Shakespeare Workout: Release the Rage
"I would eat his heart in the marketplace..."
Shakespeare loves to play with genre – letting his comedies dive into troubling darkness, and peppering his tragedies with absurd laughter. And in doing so, he allows his characters to live big, bold, conflicting emotions. Love sits alongside rage, hope accompanies despair and reason grows out of chaos.
In this workshop, we’ll take a deep dive into one of his most problematic scenes – Much Ado’s failed wedding. How do we root bold decisions in emotional truth? And how do we release rage and sustain it?
We’ll explore a selection of speeches and characters from Much Ado with a particular focus on: Act 4, Scene 1. There’s no need to bring or prepare anything in advance, though re-reading Much Ado, and especially Act 4, Scene 1 will help you to hit the ground running.
This session is perfect for actors who want to:
- Approach Shakespeare through a contemporary lens whilst honouring the language.
- Build nuance into bold choices.
- Explore conflicting emotions of love and rage, hope and despair in the text.
Come ready to play, throw away your preconceptions and be bold!
