devsquared
Dev²
Public journal of a mid-40-something living in North Portugal
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Skimmed a book on rehearsal this morning and ran into this fav koan of community theatre directors (and maybe pros too idk):
"Take risks!"
what does that even mean?
we're in a blackbox, Lance, not on K2; we don't even have chairs to trip over. So, probably doesn't mean physical risk. Let's try emotinal. Wait, we're in roles, and let's be honest most characters are pretty much emotionally 3 years old even if they're a thousand: "I fight for [objective], gimme, right now, or I'll DIE." Doesn't matter if the objective is a piece of chocolate, a day off work, avoiding a divorce, or terrorising Gotham, it's always written like, "Either I win or I perish." What's the step up in risk when you're that dramatic and everything is at an emotional fortississimo?
#acting#“take risks”#this is where my experience of theatre isn't like life#in life we have dynamic range#we know that we'll only be very grumpy if we don't get that coffee#and that we might actually die of grief from the divorce or at least wish we would#I usually prefer theatre to TV#but TV does seem to do a better job of more consistently showing those polarities
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Alexander Technique is so strangely taught. Every book is like reading someone's book of shadows that they don't know is their book of shadows. Like 1/3 of it will be a straight-forward, desert-dry tension-reduction-by-attention-and-habit-modification manual, 1/3 will be a grift-flavoured advert for obviously endless expensive tutelage, and the final 1/3 is a prescriptivist cult recruitment pamphlet for the author's specific denomination, and their rituals and pseudo-scientific rationalisations
#acting#alexander technique#pure A.T. is prob pretty good method if you have a fairly healthy musculoskeletal system#alas i don't but I've got a lot of mileage out of using it along-side other tension reduction modalities like yoga and myofascial release#call me paranoid but the weird pseudo-science stuff wrapped up in this technique is super sus and freaks me out#post-pandemic me does not trust magical thinking about pretty self-evident things#the whole technique boils down to paying attention to how tension jacks up your kinesthetics and creates a mental/emotional feedback loop#and how to consciously stopping doing those things without inadvertently adding more tension to break the loop#rocket surgery it ain't
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Still working up Goethe's Erlkönig. This one's definitely going to take longer than expected. I think it might be getting away from me in a good way. I'm doing it as 4 characters now and I think it's safe to say it's something of a proper performance, bit like a monologue that rhymes
I tried to film it yesterday and today, but so far I haven't got a take I really like. One was pretty good, but a cat jumped in my lap and gave the camera the butthole treatment
The reason it's going to take awhile though is yesterday during one of the takes I suddenly connected to the text, and it became clear to me that it would be so much easier to deliver well if I give Der Sohn as a feeling character consumed by his fear, Der Vater as a rationalist all up in his head, and Erlkönig as a will driven child thieving pervert. I'm excited to rehearse it again for something more than just knowing the words
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Leça da Palmeira
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Went into Porto today to see a group deliver monologues at a little blackbox theatre. Oh my god, they were good. I'm genuinely very impressed. These were, to the best of my knowledge, amateurs who just do this for fun, and it was good, very, very good. The attention, focus, and presence that I've seen at least three if not four college directors beg for, and these people just showed up and gave it freely and gave the audience these brilliant monologues, some of them self-authored. Fantastic evening. 10 out of 10 recommend underground theatrical performance in Porto.
Oh and IOh and I should mention that these monologues were given in English, a second or third language for a lot of the performers
And they wereAnd they were still connected to the work
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Pepsi can fish sculpture in Bonfim
#Porto#portugal#bonfim#sculpture#art#at a little blackbox theatre#in a place where you don't expect to find a little blackbox theatre lurking
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Some views of Leixões and Leça da Palmeira heading north over the drawbridge that crosses Rio Leça
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Sunset, Leça da Palmeira
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Apparently I have an artistic ideological stance I didn't know I had:
I really don't like it when acting coaches write books that teach ego-driven, self insertion in acting (or any art for that matter)
I read book on speaking and another on screen acting. (Aside: There is trend in screen acting books to make the work sound as enjoyable as cleaning out a sewer with a spoon)
The screen acting book lectures you to be visible as you in all your roles
Wait, do what now? no. that always looks like dogshit and also it would be boring work up a character that way
I want those sweet chameleon skills of the character actors that transforms themselves for different roles. If I could see 90% less of myself in a performance, I would still see a distracting amount of myself.
The speech book is even more obsessed and goes on and on about showboating one's own idiolect (your specific, unique way of speaking and not just your accent, literally every single thing about how you specifically speak)
Yeah but no. Some people might still have a useful regional accent and that's great for those roles, but what if they want to play something else? and me? Well, my idiolect is fucked 9 ways the hell up and isn't really useful for anything. I had basically a dialect as a kid, changed it due to bullying and bigotry, changed it more from moving a lot and natural mimicry, found it changed itself even in syntax and grammar from exposure to other languages and living abroad, and then there's influence from tv and t'internet. Somehow I have an inner monologue that sounds more like London estuary than anything else, but not really even that. Also, important note here: I'm not British. Anyway, yes my idiolect is a collection of my lived experience, and therefore, I can't emphasise enough, pretty fucking astronomically irrelevant to most characters
#art#acting#anti self-insertion#in performance#mary sue#to your heart's content in the writing cause that's the story#that's literally where self-insertion belongs#write what you know and all#so anyway I'm still looking for a decent Standard American English or equivalent British english elocution textbook if you know one
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Por do sol in Leça da Palmeira with a guy climbing on the rocks giving me some really good shots
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Boa Nova Lighthouse near Leça da Palmeira, Matosinhos, Porto, Portugal
You can see the fresnel lens turning with the naked eye but my phone camera can't get an image of it. (Have to try again with my DSLR)
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Our official 2-year temporary residency cards came from AIMA yesterday, but we were in the city so I went to CTT to fetch them today
OMG we actually get to stay for 2 years! I mean maybe longer if we can apply and be accepted for renewal in 2026 but YOLO for right now. I'm going to enjoy the hell out of these two years I know I have here
Also, RIP tumblr's photo storage servers I guess
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Two-tone mural in Santo Ildefonso, Porto, Portugal. Love that bird with the top hat
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Was supposed to record a recitation (I think it'll be more of a performance) of Goethe's Erlkönig (in german!) today, but there's been a family emergency most of the way across America and the partner's had to leave. I'm no where near ready to film it yet. I've barely re-learnt the words of it at this point and my accent is... interesting
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Welsh-Portuguese fusion cuisine: bara brith and gelato. Roedd hi'n blasus iawn!
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a wide shot of Mercado do Bolhão, Porto, Portugal nearing closing time
O Porto é cidade bonito
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Produce at Mercado do Bolhão, Porto
Also sold at this market...and lots of places actually is this... thing, I don't know how to call it in any language, that they make here where they put a walnut inside a dried fruit like a date or a fig. I think the acid of the walnut does something to the fruit and it is just... simply the best candy (and it is candy) that you will ever eat
#porto#bolhão#food#produce#laranja#morongo#cerejas#not to be confused with cervejas which is also delicious
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