Movement, Rhythm, and Mood in Shakespeare's Play The Taming of the Shrew

Introduction

Shakespeare uses the elements of drama to portray characters and create meaning to his plays. He has used the drama elements of movement, rhythm, and mood in his play The Taming of the Shrew to portray and create meaning to the characters.

Movement

The element of movement in drama is where the actors move on the stage, it can help communicate with the audience and make the effect upon the play. It also helps with characterization for example if the character is moving quickly, lightly or slowly. Movement can also be how actors move in relation to other characters onstage for example fearfully, threateningly or in a friendly manner. William Shakespeare uses movement to embody the character emotionally and physically in the story of The Taming of The Shrew for example The Royal Shakespeare Theater's performed a 2019 production of the Taming of the Shrew and in Act 2, Scene 1 they used slow movements at the start and gradually got quicker, at one point in the play Kate and Percutio walk around in a circle to represent that they are arguing and soon after that Kate slaps Percutio. These movements show the audience that they are in an argument and can not agree with each other. Through participation in a workshop, Miss Bourke gave us a script on The Taming Of The Shrew and we went off into pairs and tried to understand what situation it was, then we went back to our desk and watch the Video that The Royal Shakespeare Theater's performed and made points on how we could use movement that they used to make our performance more believable.

Rhythm

Rhythm refers to the timing and pace of the dialogue spoken and the beat and tempo of the performance. In drama the rhythm should never be the same throughout the play regardless of its length, it can follow the emotional state of the character/s as well as the atmosphere of the performance at certain moments. Willam Shakespeare used iambic pentameter for his plays and this is normally the sound of a heartbeat. In Romeo and Juliet Act 2 Scene 2 Romeo's soliloquy can be in Iambic Pentameter ‘But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun....’ Through a workshop in class, Mrs. Bourke showed the class a video on Iambic pentameters and then gave us a script to Macbeth Act 5, Scene eight and we had to find an Iambic meter and perform it in front of the class, this helped my understanding of how you can perform the play.

Tension

Tension is growth signified with expectations within the play, it is a feeling that the story is building towards something exciting is going to happen. If there is no tension in a scene it is hard to keep the audience engaged with what is happening in the play. Shakespeare creates tension by showing contrasts in the moods and emotions of the characters. For example in Romeo and Juliet Shakespeare creates tension for the audience throughout Act 1 Scene 5 where we see Romeo and Juliet fall deeply in love but each of them are from feuding family. He also creates tension in Macbeth for example In Act 2, scene 2 of Macbeth is where Macbeth is going to kill King Duncan. The dramatic tension of this scene brings the audience to the edge of their seats with expectations of the news of King Duncan's death. Macbeth and Lady Macbeth have an agonistic discussion between each other that produces a dramatic tense. ‘My hands are of your color; but I'm ashamed to wear a heart so white.'