Characterization Articles for Drama Teachers

Uta Hagen held a lot of influence in 20th century American Theatre. She made her Broadway debut in 1938 in Anton Chekov’s The Seagull. She also acted against Marlon Brando in A Streetcar Named...

One approach to character development is to identify the difference between what characters want and what they need. Sometimes students get the two mixed up. Which is more important? Do plays...

Characters come to life in the small details, the little things like personal preference, food, or music choices. These two exercises can help student actors discover those details and really get...

Student actors are frequently cast into a role that is totally outside their comfort zone. They might have to portray someone completely different than themselves, with radically different beliefs...

As an actor, character research is part of your job. Doing research gives you the foundation and background to help make your character believable to an audience. Research helps you understand a...

Figuring out what your character wants will help you add depth and interest for your character, making them more realistic and believable. A character that doesn’t want anything is a boring...

If you want your students to physicalize their characters, get them thinking about status. What is status?Answer this question for yourself. Write down a couple of different answers yourself, then...

Student actors tend to keep their limbs close to the body. When we think about creating physical pictures on stage, one of the easiest ways to present depth is through extension. How can we...

“Body language accounts for 60% of our understanding of emotions, our reception of subliminal messages and our grasp of relationships.” - Ron Cameron-Lewis, Acting Skills for Life Student actors...

How are your students at physicalizing nonhuman characters? Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream? One of the seven deadly sins? A banana in an improv scene? A god in a Greek myth? The Lint Roller in...

A character’s physicality is part of the actor’s toolkit. Physicality, along with voice and imagination, helps to tell a story, no matter if you’re doing a mime, tableau, monologue, or scene. The...

If you want your characters to be three dimensional, you have to consider their voice. What words do they choose? What’s the structure of their language? How do they communicate? A character...

This is a great classroom exercise to not only have fun with Shakespeare but to also see how well students can re-frame which ever Shakespeare play they are studying. Take a character from one...

One of the keys to Classroom Management is getting students to work well together. Group work is tricky if students don’t know one another. Why should I share something with this guy who doesn’t...

Commedia dell’arte is an improvised comedic theatre form that flourished in Italy in the 1500s. The exact origins of commedia are fuzzy and hard to pin down; there is not much documented previous...

It happens all the time in young or beginning actors. You’re sitting in the audience and out of the corner of your eye you catch it – an actor starts to shift back and forth on their feet. Their...

Fear is such a wonderful motivator for characters – with both positive and negative connotations. How many of us know someone who won’t do something because of fear? Who won’t get on stage, or get...

If you want your students to take their character development to the next level, introduce them to Laban Movement. Laban Movement will provide them with a clear and understandable tool set that...