Back a long time ago, the idea of blocking was pretty straightforward. It was really about stage picture. You stand there. Or I stand here. Or you sit on this line. Or I stand on this line. There are moments when making specific movements across the stage or movements on the set are prescribed in a precise way that we need you to do this now because of something that happens in the script.

But the truth is that much of what happens in blocking is a collaboration between actor and director. It is the exploration of the actor’s actions and needs in a given moment in a scene. It’s easy to take for granted something as simple as walking across a room or where you stand in a space. But the following simple examples may help you understand how meaningful blocking can be in the performing arts.

So, if you picture a fairly traditional theater with the audience on one side and the stage on the other, you can then imagine an actor standing in the middle of that space, facing the audience, in a stance that means something, right? This person is alone. Depending on how big the space is, we experience something about the scale of a human being in this space. We might think about how that person is or isn’t like us as an audience member.

Now, turn that person away from you so that they’re facing away. That’s right; they’re facing upstage. Suddenly, I lose all sorts of information. I can’t see that person’s face or expressions. As an audience member, I’ve lost information, but I’ve gained potential interest. You might not be aware of these perceptions unless you have a performing arts education.

Now, what if that person extends their arms really wide, opens their chest up, but I can’t see their face? You can imagine that any one of those choices makes a big difference to how we experience whatever that person says in that moment. But it can be challenging to interpret that person’s stance, movements, and gestures without the help of facial expressions.

It becomes even more exciting and complicated when you have multiple characters onstage. If I have two actors very far downstage, very close to the audience, huddled together, whispering to each other, my experience as an audience member is going to be one of tremendous intimacy.

But if I keep one of those actors very close and send another far away upstage, it’s going to change my relationship with one of them with whom I have a much closer, intimate relationship to that other person who is much further away. I might begin to have an empathic response to the person who’s closer compared to the one who’s more distant.

As an actor, it’s valuable to understand that your audience is experiencing, particularly in theater, your work as a kind of three-dimensional sculpture that’s constantly changing shape. As a director, it’s important to understand that everywhere that bodies are in space communicates something to your audience, as you might learn from an online performing arts education. So, it’s better for that communication to be intentional rather than accidental.

I do a lot of research about the time and the place when I start a new piece of material or undertake a new character. I feel so lucky that I live close to the Met because I can go and look at paintings. Especially with “Hamilton,” I can see paintings from that time, see how they make me feel. I can feel what women are saying within those paintings, within those portraits, because that’s all we have from that time. The research process is half online performing arts education and half real-world experiences and feelings applied to your character.

I try to look as much as I can to people that know more than me about the time period, about all of the facts, to get to the truth. Then, I have to really look into myself and see what my subtext is. What is underneath all of those facts? Is there an accent? Where is she from? When was she born? What’s underneath all of those things?

Sometimes a character can be very relatable to my own life, like Nina Rosario. I felt so connected to that character, because I’m the first one in my family to go to college. I always did things not just for myself, but with the notion that I was doing something more for my family and my community. That was a big part of my upbringing.

Nina was so much like that, and she took a lot of the weight of the world on her shoulders. I understood where she was coming from. I knew what her intention was, and I knew what her truth was, because it was just part of me. So, I had to bring that to the performance, which can be the hardest part, being vulnerable, being open to whatever’s going to happen.

I’m not robotic. I like to go in and breathe with the other actors and see where they are that night and what they’re giving me, and see how that moves me, how that moves my character, and see what I give them back. You can learn a lot from a performing arts education and also learn a lot from your fellow actors and their processes and performances.

It’s a very organic feeling every night, and I love that. I wouldn’t want it any other way. When you have an acting partner that also works that way, it’s just magic. The basic way that I try to build a character is really from the ground up and through honesty and through my truth.

Look at the theater as a field and look at the incredible capacity that it can hold. You will notice that there are many kinds of theater. There are so many different expressions, and they take different shapes. What are they? How do we get a handle on them?

