The Monologues You (Really) Need

I'll be the first to admit that I'm a speechaholic. I simply devour Shakespeare's language, and love to memorize his speeches. I have a dozen monologues ready to rock at all times, which is super uncommon for actors, and honestly not very helpful for me. I'll spend so much time agonizing over what I'll do in the room, only to immediately second-guess my choice as soon as I leave. 

While in the holding room, I have often overheard other actors say to their friends that they only have ONE Shakespeare monologue, so that's the one they'll be doing. 

Can I just get real with you for a second? If you're still using that one Shakespeare monologue you were forced to learn in college for every Shakespeare audition, you are doing yourself a disservice! I don't even have to know which speech it is to be able to tell you that. Why? because the speech doesn't take into account who YOU are and what you're trying to present in the room. And what if the casting director asks to see something else? Do you have another Shakespeare monologue to show them at all?

You need more than one monologue, but you really, REALLY don't need twelve. In order to effectively market yourself in almost any Shakespeare audition, I recommend having three thoughtfully chosen speeches that fit into specific categories:

1. The "Here I Am" Monologue

Do you know what sort of roles you would be cast in for traditional Shakespeare productions?

What roles would Sir Lawrence Olivier see you playing?

What do people assume about you based on 10 seconds with you?

What do you do really well?

The trick to this is knowing yourself well enough to explain it to the casting team via your monologue choice. Get opinions from friends and teachers that you trust if you're not sure what kind of impressions you're making, and then find a character that embodies that. If you're a clever young lady that appears to be a teenager, check out Juliet (Romeo & Juliet) or Miranda (The Tempest). If you're the "funny best friend" type, look into Silvius (As You Like It) or Bottom (A Midsummer Night's Dream). Despite this perhaps being an "obvious choice", if it's the role you're most suited for, it's okay! It shows a knowledge of yourself and where you fit into the Shakespeare universe. This piece must be in verse, as most auditions will request a verse monologue and it will be the one you use the most frequently.

2. The "Look What Else I Can Do" Monologue

This is still a role you can traditionally play (no gender-bending or anything), but it shows another side of you. If your first monologue is a low class character (like Mrs. Quickly from the Henry IV/Henry V saga and The Merry Wives of Windsor),  then consider a character of a higher social class (like Queen Margaret from the Henry VI/Richard III storyline). If your first piece is about love (perhaps Berowne from Love's Labour's Lost), go for something more bloody (Like Brutus from Julius Caesar, or even Macbeth). This will require some research and a reasonable knowledge of Shakespeare's material, but it's an investment into your career, and something you can probably use for years.

3. The "Breaking the Rules" Monologue

It's becoming mainstream to cast Shakespeare productions with little or no regard to the descriptions of the characters in the text. Gender-blind, age-blind, color-blind casting is happening all the time, which means this monologue might be your favorite one! If you're the Juliet type, maybe try on some Richard III. If you're constantly doing Falstaff, show off your Desdemona! This speech can be verse or prose. Whatever the role, avoid making it into a joke. Give the character their due and show your chops just as you would with other speeches, and you're sure to make a lasting impression on the casting team!

With a solid monologue in each of the three categories, you'll have a great choice that reflects what you can bring to a show for just about any audition. There are just a few other things to consider as you go forth on your quest for the perfect pieces:

Choose verse over prose. (Not sure what I'm talking about? Click here to learn the difference.) Most casting notices will straight-up ask you for a verse monologue. If you show up with prose when they asked for verse, you look like you either don't know what that means and didn't care to find out, or that you can't follow simple directions... neither of which is going to help you land the role you want. 

Funny is good, and surprisingly rare. Casting teams ask for comedic Shakespeare monologues from time to time - make one of your picks funny and you won't be caught off guard. 

