All language subtitles for 12. Mask Work - Add Stakes

All right, tell everyone your name. What

are you going to do?

I'm Allan. I'm going to be doing Fool

for Love by Sam Shepard.

Finally, we get to this little white

house.

the red awning on the far side of town.

I'll never forget that awning.

The way it swung and the night breeze

and the porch light made it glow.

It was a hot desert night. The air smelt

like a new cut alalfa.

We walked right up to that porch and he

rang the doorbell.

I remember getting real nervous like cuz

I wasn't expecting to visit anybody.

I thought we were just out for a walk.

This uh woman comes the door. This real

pretty woman, red hair.

She just throws herself into his arms.

He just starts crying.

He just breaks down right there in front

of me.

She's kissing him all over the face and

holding him so tight and

he's just crying like a baby.

Then

through the door

behind them both,

I see this girl.

She just appears.

She's standing there staring at me and

I'm just staring right back.

We can't take our eyes off each other.

It's like we'd seen each other from some

place, but we couldn't place where

that second,

that very moment,

we knew we'd never stop being in love.

Thank you.

Um, you ever been in love? Oh yeah.

Love at first sight.

Yeah.

Is that what this is?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, it is.

Um,

how long has it been since you've seen

this person you're talking about?

Uh, well, I just saw her. I'm fighting

for her with another guy who's taking up

for a date.

That's right.

And it's still

It's still a burning love. Yeah.

kind of feels a little casual.

Kind of feels like

you're telling this story and you know,

oh, and then this thing happened.

Mhm.

Like there's

I don't know what the stakes are.

And so it becomes

it becomes a descriptive story.

But the reason it's being acted is

escapes me.

Okay.

So, it's either not a good monologue for

you

or we have to [ __ ] with it.

Yeah.

I think we should [ __ ] with it.

Uh, let's do this. Let's grab that mask

right there.

Sure.

And let's um let's let's try this. Um

let's try this by giving it a a stake it

maybe doesn't have in the in the in the

text. Um, just to just to give you

something.

If he goes through with this thing,

with this woman, you going to kill him.

[ __ ] kill him.

And this, you should start there. This

means that

you intend to grow old with this woman

and he's not going to have anything to

do with it.

So allow that to be the driving

connection between the beginning of this

piece and the end of this piece. Let's

see if we can start a fire.

Finally,

we get to this

little white house

with red on.

on the far side of town.

I'll never forget that awning.

The way it flapped in the breeze and

the porch light made it glow.

It was a hot desert night.

And the air smelled like

a new cut alalfa.

We walked right up to that front porch

and he rang the doorbell.

I remember getting real nervous

cuz I wasn't expecting to visit anybody.

I just thought we were out for a walk.

This woman

comes the door. This real pretty woman

with red hair.

She just throws herself into his arms.

He just starts crying.

He just breaks down right there in front

of me.

She's kissing him all over the face and

holding him real tight. And he's just

crying like a baby.

But then

through that door

behind them both

I see this girl.

She just

appears. Great. Let's stop there. I'll

tell you why. Uh very interesting what

just happened. It's just interesting. I

mean, suddenly you're

carving out specific things that we're

hearing and they're landing and we under

Take your mask off

and and we are understanding that

something's going on. And then when you

see her, what was really interesting

about that was that you had gotten to a

point where you were describing this

[ __ ] stuff that was going on with him

and it was really specific and pointed

and then

you literally went like this and it was

like we all went because you they didn't

matter anymore and we got it and I could

have let you go on and do the whole

thing but the purpose behind the

direction and what you were able to do

with it is is that this piece the first

times you did it

was kind of flat. Didn't really know why

you were saying it. Didn't really have

any specifics. Wasn't really carved out.

didn't even have any you found levels of

humor whether you were going for it or

it was because it became specific that

it became humorous

that that's the I mean it's just sort of

why this exercise is such a great one

is because suddenly you get out of your

head and you start you you're able to

suddenly have something else going on

that pushes you and drives you toward

making choices. because it felt like it

was a monologue in which you had made

virtually no choices

and so therefore

you know take it or leave it but as a

piece

suddenly it became interesting suddenly

there was something going on and very

often thank you very much that was very

good work very often

that's the thing we've got to realize

about a piece is that you have to sort

of look at it from the point of view is

what is this piece saying to the

listener? What am what does this piece

describe? What how can I make this thing

come alive? And very often it's that

process of trying it, trying it again,

trying it again. No, that's not it. What

is what am I missing? What's the missing

elements to help me make this thing pop,

sing?

You know, in a weird way, there was a

great stage manager named Mitch Ericson,

who was one of the great stage managers

of all time. And he always used to

whenever I'd [ __ ] about the audience or

the text, he'd say, "You know, you

should have a tattoo put across your

chest upside down that says blame the

text last."

I don't, but it was a suggestion. um

that sometimes we do have to sort of

figure out how to get underneath it

because you can't say it's bad writing.

It's it's a incredible play, but you've

chosen a section of the play that is

challenging

as a monologue.

So, nice adjustments. Um, who's up next?