I have a couple of answers. The thought that often emerges is this idea of different theater genres and different kinds of theater frameworks. It is crucial so that we have a toolset with which to discuss. To look at theater and engage in the different expectations.

There is a kind of way that one can understand contemporary theater. I’ll focus on that for a moment. First, there is that kind of work that would be considered playwright-driven work. It is work where the initial collaboration and the initial impetus come from somebody. The person puts a kind of text framework that focuses and becomes the foundation for making the work. The idea is that the play is what reigns supreme. It is the fundamental guiding principle.

There’s another kind of work that functions on a collaborative model. Work that brings a group of individuals together to devise, make, and create. Or to research and bring together a new piece, a new work together. This kind of approach sits on a question, a research action, or a series of interviews. Also, it could be an exploration that allows the piece to take shape. The result might be a written text, but not necessarily the beginning space.

These two are spaces where the text sits as a significant part of the conversation. There’s a third space I want to draw our attention to, and it’s the space of physical work. Physical work created collaboratively or already with a plan. It’s about physical expression. Also, there may be language, which is a kind of secondary part of the performance.

These three pods become essential. There’s another one that I would frame. I find it problematic, but it’s essential to know. It’s a framework often termed classical work, and we inherited this language over time and space in the theater. It is present particularly throughout Europe and the Americas.

When folks say “classical,” they often refer to Shakespeare or Greek theater from the Classical era, Aristotle and Euripides. During that moment, there was philosophy, which influenced the creation of plays. It is of what we framed as classical.
There are a few more things included depending on who you discuss. Definitively, when one looks at classical, one is often looking from a Eurocentric standpoint. Again, I find that a little bit problematic.

If we’re going to speak classical over a particular area, I always invite that we look at it on a global scale. Look at Japanese Noh theater, a kind of theater that was great in Japan. In the 15th century, we looked at Chinese opera. Also, we ought to look at India’s Kathakali, and Indonesia’s wayang kulit-like. All these different traditions do have a kind of classical narrative. These narratives are an essential part of performing arts education. They are a significant subject, even in online performing arts education.

I used to cringe when thinking about budgets. Now? I love a budget because it’s a roadmap. It is one of the many roadmaps you learn to use in performing arts education. When you have to write down the line items of every single cost for everything that needs to be done, you discover that you have organized a list of the tasks you must complete in order to achieve your performance goals.

You don’t worry so much about what each item costs. Instead, you say to yourself, “Oh my gosh! I do need this. I do need that. Do I really need that?” Depending on your shifting circumstances, the list can change. You have to be fluid.

Yes, I wanted wild projections of city imagery during my show. I then realized that for many different reasons—money, cumbersome technology—it might not be practical wherever I go. What I did instead was copy and enlarge images from the graphic novel that we made of the play. We used them to make the set, which turned out beautiful and brilliant.

As you can see, a budget task that might drive you crazy because of cost considerations can also add to the creative process while saving you time and money in the long run. An online performing arts education can help you recognize unique creative opportunities in administrative tasks.

“When I said, ‘Will you be a presenter?’ They all said, ‘What’s a presenter?’ And I said, ‘It’s like a producer, but you don’t put any money in. You’re just a presenter’. And when they didn’t have to put money in, it was even more enticing for them,” says Robert Galinsky.

“So now I got a team with A-list Hollywood actors, hard-core working actors that are respected both in theater and in film. Matter of fact, Barry Shabaka Henley starred in “Jitney,” August Wilson’s “Jitney.” So now I got solid people with great reputations. So now I could go to the investor.”

Galinsky had another mentor in the performing arts, Mark Schoenfeld, who wrote the musical “Brooklyn,” which ran on Broadway. Schoenfeld taught Galinsky that a lot of interesting people have resources, and it’s time to start asking about them, which can only help in performing arts education.

