(upbeat music)
-: Hi everyone!
My name is Kim Douthit and today,
we're gonna be looking at objectives
using a soliloquy from Romeo and Juliet.
You don't need a whole lot of materials for this.
We have, as you can see,
the text provided for you.
This is from the balcony scene for Romeo and Juliet,
so if you wanna get a little fancy and grab a chair
or a stool or something to be your stand-in balcony,
you're welcome to do that.
You're also gonna need to take a couple notes during this.
So, grabbing a writing utensil and something to write on
would be a good idea.
We all have things that we want, right?
We might want a cookie or a new pair of shoes.
For our younger siblings to suddenly disappear.
And we have different ways of getting what we want, right?
So, in theater, we call what we want an objective.
Getting what we want, like let's say I want a cookie.
That's gonna depend a little bit on
how I'm trying to get it, right?
Who I'm talking to.
If I was trying to get a cookie from my grandmother,
that'd be a little different than trying to get
a cookie from, let's say, my little brother.
Our relationships are different.
So, the way I go about it, that's gonna be
a little different, right?
So, if I'm talking to my Grandma,
I might try imploring her or begging her for that cookie.
My little brother, I might try threatening him.
In theater, we call this actions or tactics,
the different ways we try to get our objective.
Something is standing in the way of our objective.
That's an obstacle.
Why are obstacles important in theater?
Well, if our story of Romeo and Juliet went,
"Once upon a time, Romeo and Juliet met
"and they fell in love and got married
"and it was wonderful and they lived happily ever after."
It's not really an interesting story.
Romeo and Juliet might be a little bit more fond of it,
but there's no conflict because from conflict,
that's where we get drama.
So, we need things standing in the way of what we want.
So, we're gonna look at what one character wants,
at what Juliet wants, using a soliloquy.
Now, what's a soliloquy?
It's a character saying their thoughts aloud.
Now, sometimes, they're by themselves
or they think they're by themselves.
In the balcony scene at this point,
Juliet thinks she's by herself.
She doesn't realize that Romeo is nearby listening in.
Now, a soliloquy is different than a monologue.
That's another thing you find in theater,
which is also any time a character speaks
for a long period of time.
Soliloquies specifically deal with a character's
inner thoughts, what's going on internally.
So, this is a very famous soliloquy.
In fact, you probably know a line or two from it
or you'll recognize them when you start hearing it.
Now, since Shakespeare is designed to be performed,
let's start off by just reading through this soliloquy.
So, have a stand up, look at the text.
Do your best Shakespearean voice
and say, "O Romeo, Romeo,
"wherefore art thou Romeo?
"Deny thy father and refuse thy name
"or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love
"and I'll no longer be a Capulet.
"'Tis but thy name that is my enemy.
"Thou art thyself, though not a Montague.
"What's a Montague?
"It is nor hand, nor foot, nor arm, nor face,
"nor any other part belonging to a man.
"O be some other name.
"What's in a name?
"That which we call a rose by any other name
"would smell as sweet;
"so Romeo would, were he not Romeo called,
"retain that dear perfection which he owes
"without that title.
"Romeo, doff thy name, and for that name,
"which is no part of thee, take all myself."
That was awesome!
We got all that in the first try, right?
What we're gonna do 'cause again, this is a lot of text,
we're gonna do an activity I call telegraming.
I love this activity for breaking down text.
What we're gonna do is look at each line
and pick the four words from each line
that we think best encompasses what's happening,
that stands out the most to us.
Now, it's important to note the four words
that I think create the best line,
they may not be the same as your four words.
So, if you're looking at it and saying,
"Hey now, wait a minute, Kim.
"I disagree, I think these four are better."
That's totally fine.
And you can write down the four that you think
work the best.
So, let's look at this first line.
"O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?"
Now, are we noticing anything
that is being repeated over and over again?
Any word at all.
Might it be the word Romeo?
She says it three times!
Romeo, Romeo, Romeo.
I feel like that's giving us a really good idea
of what she is speaking of.
The word wherefore and this is also really interesting.
She's not asking, "Where are you, Romeo?"
She's asking, "Why are you Romeo?"
Romeo, Romeo, why are you Romeo?
So, that, to me, is another really important word.
So, our telegram for the first line reads,
"Romeo, Romeo, wherefore Romeo?"
Let's look at the next line.
"Deny thy father and refuse thy name."
A couple words really stand out to me.
The word refuse is really interesting.
And name, we've already had a name up here a lot.
We had Romeo, let's keep going with that name.
Deny, that's a strong word, and father.
So, we have four words here too.
So, so far, our telegram reads,
"Romeo, Romeo, wherefore Romeo?
"Deny father, refuse name."
