how to look at shakespeare as a professional actor

Don’t let your first Shakespearian production feel daunting. Use these tips to feel at ease in the rehearsal room.

The phone rings. It’s your agent. It’s finally happened. After all of your hard work, training, going to workshops, auditioning–you’ve finally booked your first Shakespearian play. You hang up from the call with your agent, call your mom, and begin to think about subletting your apartment.  

After that sense of thrill and excitement dies down, the panic sets in. Theatre isn’t the same as film–and Shakespeare isn’t like approaching other scripts. Whether you went to school for acting, musical theatre, or engineering, approaching the Bard can feel overwhelming. Don’t let the pressure ruin your excitement. 

Here are five tips to help you approach Shakespeare as a professional actor:

1. Make sure you are working from the right Shakespeare script

Now, this doesn’t mean to make sure you are working from Twelfth Night, and not looking at Henry IV Part 2. Find out from production which version of Twelfth Night they will be using. Make sure you are working from the same edition of the script. If they already know where their cuts to the script will be, have them send over the version as soon as possible so you can begin your work. 

2. Don’t feel ashamed to use a modern translation

There is nothing less-than about using modern translations like No Fear Shakespeare from SparkNotes. Here is a secret: every script of his plays is a translation. We don’t have copies of the originals, and what we ‌have has been near-illegible for hundreds of years. Use these modern translations. Shakespearian scholars have made them in order to help us understand the meaning behind the words. 

3. Use a digital copy of The First Folio

 The First Folio was printed in 1623 after the death of Shakespeare. It is the first surviving copy of more than half of his plays, containing 36 in total. It is notoriously difficult to read. There is no difference between a “j” and an “s” and sometimes the printing press ran out of periods and they used a question mark instead. Scholars spend their lives translating the first folio into the script you will perform. So… why use it? Using the First Folio allows us to see the options in each line. Maybe a line in the script doesn’t make sense to you, but looking at the Folio you see  there was originally that question mark, and that you understand. It gives you the opportunity to explore.

4. Research, research, research

Shakespeare makes cultural references his audience would know. He loved a metaphor and a simile. Unfortunately for us, we don’t have the same ones. References to Beyoncé’s lyrics would equally confuse the Bard. We need to research. He often wrote historical pieces. Who was King Henry V? What was his world like, and what did people in the sixteenth century think of him? We need to research. Shakespearian productions almost never take place in the originally written setting. Macbeth in late Romanov Russia? That is now a world you, as the actor, also need to understand. As professional actors, we need to research.

5. Forget the words and connect

“It's never about the words, but the connection between people,” says acting coach Adrian Griffin, professional actor, Stratford alum and former protégé to Sanford Meisner. “Trust you know the words and use them to say what it is YOU need to say to the person in the moment.”

Now, don’t literally forget the words–there is nothing worse than trying to improvise iambic pentameter. Once you are on your feet, performing, trust all of your hard work to support you, and focus on the connection in the moment.