Monologues as Music

In a recent O’Neill Studio Lab, a group of actors gathered at The Players Club to explore the problem of emotional “flow” in monologue work.

The more experienced actors seemed to face the same challenges as those less experienced, specifically how to deepen, widen or re-connect to emotional to best “support” the text.

Every trained actor knows that physical tension can present a formidable challenge to the actor and that just “trying” to relax does not do the trick.

In our Studio, actors do breath work to establish an emotional connection by slowing the text down, taking a breath at each point of transition and then waiting for a flow of feeling to begin before speaking the line on a light exhale.

Then we progress to singing as a way to deepening the connection. The actor sings a song that has a personal association with the monologue before working their way through it.

Also valuable is singing the monologue on an improvised tune by the actor before doing it solely as speech.

The linking of song and monologue created inner life for both actors who consider themselves singers and those who do not. It helped create emotional flow that was full, free and effortless.

From Lab participant Jayson
“I found the whole singing thing a great way to establish the flow of the piece (monologue) - I’ve never considered myself a singer. It allows me to let loose, relax and not think so much.”

From Alison

 

"I found the use of music very helpful in going deeper in the monologue, both in singing a complementary song beforehand and performing the monologue as a song itself.  Singing the song before my text helped me to establish a flow because, as you pointed out, I can find the flow more quickly and consistently when I sing.  

When I improvised the monologue as a song, the words and emotions instantly became so fresh and spontaneous because I truly had no idea what sort of sound would come out of my mouth.  I surprised myself.  I allowed myself to change the color, quality, and volume of the text in ways that I probably wouldn’t have discovered by spoken repetition alone.  Most importantly, I think the improvisation of the music encouraged me to engage every last scrap of my energy and person."

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