That actually creates a pretty clear picture
of what's going on.
Now, if we look at the next line, this is a little trickier.
"Or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love."
I'm gonna go with, let's see, wilt not, sworn love.
But you might pick a different combination of words here.
Let's do one last line together and then I'm gonna give you
a few moments to look at the text and figure out your own.
So, our next line is,
"And I'll no longer be a Capulet."
Hmm, well I think there's a couple important things
happening in this line.
One of them, again, any time we say a name,
I feel that that's important.
So, let's look at Capulet.
What's she not gonna be any more?
She's not gonna be a Capulet.
So, I'll no longer.
So, what we have so far,
"Romeo, Romeo, wherefore Romeo?
"Deny father, refuse name.
"Wilt not, sworn love,
"I'll no longer Capulet."
So, if we're looking at just those first four lines
at what Juliet wants, what does she want in her telegram?
Romeo!
She wants Romeo!
But what's standing in the way of getting what she wants?
Well, it's because they're enemies, right?
So, their families.
What's she going to do about it?
She switches pretty quickly here, I think,
because she says if you deny your father
and refuse thy name, then we can be together,
or if you won't do that, you know what?
I'll deny my name.
Now, I want you to look at the rest of this text
and pick out your four words on each line.
We'll give you a little bit of time to do that.
(upbeat music)
All right, we got a lot of names up here.
We got a lot of words up here (laughs).
Let's see what I did and see how it compares to
what you did.
"Romeo, Romeo, wherefore Romeo?
"Deny father, refuse name.
"Wilt not, sworn love,
"I'll no longer Capulet.
"Thy name, my enemy.
"Thou thyself, not Montague.
"What's Montague?
"Hand, foot, arm, face,
"nor part man.
"Some other name?
"What's name?
"That rose, other name smell sweet;
"Romeo would not Romeo.
"Retain dear perfection owes.
"Without title, Romeo name.
"Name no part thee.
"Take all myself."
What's so interesting from this,
you still get a really good idea of what's being said!
Juliet wants Romeo.
Now let's take this one step further.
From a four word telegram, I want you to break it down
to one word from each line.
And you know what?
We've already narrowed it down to four words.
So, from each of those words, I want you to just pick one.
One word.
I'm gonna do these words for me in red.
(upbeat music)
So, my telegram now reads,
"Romeo, name, love, Capulet.
"Enemy, Montague, Montague.
"Face, name, name, name.
"Romeo, perfection, Romeo.
"Name myself."
What do you notice in that?
There's a couple words said over and over again,
the word name being the main one
and I didn't even circle all the names!
Name is said seven times in this soliloquy!
The word, Romeo, is said six times.
So, her inner thoughts are so apparent.
She wants Romeo.
But what is this idea of a name?
And can she have him?
She's trying to find a way to justify.
She's working through that obstacle,
that thing standing in the way 'cause I love that section
where it says, "Capulet, enemy, Montague, Montague."
'Cause that really encompasses what her obstacle is.
The two families are enemies.
How does she work through it?
By thinking about the very nature of what makes a person.
Are we more than a name?
And why does a name matter?
What I also really love about this,
this kinda shows you how young Juliet is.
'Cause what's she fixating on?
She's fixating on Romeo, a boy she just met at a party
and even though they are sworn enemies,
there's an ancient grudge between these two families,
she finds a way in only a few lines
to kind of work around this whole ancient grudge thing
and say, "Mm, but I like this boy,
"so I'm gonna kind of not think about the fact
"that our families hate each other."
Juliet is extremely young.
So, you get so much of her character and what she wants
in just a few lines.
So, looking at the full text again,
read it one more time since you have a little bit
better grasp on it.
"O Romeo, Romeo wherefore art thou Romeo?
"Deny thy father and refuse thy name
"or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love
"and I'll no longer be a Capulet.
"'Tis but my name that is my enemy.
"Thou art thyself, though not a Montague.
"What's Montague?
"Is it nor hand, nor foot, nor arm,
"nor face, nor any other part belonging to a man.
"O be some other name.
"What's in a name?
"That which we call a rose by any other name
"would smell as sweet;
"so Romeo would, were he not Romeo called,
"retain that dear perfection which he owes
"without that title.
"Romeo, doff thy name and for that name,
"which is no part of thee, take all myself."
Now, this method of breaking down text
is really fantastic for figuring out a character's objective
but it's also really great if you're having trouble
understanding anything
because every time you take it into smaller chunks,
it automatically becomes more manageable.
I wanna thank you all for breaking down
a little bit of text with me and looking at some
Romeo and Juliet.
My name is Kim Douthit and I hope you have a wonderful day.
(upbeat music)