“O, it offends me to the soul to hear a robustious periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings.”
With these words from Hamlet, Shakespeare let the world know what he thought about those whose diction was not up to scratch. Good drama required speech to be given “trippingly on the tongue”, he believed – and theatre directors and producers have followed his lead for centuries.
But a row has erupted among senior theatrical figures in the UK over the teaching of acting after the decision by one of the world’s leading voice experts to part company with a top British drama school.
They fear that basic aspects of the training of actors are being overlooked as drama schools shift from theatre experience to emphasise work in film and TV.
Prof Patsy Rodenburg has worked with actors including Judi Dench and Ian McKellen, and with playwrights such as Arthur Miller and Harold Pinter, and she taught at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama for 42 years as head of voice and then professor of text and poetry. Her former students there include Daniel Craig and Damian Lewis.
But she has now resigned because she had simply reached the end of her tether, Rodenburg told the Observer last week. Over the past 12 years, she had increasingly sensed that the craft of acting – “breath work, body and vocal preparation, in order to have great presence and impact when speaking” – has lessened in importance at the Guildhall and beyond.
“Craft is a scaffolding to enhance creativity,” she said. “It’s like a chef knowing how to chop an onion. It’s the work you do before you meet a director. Without craft, an actor is a liability in an ensemble because the director can’t get them to do what they want. If you want to be a film or television actor, you don’t necessarily need a lot of craft. But if you want to go on stage and serve an audience, you do.”
Rodenburg added: “It became very clear to me that the people who were supposedly teaching voice and movement don’t know what they’re doing. You can’t teach voice unless you teach breath. They don’t even teach breath
To Rodenburg’s astonishment, teaching colleagues refused to let her watch their classes. While she is a renowned authority on Shakespeare and classical theatrical texts, she sensed that they do not even “believe in Shakespeare”. She also heard from students that other teachers were not pushing them to excel, instead telling them: “Don’t worry if you can’t do it. Just lie on the floor for a bit.”
Rodenburg said older actors and directors are complaining about the lack of craft and resilience in young actors. She recalled one performer who told a director: “I’m too tired to go on today – I’m a bit emotional.”
The Guildhall had tried to keep her while failing to respond to her concerns, she added. “I said: ‘I need help from teachers that teach like I do’, and they wouldn’t support me. So I had to resign.” In a letter to her students, she explained: “My passions and belief in theatre no longer resonate fully in the training of actors and actually aren’t really understood in most theatre companies around the world.
“I have to choose to leave and to work with teachers and actors who are like-minded and can do some of the hard graft alongside me.”
She is planning to offer free classes for Guildhall alumni and has recorded podcasts entitled Craft: Sweat and Joy, the first two of which were released last week.
Daniel Evans, co-head of the Royal Shakespeare Company, told the Observer that the departure of Rodenburg from the Guildhall is “a great loss for that institution” and he is now discussing a collaboration at the RSC.
“It is a concern that Patsy is leaving, because future generations of actors won’t get what I had. Patsy was almost synonymous with the Guildhall. She inspired so many great students. When that depth of training diminishes, and when Patsy talks about craft, I’m right with her.
“She’s a complete inspiration. I dearly want her to work with us at the RSC. She changed my life. She’s an amazing teacher. Her method of teaching, her belief in craft, how she gets actors prepared, are second to none.”
Discussing great actors who fine-tuned their craft in the theatre, Evans singled out Brian Cox, who played Titus in a seminal RSC production long before he found fame as Logan Roy in Succession.
Noting a shift towards film and television in drama school training, Evans said: “My concern is that we do not yet know what impact that will have on generations to come. If the balance has shifted away from basic craft skills, that would be a great loss.”
The Guildhall said yesterday that although its “debt of gratitude to Rodenburg is enormous”, it strongly rejected her criticisms, noting that it was ranked No 1 in Arts, Drama & Music by the Complete University Guide 2024 and one of the top 10 performing arts institutions in the world in the QS World University Rankings 2023.
It added that Shakespeare is a fundamental part of the repertoire and curriculum of its BA (hons) acting programme.