Race doesn't matter, except when it does. If you are an actor of color, you can play any role that a white actor can play, period. Aaron from Titus Andronicus and Othello are both "Moors", people from northwestern Africa of Berber and Arab descent. Similarly, the Prince of Morocco in The Merchant of Venice is from Morocco, and Shylock, Tubal, and Jessica in the same play are Jewish. These distinctions have significance in their respective storylines. Ask yourself if you are the right person to tell their stories before undertaking it.

Finally, avoid using one of the 154 sonnets as your monologue. I was once in line to audition when the casting director stepped out of the audition room to announce to all of us that Shakespeare wrote nearly forty plays, so we should be playing his characters, NOT doing a sonnet. Unless you're auditioning for an evening of sonnets, pick a speech from a play. 

Whether you need to work your way up to three perfectly picked monologues, or scale it back from a dozen, I hope these tips will help you on your way. And if you need any additional assistance, click here to schedule a coaching with me! Break legs, all!

Is Your Training Serving You?

Let's start with a story:

This may surprise you, but I went to college for tap dancing. (Yes, really.) Twelve days after I graduated high school, I flew across the country to NYC, a city I had never traveled to, and began training in a two-year conservatory musical theatre program.

I chose musical theatre because I knew I wanted to be an actor, and since I can sing and I can dance, it seemed like the best course of action to have training in all of those things. This plan worked out for some time: I got a job dancing at parties and events for a few years, wearing some cool and some bizarre costumes while doing choreographed routines to some of Broadway's biggest hits. Next, I got a job touring the country teaching musical theatre (and improv, mime, and Shakespeare) to children. 

I got back to NYC in September of 2008, just days before the housing market crash and the financial disaster that followed. What a time to be auditioning! No one was buying tickets to shows, so few shows were being produced. I got a restaurant job and weathered the storm.

When work opportunities slowly started to come back, I learned that I didn't like musical theatre anymore. More importantly, I loathed auditioning for musical theatre. I was bitter. I wasn't trying my best. I didn't want to be there, and, therefore, no one wanted to hire me. I realized that classical theatre was much more appealing to me, but I didn't know how to get involved.

I'll tell you what I did, and what I wish I had done sooner. My path may not be what's right for everyone; it certainly came from trial and error.

What I did:

I tried the "be so good they can't ignore you" technique. Honestly, I probably wasn't all that good yet, with minimal training in classical theatre, but I was studious and determined. 

I worked for free. I'm not a fan of being a volunteer actor, but I needed to get some skills. I was cast in a less-than-great production of Medea where my dance/movement skills were a selling point in the audition. Then I played Hermia in A Midsummer Night's Dream. THEN, I started booking paying Shakespeare gigs.

While I'm a big fan of learning as much on the job as you can, I still had to play catch-up when I came in to my first paying Shakespeare job. I didn't understand the basics of verse mechanics, and made a lot of embarrassing, simple mistakes. Thankfully, I had patient people around me who helped point me in the right direction. My own curiosity and desire to not be embarrassed led me to...

What I wish I had done earlier:

Classes. So many classes. And workshops. And lectures. I cannot emphasize enough how much I needed to put my pride aside and get back into class. I was ten or more years out of college, with an education that was not serving me anymore. I don't even put my college on my resume, because it's simply unrelated to what I do now, as much as it would be if I had gone to school to be a mechanic. I took a good, hard look at my resume and realize that my training was lacking, so I fixed it by learning from people in the biz whose work I admire.

 

Is Your Training Serving You?

Do you feel that you have the skills to be competitive in auditions, and to be a rock star if and when you book the role? If not, you need more training. Focus as intensely as you can on the skills you need to master, and master them!

Who is booking the work? What training do they have? Can you get comparable training?

A Master's Degree might be out of the question for you, due to time, money, or any number of other reasons. One potential workaround is to study with the best teachers you can find, either privately or in a group class.

What I hope you take away from this is that if your training isn't serving you any more, that it is okay (and encouraged!) to go get the education you need for where you want your path to go. 

If you want to step up your Shakespeare skills,

Email ShakespeareCoach@gmail.com to schedule your coaching session!

For more info, visit ShakespeareCoach.com!