Identifying the Story

The telling of a story is the primary purpose that brings actor and director together. Identifying the content of that story is essential for the development of a good end product, and establishing a clear understanding of story can improve an actor's performance. Understanding the content and purpose of the story places the actor in control of the material being used and consequently creates the potential for greater freedom during the performance.

Identifying the story means clarifying at least two elements. The actor needs to clearly understand

• What happens in the story (plot)
• What the story is saying (theme)

What happens in the story?
It is astounding how often people can interpret the specifically listed number of events contained in a script in such a vast variety of ways. It's more than astounding, it's wonderful. The potential of the creative mind is unlimited. But herein also lies a problem. If each actor has a slightly different view of what is actually happening in a scene the outcome can be very confusing for the audience (unless of course this is the intended outcome of the production as it can be for example in a Harold Pinter Play). Agreement on exactly what is happening in the story is therefore a very important ingredient for a clear and cohesive outcome.

How to Identify Story Content
Mostly agreement about the overall plot of the whole play is fairly quickly and simply reached. Surprisingly most difficulties occur when actors are identifying the content of a scene. This often emerges as a problem because what appears to be happening in the scene seems so clearly defined on the page that everyone takes for granted that all the players hold the same view of it. This is seldom the case.

Perhaps this is because one of the actor's primary tasks is to learn the dialogue, so the assumption is often made by the actor that what is happening in the scene is directly related to what is being said. But this is not always the case. Frequently the story is actually happening between and around the dialogue. The story is generally what is happening to the characters while they are saying the dialogue. For example the dialogue may be entirely about John and Jane discussing what happened at the football in the last five minutes of the game - but what really happens in the scene is that - John tries to seduce Jane, she slowly realizes what he is trying to do and rejects his attempt. This is a fairly clichéd example but it is not uncommon for dialogue and story to be as distinctively different as this example implies.

Where to Start When Assessing a Scene.
It may sound so obvious as to be absurd but the most important task is to identify the beginning, the middle and the end of the story that unfolds in the scene. Common problems are that while it is not difficult to recognize the middle or body of the story, the beginning and the end are often less clearly defined. The result of this is that the scene will have an inert beginning and a vague sometimes non-existent end.

What Makes a Story?
If the beginning, middle and end of a scene have been identified the next most likely problem will be that these events have been defined almost at random and are not connected by a sense of story. In a linear story the beginning inevitably provokes the events that happen in the middle of the story and the end provides an answer to the question asked by the beginning. In the above example Jane's slow realization of John's attempted seduction (in the middle of the story) is provoked by the beginning of this scene and at the end of the story her rejection of his attempt resolves the action he started at the beginning. Without a sense of story linking events the audience is left with a dysfunctional series of unconnected incidents. So beware - for often actors find it is easy to identify the apparently significant events in a scene and fail to check if when linked together they provide an engaging and progressive sense of story.

Endings
In this process of clarifying the phases of a story the process of identifying the ending is very important. Sometimes once the ending has been defined the actor may review their choices about what is happening at the beginning. Endings are very informative about the real purpose of a scene.

ONCE THE STORY HAS BEEN CLEARLY IDENTIFIED THE DIALOGUE WILL OFTEN TAKE ON A COMPLETELY NEW MEANING.

What the Story is Saying
Identifying the underlying theme of the story also provides exceedingly useful information with which the actor can work.

Whether intended or not, the thematic content of a story will inevitable speak to its audience as a thematic message is always implied by the outcome of the events of the story. However if the theme of a play is clearly defined then the actors can help translate that intention into the production by using the reasons behind their character's decisions/choices to explore issues related to the theme. A constant subtle use of this process will bring a very unified purpose to the production and ultimately a clear understanding of the story's theme to the audience.

ONCE THE THEME HAS BEEN CLEARLY IDENTIFIED THE REASONS BEHIND THE DIALOGUE MAY TAKE ON A COMPLETELY NEW PURPOSE AND THE DIALOGUE MAY TAKE ON A COMPLETELY NEW MEANING.

Identifying the theme will be dealt with in detail on another occasion.

August 2001

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