Galinsky says, “So here’s a point I want everybody to get. Change your mind about when you ask somebody for something. When you ask somebody for something, you’re not a burden. That’s a compliment. It’s a compliment. So refrain. Don’t go in asking. I didn’t go to my investor going, ‘Could you, could you give me the money, could you?’ No, I went into my investor going, ‘You’re the man. You make things happen. I want you to make it happen with me. With me, not for me.'”

So the take away from Galinsky’s main point, it’s really important to go in there knowing what you want, and take this as a great lesson in online performing arts education. Because he’s going to go, “Wow.” No matter what question you ask of anybody. “Wow, they thought that much of me to ask me to come in on this?” This doesn’t mean they’re going to say yes immediately. They’re going to examine everything and all the variables, like who’s on the team, what is the script, what is the history of the work, who is this person, and do I want to be associated with them? However, you’ve got to get over the hurdle of asking. You’ve just got to ask. You have to ask people for help.

What does a scenic designer do? “Well, I am essentially in charge of all of the visual elements that you see in the theater,” says Giannis Downs. “That can be what the curtains look like, what the props look like, what the architecture is painted like, and even how the actors come in and out of the space. My work tends to influence the costume designer and the lighting designer as well.”

Often, the performing arts scenic designer is brought in earlier than some of the other designers because the number of architectural elements involved tend to require more time to work on. I often work about six to eight months in advance of a production. So the scenic designer will be contacted by a director or a producer early on. When hired, they will start meeting with the directors. Sometimes, they will be in different parts of the country and have video chats or phone conversations. They’ll get to know each other and do some visual research. Then, they’ll start to develop visual clues as to what the design might look like.

As we develop the design a little more, the scenic designer will start doing some renderings, which could be pencil sketches, which a performing arts education would recommend. But nowadays, they’re more often crafted as digital illustrations. That will help the production team determine what the overall look will be. As that develops further, scenic designers make 3-D models and photograph them to forward to the others. Sometimes, the scenic designer sends the model itself to the director for approval.

“We’ll then take that model and do draftings of each element that will appear in the show,” says Downs. “So that could be large walls, as well as architectural details and individual props.” Online performing arts education models can be helpful at this stage. The scenic designer will create a large package of draftings of everything that they can think of along with lists and references for all of the elements that will be involved.

The next step is to take the model and paint it in Photoshop or other digital programs, and that will provide color notes for the director to choose from. The lighting designer and costume designer can also base their ideas on these renderings. Those will become the basis for the painters to colorize the show. When the production team is actually in the theater, much of the scenic designer’s work is done.

With Module 5, “Managing the House and Beyond,” we’re going to take a look at the much larger ecosystem of people and professions that are involved in making live performances happen.

The performing arts experience for most of us involves simply showing up, receiving a program and watching a live performance. Yet, the reality of the performance involves so much more than the audience experience. There is an entire community, an ecosystem, and a long history of people from any number of different fields, including artistic, managerial and critical, that all come together to produce more than just the play or performance that you see on any given night. These people are in a conversation about live performance with a full, rich history throughout time and all over the world.

Performing Arts Education

As you can guess, we’re excited to share with you a tiny bit of insight into the many, many different kinds of professions that make up this exciting world of live performance. An online performing arts education can open doors you never might have imagined to a wide range of careers in dance, drama, music and various other performance-related fields.

Why join or not join a union? If you join a union, whether it’s Equity or SAG-AFTRA, you are guaranteed a certain amount of money per week. You have rights as an actor, and actors always need to look for places where they have rights because we are easily preyed upon. I don’t just mean things related to the MeToo movement. It can even be something like a director deciding to keep the actors past the allotted eight hours.

We need to work on actors’ knowledge of this during online performing arts education. For example, when you’re told to stay late, you can say, “I’m in Equity, I’m out,” and no harm should come to you. The same goes for SAG-AFTRA members.

