Memorising a Script

Today I received an email from a gentleman who was asking this question in relation to the blog that I wrote about Dave Lankford’s now infamous “Dear Actor (Sincerely Playwright)” article.

“Can you please clarify why you agree that “memorising the script must come first, solving the mystery second?” … Why should an actor memorise words BEFORE deducing WHY he says his lines? Otherwise it becomes rote memorisation, no? Thus, the actor runs the peril of reciting the lines the way he first memorised them.”

First off, I do 100% believe that Dave is right, we should commit the lines to memory first and then set about solving the mystery.  The answer is rather simple, doing it this way AVOIDS the peril you mention, rather than causing it – but with a few adjustments…

I’ll explain how and why…

So why should one learn their lines before moving on to solve the mystery?

First, because learning lines is such a chore that getting it out of the way as soon as possible is always advisable.

Second, so as to avoid letting your thoughts about the scene affect the way that you say the lines, learn them before you analyse the scene in order to prevent this from happening.

There are two things that should affect the way that you say your lines, first the intention of the character and secondly the moment in which they are spoken.

So How? If you learn the lines free of prosody (patterns of stress and intonation), then these lines become memorised, not hooked to how they should be said, but just as simple information to be learned. They are now wonderfully flexible and ready to suit the situation.

Take the line:  This is great.

Just learn that as a bit of information, forget what it means.

Now imagine the difference: (DISMISS) This is great (PRAISE) This is great (CHASTISE) This is great. The same words now take on their meaning by the prosody created by each individual tactic.

Yes, it is a bit more difficult to learn them, since you can’t rely on rhythm, but you will pick it up quick enough.

Now that it is accurately learned, you can analyse the scene and try to understand what your character’s intention is in that scene. Once you’ve determined the intention, you can consider all the different ways that you could possibly achieve that intention using that line. There should be about 15-20 ways that you could probably do it.

When the moment comes, you can let the combination of the intention and what is happening in front of the actors in that moment influence how you spontaneously respond with the line.

I hope that helps Vincent. I am always up for answering more questions, if anyone has anything they’d like to ask, please do get in touch.