An Actor's Edition of Shakespeare Revisited

About the Book

An Actor’s Edition of Shakespeare Revisited is a book for actors, directors, professors of theatre and the general public. Each of the plays has been edited for more understandability and length. The intent of the book was to make the works more accessible without making the language modern. When audiences see a Shakespeare play, they have only one time to grasp the words as they are spoken. Audience members do not have time to look at lengthy explanations or notes about words or expressions. Therefore, this edition of these five plays, presents the plays so that audience members as well as actors can follow the plays with little difficulty. Some words have been changed to accomplish this. In certain speeches, subjects or verbs were supplied for understandability. Because Shakespeare used many pronouns, these plays make use of more nouns so that the meaning of who or what is being spoken about becomes more clear.

The book also has some useful tools for the director and actors. A chart has been provided for each play that lists each character by act and scene. This can be very useful when there is a need to double cast actors. In addition, a “combination roles” page has also been added which gives suggestions for doubling parts for a smaller company. To help at rehearsals, page numbers for the beginning of each act and scene is provided on a single page for each play. Finally, each play has been broken into “beats” for the actor and the director. It is the hope of the author of this book that more people will find excitement in reading, performing, staging, or viewing Shakespeare because of the edited versions for understandability. Enjoy the plays---either reading or performing.

About the Author

James R. Hartman is currently Professor of Theatre and Drama at Schoolcraft College and also the Artistic Director of Theatre. He teaches Acting, History of Theatre, and Oral Interpretation of Literature in the Department of Theatre and Drama and also has taught Shakespeare in the English Department. Professor Hartman’s degrees and training in theatre are from the University of Cincinnati and Indiana University. He joined the Stratford Shakespeare Festival in Ontario, Canada for stage workshops and has studied the Alexander Technique and Bartenioff Movement with top European scholars. He has taught theatre at the University of Cincinnati as an Assistant Professor and Indiana University as an Associate Instructor. In addition, Professor Hartman has director over 100 College productions, 56 of which were directed at Schoolcraft College. His own theatre credits include performances at Meadow Brook Theatre and Masonic Temple in Michigan as well as the Cincinnati Playhouse In The Park, Edgecliff Theatre, and Mariemont Playhouse in Ohio. His supernumerary roles in opera include performances in seven operas with the New York Metropolitan Opera. Television credits include the title role in Lincoln at Little Rock and Jimmy B. and Andre. Some of Professor Hartman’s television commercials include two years for United Foundation, Delco Radios, Highland Appliance and many others. Professor Hartman has served on an advisory board for P.B.S. television, channel 56 in Michigan and has served as a member of the Editorial Advisory Board for Collegiate Press. He is currently a member of the Screen Actors Guild and the Association for Theatre in Higher Education which has taken him to Toronto, Washington D.C., Chicago, San Diego, New York, San Francisco, New Orleans, Denver, and Los Angeles where he continues to study theatre through workshops and panels. Professor Hartman was a theatre student of Oscar G. Brockett.