Every day on motion-picture sound stages, in television studios and the theater, you have changes thrown at you. When you're cast in a production, you're given a final script, but this does not insure you against changes. During the actual production, scripts are constantly being revised. You may receive revisions at the last minute.

Here your training and experience show up. You must wipe out what you've memorized and use the law of substitution— quickly, accurately and automatically.

You used your own pauses in the "quality of mercy" speech. Relearn the speech with these arbitrary pauses:

Exercise

The quality of mercy is not strain'd (pause),
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath (pause): It is twice blest (pause)—
It blesseth him that gives (pause), and him that takes, (pause)
Tis mightiest in the mightiest (pause), it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown (pause).
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power (pause),
The attribute to awe and majesty (pause),
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings (pause).
But mercy is above this sceptred sway (pause),
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings (pause),
It is an attribute to God himself (pause);
And earthly power doth then show likest God's (pause)
When mercy seasons justice.

Another great connector and common denominator with reality is the

Second Law of Timing—Move During a Spoken Phrase.

Always start the movement with the first syllable of the first word and end it with the last syllable of the last word.

Repeat the "quality of mercy" speech with the "revised" pauses well memorized.

The first vocal phrase is "The quality of mercy is not strain'd."

The first syllable you hear in that phrase is thuh. The last syllable you hear is ain'd.

Touch your knee with your fingers at the same time you say thuh. Now touch your shoulder with the same fingers saying airid. Do this several times.

Fill in the remaining sounds and read the whole phrase, "The quality of mercy is not strain'd," touching your knee on the thuh and your shoulder on the ain'd. Let your hand remain on your shoulder.

The second phrase is "It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath." Let your hand leave your shoulder on the sound of ih in the word "it" and touch your knee precisely on the eath sound in the word "beneath." Your hand remains on your knee.

The third phrase is "It is twice blest" Start your hand up on the ih sound in the word "it" to reach your shoulder exactly on the est sound in the word "blest" Your hand remains on your shoulder.

Obeying the second law of timing, continue doing your knee-to-shoulder and shoulder-to-knee action, in sequence, throughout the vocal phrases only of your "quality of mercy" exercise.

You've just used the laws of ratio and proportion that you learned in school. They'll keep your reading of the speech from becoming visually monotonous.

Here's why and how:

The number of words in our arbitrary vocal phrases varies considerably. But in this particular exercise the same distance must be traveled by the physical action during each vocal phrase.

Therefore, either the physical action must be speeded up (or slowed down) to accommodate the length of the vocal phrases; or the speed of the vocal phrases must be drastically changed to accommodate the actions.

In this case, it is much better, as you can see—and hear—to accommodate the speed of the physical action to the length of the vocal phrase.

Going back to the beginning of the "quality of mercy": instead of using the knee-to-shoulder and shoulder-to-knee action during the vocal phrases, substitute our units of motion (eyes—head— smile—hands), using only one unit to each phrase. Next, substitute any contemporary play speech for the "quality of mercy," using our arbitrary units of motion.

Now, still adhering strictly to the second law of timing, go through the "quality of mercy" speech, using a natural subconscious body objective, such as taking off your coat.

Then, for the "quality of mercy," substitute any modern play speech, using a natural, subconscious body objective.

You may have heard that some people are born with a sense of timing. If you've been blessed with it by nature—fine. If not— a sense of timing can be acquired.

Practice these exercises on the two laws of timing until you have perfect synchronization of movement and speech.

Never underestimate the power of a pause. It gives you a chance to do nothing—with sustained energy. Jack Benny has been pausing with sustained energy for a full career. His public loves his pauses as much as his lines.

So far, your pauses have been logical. Now try the psychological pause.

The psychological pause interrupts a body phrase or a vocal phrase. By starting a body phrase and interrupting, or stopping its action, while you insert a vocal phrase, you produce suspended motion.

By starting a vocal phrase and interrupting, or stopping the speech, while you insert a body phrase, you produce suspended sound. In both cases, you momentarily dam up time. You create SUSPENSE.

Mae West parlayed the psychological pause into a career.

The psychological pause is the actor's "cliff hanger." Its suspense stimulates interest, causes surprise, stirs the imagination of the audience, and vitalizes the actor with a quality of excitement.

The psychological pause is so potent it must be used sparingly, with sound motivation and good judgment. Otherwise it becomes too much of a good thing.

At one time or another almost every actor stops short in the middle of a scene, flaps those things hanging on the end of his arms, and asks desperately, "What shall I do with my hands?"

You'll never have to go through that crisis. Timing body phrases —in units and objectives—has given you the answer to that bugaboo question of WHAT TO DO WITH YOUR HANDS. NOW, your sense of timing is substituting habit patterns, constructed in the conscious mind, for relaxed habits in the subconscious.

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