LEARNING TO ACT.

Auckland Star, 2 September 1933, Page 14

LEARNING TO ACT.

SIDELIGHTS ON DRAMA,

"Actors must be born. Then they much bo made. One is no good without the other. What ecems so natural in the highest drama ie the result of years and years of hard work," said Miss Elizabeth Blake, yesterday. Mies Blake, who is Mrs. Natusch in private life, was the gueet of honour at the Writers' Club, and was explaining the education needed to fit a person for a stage career. She. was welcomed by Mrs. Isabel Cluett. The professional training demanded to-day, said Miss Blake, was such as she had undergone when she put in seven years. This training was imperative if there was to be any chance in the present day drama. The two to three years in a dramatic school took the place of the old stock company. Her training was under Madame Rosina Fillippi, an Italian. It began with learning to breathe. In the Auckland Town Hall as much breath production was needed as in the Albert Hall, and success only came from chest breathing. The next thing studied was soine of the fine passages from the Old Testament. The teacher sat at a grand piano and played it as loud as she could, while the voice of the student had to rise above it. Then the student took fencing and dancing for two years, without any intention of being a dancer, but so that she could learn stage movement and how to fall downstairs without being hurt, or fall backwards without being bruised. It might be easy to fall once or twice and only be bruised a little, but when it went on for a season's run the student must learn to fall without a bruise at all. Then they were taught to walk blindfolded, with their eyes shut, and woe to them if they struck any of the many, articles with which the great studio was furnished. The sleep-walking scene from Macbeth had to be done blindfolded and with closed eyes. In Dumb Show. The next course was in mind control. All the plays were given only in action, without a word. Each student had to give a clear idea of the part in dumb show. In this, one of the most interesting, was portraying a murder scene. This was all right if the student was about fifteenth in the line, but if there were 22 students and each had to do a murder in dumb show in a new -way it became difficult.

Fencing was sometimes taken, with the button off the foil, by the instructor, and if the student did.not have a <jooc\ stage sense eho often had a eharp jab from tho teacher to quicken her understanding. A lot of time was spent in studying I the comedy of manners. In "The Gay Lord Quex" was a scene in which actors came in and took tea. It took exactly one minute and a half to act, and every amateur company thought it was easy to do. The study took the students exactly four hours and a half before they were allowed to be comparatively well instructed in the part. But acting that was not clothed with the spirit, and in which the technique was not unconscious wae failure. Touring in the" Country. Miss Blake explained that she had been a nurse, but had been turned out because the army did not need them any more, and then ehe took up acting. She formed a email professional company to tour tho smallest villages and towns. These were often the roughest, where the audience stood at the back in their caps. She gave some amusing experiences of the strolling players. In one village they arrived late and in the dark, to find that the electric light and gas companies were holding a fight, and they had removed the fittings from the little hall. The play was staged by the aid of acetylene lamps. In the Forest of Dean, where the people were very poor, the only place was a coal shed, and they put sacks over the coal heaps at the back as dressing tables. There were eeven in the company and Miss Blake had thirteen changes during the piece. It was a place where, if the audience did not like the play, they broke up the lamps. The first to take the stage was a small very young girl, who was to speak lyric verse. She was greeted with catcalls, but waited a few moments very quietly and then asked them if they wanted to hear her. So beautiful was her performance that the whole audience listened to this child speaking lyric verse for over an hour, and even then would not let her go. An amusing tale was told by the speaker of how the company arrived late in the night at a big haunted house. She said she was nervous, but although the ghost was well known they were not I given a visit. They were all very tired and very scared, and were dropped from a motor lorry to make the best of things. She believed that the noise which prevented their sleep came from a broken ventilator. . "Why do people want to write or act?" asked the speaker at the conclusion of a vivid address. They must have some big idea beyond self-expres-sion. If the present craving to create beauty took tho form of the study f>l the glorious language of our race, which was written by Shakespeare and Milton, we could use it for the development of truth and better feeling between peoples. who if they had a mutual respect would build an international world.