The group explores how the very choice of language and imagery takes us into the world of the play, and into the inner world of the character.

Cicely Berry introduces us to the opening scenes of two of Shakespeare's most powerful plays— A Midsummer Night's Dream and Hamlet. Students work on the first three speeches of The Dream, where they uncover the hidden passion and sexuality in Shakespeare's language that set the mind's stage for the extraordinary romance of that midsummer night. In Hamlet, the spareness of the language and the spaces within it open our ears to the mystery central to Hamlet's dilemma. We learn how the vocabulary of each play takes us into its unique world. In the darkened rehearsal studio, the opening scene of Hamlet is whispered with stunning impact by Robert Sean Leonard, Toby Stephens, Lennie James and Paul Jesson.

Berry now propels us into Julius Caesar, where Brutus contemplates killing Caesar. Each thought is made active and builds through the next. We begin to understand that the images Brutus uses reinforce the subversiveness of his thinking and help him justify the action he agonizes about in this speech.

Emily Watson experiments with Ophelia's famous soliloquy about Hamlet's madness, which so powerfully demonstrates how the very sound of the language is the bedrock of meaning—the words cry out her desolation.  Berry leads us on into one of Macbeth's most searing speeches. She discusses the importance of thesis and antithesis in drama, and how characters work through the extremity of their passions through their language. Diane Venora works on Juliet's passionate speech about love from Romeo and Juliet. We see how the structure of the characters' thoughts builds in each piece and how the imagery takes us into the mind-set of the character. Lindsay Duncan works through Isabella in Measure for Measure in one of Cicely Berry's most haunting exercises about character and imagery. By working through her soliloquy surrounded by the accusing stares and turned backs of the members of her group, she understands the isolation that her decision must bring.

Cicely Berry's exercises are crafted to help the student hear and then convey meaning from Shakespeare's language. The intelligent and passionate discussion among these highly accomplished actors about the challenges they experience in Shakespeare are very similar to the hurdles that typical readers and students of literature confront in their relationship with Shakespeare.

Workshop 2: Under the Text

Shakespeare texts used in exercises are supplied on screen for classroom use as well as in Cicely Berry's teacher's manual.

• Introduction: Jeremy Irons 0:00:42
• Introduction: Cicely Berry 0:02:46
• Exercise 1: Sexuality and Violence in the Language
  (A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act I, Scene i)
  Introduction: Cicely Berry 0:04:27
  The Group Reading (subtitles) 0:05:25
  Group Echoes Back Bawdy Imagery from Trellis
  Stepter (Theseus) and Lolita Davidovich (Hippolyta) 0:07:18
  Group Holds Hippolyta and Theseus Apart
  as the Lovers Struggle to Reunite 0:12:01
• Exercise 2: Speech Structure
  (A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act I, Scene i)
  Introduction: Cicely Berry 0:15:53
  Tony Goldwyn Reads Egeus (subtitles),
  Group Repeats Violent Words 0:16:12
• Exercise 3: The Spaces Between Words—Suspense
  (Hamlet, Act I, Scene i)
  Introduction: Cicely Berry 0:19:50
  The Whispered Hamlet: Lennie James (Barnardo),
  Paul Jesson (Francisco), Tony Goldwyn (Horatio),
  Robert Sean Leonard (Marcellus)(subtitles) 0:20:49
• Exercise 4: How Imagery Shapes Character and Action
  (Julius Caesar, Act II, Scene i)
  Introduction: Cicely Berry 0:30:05
  Lennie James Reads Brutus (subtitles) 0:31:51
  Group Heckles Brutus 0:36:49
• Exercise 5: Imagery and Antithesis: When Words Collide
  (Romeo and Juliet, Act III, Scene ii)
  Introduction: Cicely Berry 0:42:37
  Diane Venora Reads Juliet (subtitles) 0:43:24
  Group Repeats Antitheses 0:44:41
  Breaking Out of the Circle 0:46:49
  Exercise 6: Thought Structure
  (Macbeth, Act I, Scene vii)
  Introduction: Cicely Berry 0:53:40
  Victor Garber Reads Macbeth (subtitles) 0:54:01
  Running and Crouching (Victor Garber) 0:56:27
• Exercise 6: Thought Structure
  (Macbeth, Act I, Scene vii)
  Introduction: Cicely Berry 0:53:40
  Victor Garber Reads Macbeth (subtitles) 0:54:01
  Running and Crouching (Victor Garber) 0:56:27
• Exercise 7: How Vowels Convey Emotion
  (Hamlet, Act III, Scene i)
  Introduction: Cicely Berry 1:03:37
  Emily Watson Reads Ophelia (subtitles) 1:04:13
  Ophelia Runs from Hamlet 1:05:30
• Exercise 8: Exploring Imagery and Structure within Character
  (Measure for Measure, Act II, Scene iv)
  Introduction: Cicely Berry 1:12:48
  Group Reads Isabella (subtitles) 1:13:35
  Lindsay Duncan and LaTanya Richardson Read Isabella 1:17:38
  Changing Direction on New Thoughts—
  LaTanya Richardson Reads Isabella 1:20:56
  Beseeching and Bewildered—Lindsay Duncan Reads Isabella 1:23:32

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