When you hear the mouth machine saying the words of your monologue (see previous post), those words act as a direct stimulus on your experiencing. This triggers all kinds of impressions and responses beyond the primary meaning of the words. You’re able to develop a personal connection with the text. The words begin to have real meaning for you. The words become a part of the character’s reality and that brings believability to your performance.
Interestingly, this all happens automatically unless you do something to disrupt your experiencing of the words. This disruption is often caused by forced line readings. Instead of hearing what the mouth machine invents, you only hear the expected line reading. This is further complicated when you don’t let the expected line reading stimulate your experiencing. Since you expect it, the read does not trigger personal responses and associations and you fail to make a personal connection with the words. Without a personal connection, your verbal rendering of the words is going to be less than believable.
Another useful feature of using the mouth machine is that it can drive the long-term development of your monologue. Since the mouth machine never says a given line the same way twice, the “meaning” will continuously evolve. This is not only important to keep the performance of the words fresh from audition to audition, it also allows you to go ever deeper into the reality implied by the words.
Next… “Must have” line readings.
Labels: line readings