PRAGMATICS: CHANGING THE SUBJECT

People often use signal expressions to prepare the other person when moving from a safe or general topic to a more serious one. They might also use their voice and body language to communicate a warning that the new topic may be difficult.

– It’s probably good I ran into you. I wanted to talk to you about something.

– I wasn’t going to say anything but . . .

– You’re not going to like this, but . . .

– You should probably sit down

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More Serious

The following advice and suggestions come from professional theatre and pronunciation experts.

Read the whole play and talk to your classmates about the story. What does it make you think about? What is your opinion about the ending? Would you handle the situation differently?

Talk about the characters and take notes. How do the different people in the play change? What do they realize as they experience the events in the story? Do some people change more than others? Also, think about which character is most like you or people you know. Or, who is different from you? In what way?

Get comfortable performing in front of your classmates. Work in pairs and groups to play drama games. Say your lines with different emotions or try to show where you are simply by the way you move. Then get other students to guess the situation. Have fun, and don’t be afraid to be silly.

Think about how you will produce the play. Depending on the number of students in the class, you can have two or even three casts. You can also create new characters who can perform a monologue at the beginning. Or you can write in new scenes.

If you don’t have enough students for two or three separate casts, some actors can participate in more than one performance. Finally, you might consider doing plays in repertory, which means some students perform a different play in the series. Or if some students are feeling creative, you might write a prequel or sequel to perform separately.

Once you’ve organized your approach, choose a role or audition for one. Remember the students with the biggest roles will have the most work, so think about how much you can commit to the process. Then once your role is assigned, use a highlighter to mark your part. This will help as you prepare your script for working with other actors. Use the extra space on the page to make notes about your character, your feelings, and movements when you say the lines. Also make sure you know your entrances and exits (when you are supposed to come on the stage and when you are supposed to leave the stage).

Support your classmates. Practice your lines with other actors. Try to listen as if you are having a real conversation. Enjoy the back and forth of common phrases that people use with friends and notice how language changes when people talk to strangers. Your teacher can watch you and take notes. After the rehearsal they can share the notes and give you support for pronunciation or other elements. Of course, your teacher may not be with your cast every minute, but that will give you a chance to practice with each other and develop your character.

Be creative. Change the script if you want. Add a new ending. Cut lines. Or write your own play. Use the language you’ve been learning in other classes to become fluent. And don’t forget to have fun. Spend time getting to know your classmates in a new way and enjoy the process.

The most important challenge for you as an English-language learner is for the audience to understand what you say. They also need to understand how you feel. Achieving these goals will help you in the production but also give you skills for life beyond the classroom.

Prepare your lines. Prepare and note how you will say them. Put slash marks between thought groups (there’s more about this in the next section, Pronunciation Tips for Actors). Mark word and sentence stress by putting a dot over stressed syllables. Use underscore lines to mark linking and reductions.

Record yourself and listen to the recording. If you can, listen to a recording of someone else doing your part and imitate the actor, but don’t be afraid to change it up. Every actor brings something different to a role. If you still feel nervous, identify the words and phrases that the audience really needs to know to follow the story, and focus on saying those as carefully as you can. You can learn strategies for this in the next section on pronunciation.

As part of your preparation, you can also discuss the pragmatics in the script. Pragmatics are the decisions that people make about how they want to manage their relationships and achieve their goals. Some people want to be very polite or formal. Others are more casual or direct. Exploring your characters’ decisions and language choices helps you recognize and use words, phrases, and signal expressions that communicate feelings, intentions, and other hidden messages. Each play has a highlighted pragmatics focus, but you will find many others in the dialogs as well.

Don’t just work with the individual words in the script. Practice communication styles in role-plays. Try different situations. Pretend you are picking up a distant relative at the airport. Ask a new coworker for a favor. Try to persuade a friend to take a trip. Change partners and repeat so you have more practice.

Whether you perform with or without your script, learning to speak naturally takes practice. Read your lines often and plan the way you feel when you say them. Emotions can also aid memory, and you’ll need to show emotion in your performance.

You’ll also develop fluency as you work with your classmates to plan and stage your play. When you give feedback on a performance, it’s helpful to think about what feedback you would like from partners. Some people respond well to questions. For example, you can say, “You sound scared. Is that on purpose?” You can also say how a line reading affected you. You can say, “I couldn’t quite hear you,” or “I was a little confused by the way you said that line. I thought you were supposed to be happy, but the feeling didn’t come across.” When you give feedback in this way, it’s easier for your fellow actors/classmates to understand the effect of their acting on the audience.

You can perform these plays in a variety of ways. In Readers Theatre, you sit or stand still as you perform. Generally, you do not wear costumes or have props. Performers may or may not have memorized their lines. In a full performance, you move as you read, acting with your whole body. It is your choice how elaborate the settings, costumes, and props will be.

Readers Theatre: Prepare your lines with a focus on character development through pronunciation and intonation. Then stand in a row facing the audience and read your lines without moving around the stage. If necessary, a narrator can read the stage directions when there are scene changes.

Full performance: Prepare your lines as for readers theater but memorize your part and act out the movement on stage. Design a costume. Decide where you will stand and who you will look at during your scenes. Never turn your back to the audience when you are speaking. Make sure you stay still and look at actors who are speaking lines. Pretend it is all happening for the first time and you don’t know what will happen next.

The best actors enjoy themselves. They become their character and they give attention to other actors to create a believable scene with emotional power. Sometimes that means changing the script a little bit to make it more comfortable for you and the other actors. You’ll be amazed at what happens when you give your time and energy to other people in the show. See what you can create when you work together as a team.

When your performance of the play is over, the audience will want to clap to show appreciation for your performance. You can stand in a line and bow. Also, actors can come out and bow one by one. Usually the main actor bows last. Don’t forget to do this because it’s a lot of fun!