Shakespeare and Lecoq : A Practical Guide for Actors, Directors, Students and Teachers

This book provides actors, directors, teachers and students with a clear, practical guide to applying the work of influential theatre practitioner Jacques Lecoq to the process of rehearsing or workshopping the Shakespeare text. Written by theatre practitioner Ed Woodall, who trained with Lecoq himself, and Shakespeare academic Abigail Rokison-Woodall, this guide begins with warm-ups and ensemble-building, and moves through explorations of the story, the world of the play, the text, character emotion, thought and physicality and staging. Lecoq’s method often relies on ‘play’, and play is often seen as trivial or inconsequential. This book argues that the more playful you are, the more playfully you investigate your speech or scene and the more physically motivated that playfulness is, the more vital and lifelike your acting of Shakespeare will be.

Ed Woodall is an acting coach and movement director. He trained with Jacques Lecoq at the École Jacques Lecoq between 1989-91 and has worked in physical theatre with Complicité, Improbable and Kneehigh as well as acting in a number of films and RSC productions of Shakespeare.

Abigail Rokison-Woodall is Professor in Shakespeare and Theatre, The Shakespeare Institute, Stratford upon Avon, UK and was formerly a professional actor.

Michael Dobson is an award-winning game designer and co-author of Fox on the Rhine and Fox at the Front. He served as a member of the team that built the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum.

Sir Simon Russell Beale is the leading Shakespearean actor of his generation, having played King Lear, Hamlet, Macbeth, Malvolio, Timon of Athens, Benedick, Falstaff, Prospero and Richard II.