What we teach at the Funnery
On this page you'll find out about our approach to Shakespeare,
the basic physical theatre techniques we teach,
and "The Sign of the Four!"
Each summer we bring a bunch of young actors together in the gorgeous Green Mountain State. We train for just two weeks, creating an intentional community of the arts in the process. Then we put on a production that we'd be proud to show to anyone in the world.
How we do it: We get physical! With great warm-ups, voice training, and specific techniques passed on to us by amazing teachers, like Jacques LeCoq, Tony Montanaro, Avner the Eccentric, and Gould & Stearns. With our physicality, we get Shakespeare's language to leap right off the page. With our original "Vector Training," we teach Shakespearean speech in a way that young people will never forget.
Why we do it: We think that the Funnery theatre training is so positive, it's the cure for everything negative, cynical, condescending, threatening, or commercial that could possibly colonize young bodies and brains.
We wish we could be together for the other fifty weeks of the year.
How we do it: We get physical! With great warm-ups, voice training, and specific techniques passed on to us by amazing teachers, like Jacques LeCoq, Tony Montanaro, Avner the Eccentric, and Gould & Stearns. With our physicality, we get Shakespeare's language to leap right off the page. With our original "Vector Training," we teach Shakespearean speech in a way that young people will never forget.
Why we do it: We think that the Funnery theatre training is so positive, it's the cure for everything negative, cynical, condescending, threatening, or commercial that could possibly colonize young bodies and brains.
We wish we could be together for the other fifty weeks of the year.
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The sign of the four
It's a diagram in space, of the four main elements of our daily teaching: Heart, Mind, Body, and Voice. When you can travel the country again, if you see anyone wearing a "Get Thee to the Funnery" T-shirt, just make the Sign of the Four. It'll come right back at you.
HEART: We work every day on empathy: for each other, for the material, for our audience, our community, and for Shakespeare himself.
MIND: We help each other to understand every word, joke, context, motivation, character, in the entire text. We learn history, culture, and discuss Shakespeare's constant relevance to the world of today. We calm our minds with meditation, too.
BODY: We physicalize as much of this text as we can—not to subtract any words, but to clarify them.
We train daily with yoga, stretching, mime, dance, eclectic movement, and more!
VOICE: We do deep breathing, learn about resonance and articulation, and we sing; we care enough about our audience that we want everyone to hear and understand! We dive deep and discover what may be blocking our free and natural voice, and we work to get whatever it is out of the way!
You may hear about this "Sign of the Four" somewhere else, but remember: it all began at the Funnery!
HEART: We work every day on empathy: for each other, for the material, for our audience, our community, and for Shakespeare himself.
MIND: We help each other to understand every word, joke, context, motivation, character, in the entire text. We learn history, culture, and discuss Shakespeare's constant relevance to the world of today. We calm our minds with meditation, too.
BODY: We physicalize as much of this text as we can—not to subtract any words, but to clarify them.
We train daily with yoga, stretching, mime, dance, eclectic movement, and more!
VOICE: We do deep breathing, learn about resonance and articulation, and we sing; we care enough about our audience that we want everyone to hear and understand! We dive deep and discover what may be blocking our free and natural voice, and we work to get whatever it is out of the way!
You may hear about this "Sign of the Four" somewhere else, but remember: it all began at the Funnery!
Our style
All our daily activities happen collaboratively, in a sprawling happy ensemble. And then we cast the play! We have no stars; we share roles. One summer, six different people played King Lear. Five of them were girls. Sometimes our urge to multiply or divide a role brings unexpected dividends, like when we discovered that Trinculo in the Tempest could be an awful ventriloquist! ("Can he vent Trinculos?") Thus two people could share his lines at the same time—the fool AND his dummy!
Most years, we perform outside in the formal garden at Sterling College, with the mountains of Vermont as our backdrop. Costumes and props are minimal. We're all on stage all of the time, watching the action, adding voices, being responsible for the whole play, not just the several scenes we're in.
Our campers come back for more every summer, so they'll have a chance to play young, old, male, female, any gender, comic, tragic, noble and lowly, by the time they're just too old to do camp any more. Then, if they're lucky, and we're lucky, too, they may join our staff!
Most years, we perform outside in the formal garden at Sterling College, with the mountains of Vermont as our backdrop. Costumes and props are minimal. We're all on stage all of the time, watching the action, adding voices, being responsible for the whole play, not just the several scenes we're in.
Our campers come back for more every summer, so they'll have a chance to play young, old, male, female, any gender, comic, tragic, noble and lowly, by the time they're just too old to do camp any more. Then, if they're lucky, and we're lucky, too, they may join our staff!
