Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Acting Lesson


Tom Stoppard is a very verbal playwright, especially his early work, so the plays read well.  But they are a challenge to act.  Here's Benedict Cumberbatch doing about three minutes in Rosencrantz and Gildenstern Are Dead.  He's renowned lately for his facility with lots of words (Sherlock being a major instance) but I think this three minutes demonstrates how to act all those words. He reveals their humor, but he also makes them the expression of the character's thoughts and feelings.  It's a very impressive three minutes, illuminating what makes Stoppard's words theatrical,  but especially it seems to me a clinic for actors, period.

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