The singular, MOST amazing experience I have had as an educator is the summer I spent studying at The Globe Theatre in London. If you would like to read about the travel experiences surrounding that, you can go to my profile and look at my travel blog. The most important part, however, was the exposure to completely new teaching methods by the practitioners at The Globe. My classroom was changed forever. In witness to this, one of my students wrote in her journal that first year, "I have learned more about characterization in the past three weeks than I did in the three years before." Quite a testament.
One of the things that was different for me, was the use of the elements and the archetypes in developing characters. I had used animals in this fashion. Most good drama schools has some form of animal exercise that is a commonality. To equate a character to water, earth, air and fire was a revelation. Then to add in the sovereign, the warrior, the lover and the trickster--purely amazing. My next blog will be about using the archetypes.
The Elements
I have enumerated the elements we used above, so I needn't reiterate them. The practitioners at The Globe used the following exercises to introduce them to the teachers: First, they wrote one of the elements on four different sheets of newsprint. We were divided into groups and each was assigned to one of the sheets. On that paper we were asked to list attributes of a person who could be described by that element--for example, water was seen as whiny by some and fire was seen as a hot head. After a few moments of brainstorming, the groups were shifted round robin until each had the opportunity to express themselves and add to the personification.
As we presented the lists to each other, a pattern began to emerge for each of the elements. It became apparent that we perceived them uniquely and occasionally as a stereotype. For example, one group thought the air element represented an air-head, blond was also on the list. However, a little below that was the thought that an "air" person was free-thinking, spiritual, quiet. Fascinating!
We then added a stance to each element. The one in the photo above is "Earth". It is rock solid, hard, pushing against air. For water we all bent at our waists and flowed gently along. Fire is depicted with hands above the head, burning and waving as the flames move--the other attached photo. The final pose is air: standing on tiptoes, you allow your hands to drift from the position of fire to your sides--cutting slowly through space, pushing air as your move. This generally happens slowly, but could be quick, depending on the character.
Historically, scientists have used the four elements to describe the world and its surroundings for thousands of years. The Greeks, under the tutelage of Aristotle, added a fifth, aether. He taught that the original quartet could be associated with the sky, sea, earth and wind but there wasn't among those an explanation for space, also described as void. Fascinating! What type of person could be represented as Void? As a WoW player, I shudder to equate. LOL. The Japanese, however, say that Void represents Heaven. I found reference to Aristotle's teachings and was interested to see the following:
Air is primarily wet but also hot.
Fire is hot but also dry.
Earth is dry but also cold.
Water is cold but also wet.
There is a lovely diagram for this in his treatise, On Generation and Corruption. I have to figure out how to copy and paste into these notes!
Why did I look into this? Because something was triggered that reminded of me of studies in philosophy and religion classes of my college days. It seems there is foundation for the use of the elements that touches us in many ways!
So on with the acting. After we had determined which human traits could be applicable to each of the elements (excluding void)we were asked to walk around the room as a "water person" or a "Fire person". I liked this part a lot, although it was tiring to traipse around a rather small rehearsal facility. I liked it because it got us out of our heads and on our feet. (How Meisner is that?) My classmates were quite good at translating the lists into physicality. Some of the things I observed were: people felt that an air person would move with an upward pull, perhaps on their toes; fire involved quick movements and solid steps, fire people also seemed to lead from their heads and/or shoulders where as a water person seemed to lead from the torso.
When the physical traits became ingrained in our movements, we then began to apply bits of dialogue. We took various characters and analyzed what we knew of them. Which element best suited that person as they acted in that scene?
Richard III became one of my favorite plays to use because the titular character changes so much depending on to whom he is speaking. The fiery monologist who plots his evil at the beginning of the play is not the watery poetic who woos Queen Anne only moments later. I have begun to use this in my course work with advanced classes. I love it.
Application: if a student can begin to associate the movement and thought process of their character in any play, they can discover more of what makes that character a person, rather than something flat and living in the "void".
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