When you’re in a union, the pay scale is different, and you have rights. You can be called to set, but you need a 12-hour turnaround time. They have to give you 12 hours from the time you get the call to the time you have to show up. That’s not always the case if you work non-union.

In a union, you have the possibility of health benefits if you work a certain amount. Also, the union automatically has a retirement fund for you.

On the other hand, anyone in performing arts education should also be aware of the disadvantages of being in a union. You can’t do non-union work if you are in a union. In markets like LA and New York, that’s less of an issue because there’s a lot of union work in those places. In off markets, it could be more of a problem.

For example, I came across this in Seattle quite often because I was in AFTRA. There were things that I could not do. There was a fair amount of performing arts work there that I just couldn’t take because I was in the union, and I wasn’t willing to give up that status for it. I was not willing to work non-union and change my face and name just to get work. That’s crossing lines, and I don’t believe in that. I think unions are an amazing thing.

The question about whether or not you should join is a very personal one. If you are comfortable doing work that is non-union, and you are working a fair amount or fairly often, then there’s no need for you to join. If you want to get into a larger market and do the bigger work, then you should join the union.

I think that would be my advice. Also, if you’re in, you can decide to defer or leave and then do non-union work, but it’s a bit of a steep thing to get into. Not everybody is very interested or curious about trying to get out of it.

When studying performing arts education or online performing arts education, it’s important to study the patterns and the history of how modern theater came to be and how it was influenced by its predecessors.

Back in 1925, W.E.B. Du Bois created his own performing arts script theater company called the Krigwa Players. What that theater company did was propose the idea that the African-American community needed to create new works. They couldn’t rely upon any sort of theater that existed from the previous century because it was all stereotypical.

The creation of a new Blacks dramaturgy was championed with the emergence of new playwrights. Before the theater came along Angelina Weld Grimke began to write the play “Rachel,” which was a lynching play. You also began to see the early mentorship of people such as Langston Hughes, who came along and became much more of a force by the late 1930s and early 1940s.

You have non-black artists like George Gershwin, who loved opera and was inspired by Black African-American culture. He wanted to do something there. He came along and he created Porgy and Bess. It became a classic, grand, comical opera.

By the time you get into the 1930s, you have the emergence of a dynamic and more authentic African-American experience. Then what occurred during the Great Depression was the Federal Theater Project in which the government pumped money into different industries to give people a chance. They wanted to give people an opportunity to earn an honest dollar.

As part of that, artists were employed. There was a Black unit of the Federal Theater Project. It’s through that when you begin to get a number of theater companies that popped up here and there, supported by the government. There was a generation of professional Black actors who were given a chance because of support by local governments and by the federal government at large.

That propelled the future of American theater. You can almost say that every 20 years a generation passes the torch to the next generation. It’s the Negro theater unit of the Federal Theater Project that then passed the torch to those who then were the youngsters in the 1960s. This influenced people like Amiri Baraka and Lorraine Hansberry.

“A dancer is expected to embody the vision of dance,” says Jeff Kaplan. “They’re expected to take movement so they are the personification of that art on stage. Particularly in modern dance, choreographers tend to see themselves as facilitators, so they might take a group of dancers and say, ‘OK, I’d like you to journal a little. And then from what you write, we’re going to take out moments, next we’re going to take up verbs, we’re going to take out nouns, and lastly, we’re going to turn them into shapes. Now, you go over there and create eight accounts and we’re going to look at it and glue it together.”

He goes on to explain that in the ballet world it’s still more traditional for the choreographer to tell the dancers what to do. The choreographer is in charge of creating the original work. This is even taught in online performing arts education.

So unlike other performing arts, like a play, you are creating what you perform. Unlike a symphony orchestra, where you get sheet music, the content doesn’t exist yet. So in dance, the day-to-day work happens in the studio. It happens collaboratively. And you’re working as a team to create and perform something new from the knowledge with performing arts education.