Ask Judith: Submission #101

Submission Number: 101
Submission ID: 185
Submission UUID: 41438dc9-a3c8-462c-84f6-96c759b35690
Submission URI: /web/ask-judith

Created: Sat, 10/12/2024 - 09:33 PM
Completed: Sat, 10/12/2024 - 09:33 PM
Changed: Sat, 10/12/2024 - 09:33 PM

Remote IP address: 35.149.139.126
Submitted by: Anonymous
Language: English

Is draft: No
Webform: Ask Judith
Name Sarah Kearney
Email (optional) sarah.kearney2018@gmail.com
Question Dear Judith, Thank you for writing "Directing Actors" which I am currently listening to on Audible. I have the honor of directing a play by Kathryn Schultz Miller "A Thousand Cranes". Two of the actors have never been on stage before and the third is fairly new to theatre. I wanted to write to you to say Thank you for the suggestion of emotional connections and "What if" work.

I am also finding your suggestion of Script Analysis incredibly helpful. There are so many underlying themes to this script and I have been searching for ways to interpret some of the dialogue of counting the number of cranes Sadako Sasaki folded during her life. Schulz-Miller has the counting as a consistent theme and I am hoping to guide the actors to find the verbs for the counting.

Thank you for any advice, guidance and direction you provide.
Reply
Approved Yes

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  • “I took a seminar with an acting teacher named Judith Weston. I learned a key insight to character. She believed that all well-drawn characters have a spine, and the idea is that the character has an inner motor, a dominant, unconscious goal that they’re striving for, an itch that they can’t scratch. I took to this like a duck to water.”

    ANDREW STANTON [from his Feb 2012 TED Talk] writer-director, FINDING DORY, WALL-E, FINDING NEMO, A BUG’S LIFE; director, BETTER CALL SAUL, STRANGER THINGS; writer, TOY STORY, TOY STORY 2, TOY STORY 3

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