
Spirits Of Another Sort Workshop Journal #2- Same/Different
In this follow up post, Becky Leifman recently sat down with Sylvia Morsillo, our Flute the Bellows Mender/Thisbe to talk to her about her experience working on the piece. Enjoy and thanks for reading!
-Gregg Mozgala, Artistic Director

My heart exploded with joy when I heard about "Spirits of Another Sort." A. It’s my favorite Shakespeare play and B. I was going to be part of being able to offer individuals with developmental disabilities the rare opportunity to be a paid actor. I was in.
I sat down with Sylvia, who is playing Flute/Thisbe in the workshop.
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B: How did it feel to audition for a play?
S: Nerve-wracking a little bit but, it was fun. It was relaxed. I’ve never auditioned before. It was a new experience for me. I’ve done acting before in CO/LAB.
B: How did it feel to know you got the role?
S: Great! I felt like “Wow! I now have a temporary job.”
B: How is this different than other things you’ve done before?
S: It’s a paying job. The rehearsals are much longer. They’re 3 hours long.
B: What do you do in those rehearsals?
S: We do what a lot of acting companies do when they’re rehearsing. We do body & voice exercises. It leads to warming up our voices for when we speak the lines. It prepares you for memorizing your lines and your cues.
B: I always find that memorizing is only a tiny chunk of the battle. The challenge is perhaps pursuing your intentions and playing your character truthfully. How do you feel the rehearsals have helped with that?
S: We’re putting expression in what we’re saying and breaking down the line and forming it into our own words so that we understand what the line means. In depth… paraphrasing.
B: So once you’ve done that - the paraphrasing - how does that inform your character?
S: It makes it easier to study the lines. It tells you what your character’s personality is like.
B: And what about the language - given to you so beautifully by Shakespeare?
S: Olde English. Language that we don’t use today.
B: Then how do you decipher what it means?
S: By saying the lines in our own words and looking up what the word means in the Shakespeare dictionary.
B: What word do we say now that may have to be looked up in 500 years? When someone is watching a play about our time?
S: “Futurama.” Or the phrase “What’s Up?”
B: How would Shakespeare say What’s up?
S: (gets out script)... Maybe there’s something in the play… “How Now?”
B: Sylvia, “How now?”
S: Coffee.
B: Any final reflections?
S: It takes a lot of hard work and sacrifice meaning the whole time you’re studying. All day every day. It’s a new and exciting experience working with wonderful people who are very helpful in helping you to memorize certain things that you need to know for the play.