Emma Couling is a new star in the Unrehearsed firmament (it’s a crazy-looking firmament), but has already run the circuit in Chicago, Milwaukee’s Sunset Studio, and the Bard in the Barn festival.
Q: How did you first learn the Unrehearsed technique?
EMMA: I was first formally introduced to The Unrehearsed Technique at a workshop at KCACTF Region III in the Winter of 2011. Professor Bill Kincaid of WIU was teaching it and I remember him starting off the adventure with an instruction to set aside everything you knew, or thought you knew about Shakespeare for the next two hours. It was the best thing I’d ever seen. I went up to him afterwards and told him I wanted to do this with my life.
Q: For you, how does Unrehearsed differ from more conventional performance styles?
EMMA: I think the first thing Unrehearsed does (and perhaps the most important thing it does) is throw away the idea that Shakespeare is hard to understand. It develops a gestural vocabulary and an inherently honest relationship from actor to audience that makes every word utterly clear. Short of improv (and sometimes not even that) there aren’t a lot of language based performance techniques that allow that.
Q: You’ve performed both in the intimate spaces of Chicago bars and larger venues (Wauwatosa’s Sunset Studio). Which do you prefer? How do they differ?
EMMA: Oh man, it’s a difficult choice–I think the intimacy of playing in a bar is great, and it’s an added bonus that the environment encourages the sort of loud, drunken audiences that could reflect the Groundlings in Elizabethan times. But I think some of our best shows have been at the bigger houses. Taking Unrehearsed to a conventional theater space usually means that we’re performing it for people who’ve never seen it before and it doesn’t get much better than that. Plus, for something so physical, it’s nice to feel like you won’t run into a table or a bar stool if you do something crazy.
Q: How are you preparing for MacBeth? Has your technique changed over time?
EMMA: I have a really boring, language specific technique. I think it’s fun, because I like grammar, but I think I’m alone here. Basically, there are all these rules in Unrehearsed where specific words, or punctuation indicate certain movements or deliveries. So when I get my track I print the thing out, read it through once, and then read it through about a thousand more times, each time searching for one thing or another and color coding it. I read it aloud so I can get the words in my mouth. Once I’m done with this, which takes a while, I just run the scroll as much as I can, whenever I can. I also really like developing my costumes so they’re appropriate for the characters and easy to change into and out of.
Q: Who is your favorite character you’ve performed so far?
EMMA: I had a great time playing Sebastian in Twelfth Night. It was the first time I got to play one character from top to bottom and it was really wonderful to be able to focus on his journey throughout the play. And my Viola was fantastic.
What’s Emma doing this time? Let’s find out by watching MacBeth!
November 12 and 19
Justin’s
3358 N Southport Ave.
7:30 pm
Suggested Donation of $5
