.. as a 1960's rock musical.... but the text of both plays are such a gift... blissful.... this is my 5th DREAM but the language is still thrilling. We have a great team of actors... some new to Austin Shakes and that is always good. More fun to com!

Austin Shakespeare is one of first in U.S. to do MARY STUART

From Peter Oswald's new adaptation of Schilller's : “I am not like the Stuart,/Who gave herself exactly what she wanted./Denied herself no pleasure, drunk a river/Of bliss!”

I am over the moon to be direct (and currently) auditioning actors for this thrilling work!

Everyone judges by appearances, no one bothers to fathom the realities.

---- Elizabeth

Gleaming, instense, Mary Stuart*… The Obserser

power-shifting, revealing, thrilling, acting to the hilt,

“startlingly modern,” (the Independent)

gripping, tightly structured, double portrait, dignified, riven w rage, darkly funny, fluid, elegant, queens glide to a terrible collision course, crackling w gun powder

Modern society is no stranger to the perils of religious extremism!

Peter Oswald's lucid, pacy translation

shifting power dynamics...personal struggle

“unforgettable” The Daily Mail

Schiller's 200-year-old play the sensibility of a modern political thriller.

Getting Ready for Austin Shakespeare 25th Anniversary Party

Getting ready to go to Mandola's Vinyard for a "masque" to raise money for FREE Shakespeare in the Park and for education programs. Should be fun with great Italian Food... an Austin-tatious atmosphere... music from the Lute and dancing from American Repertory Company from U.T. and folks in Costume and Mask. Should be fun too... 25 years of bringing FREE Shakespeare to Austin, TX.