Breath, Sound & Silence: Shakespeare for Practical Actors Workshop

Bring the powers of breath, sound, and silence into your classical theater performance. Learn how to read your script as a piece of music and translate poetry into a living, breathing, thinking (and sometimes farting) human being. Practice controlling your heartbeat and breath—letting your physiology do the emotional work—and become your character from the inside out.

Work smarter, not harder. We are teaching practical tools for practical actors; a simple, methodical way to approach a Shakespeare script and character and memorize your lines. Get ready for this year’s PATA Shakespeare auditions, coming up on November 8! Modernize and make a 400-year-old character your own, and never sweat an off-book date again!



Isabella Buckner is a graduate of the Portland Actors Conservatory (now TAC), class of 2013, and has been acting since she could walk. Izzie’s further education comes from the mean streets of outdoor Shakespeare, where she developed a unique method to approach the diverse characters she’s portrayed. From clowns to villains to lovers and everyone in between, Izzie attributes her versatility entirely to the clues given by Shakespeare himself—clues in the text that are there for all to use, if you know where to look.