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| Introduction | |
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| Believability: The Territory and the Tools | |
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| The Divine Marriage: Combining Believable Acting with Expressive Singing | |
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| Being Believable as Your Character | |
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| Acting Actions | |
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| Acting Feelings | |
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| Acting Technically; Acting Intutively | |
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| Grounding Your Acting in Hardwired Human Behavior | |
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| Singing and Acting Together-Believably | |
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| Jumping Your Internal Hurdles | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| To Become or Not to Become: Using Yourself to Create a Believable Character | |
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| Entering Your Character's Reality-The Magical If | |
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| Describing Your Character's Reality | |
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| Making Your Character's Given Circumstances Your Own | |
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| Using the Magical If to Explore Carmen as Gypsy | |
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| Using the Magical If to Explore Tony as Leader of a Street Gang | |
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| Sharing Your Character's World | |
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| Putting It Together | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Playing in the Moment: Using Improvisation to Be Believable | |
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| How Improvising Helps You to Act Believably | |
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| Setting Up Successful Improvisational Situations | |
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| Setting Up Successful Singing Improvisations | |
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| Beginning an Improvisation | |
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| Helpful Tips | |
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| Discussing the Improvisation | |
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| Handling Possible Fears about Improvising | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Ideas for Improvisations | |
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| Judgments and Trust: Improving Your Concentration | |
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| Introduction | |
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| Improving Your Concentration by Increasing Your Ability to Trust | |
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| Improving Your Concentration by Putting Judgments in Perspective | |
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| Improving Your Concentration by Intensifying Your Engagement | |
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| Maintaining Your Concentration in Demanding Vocal Passages | |
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| Recovering Your Concentration | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Creating Your Character | |
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| Neither "Right" nor "Wrong": Making Effective Interpretive Choices | |
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| Freeing Yourself to Make Interpretive Choices | |
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| Recognizing When Your Character Choices Will Work Well | |
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| Interpreting the Music to Help Make Effective Character Choices | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Your Character's Universe: Analyzing the Dramatic Structure of Music-Theater Pieces | |
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| The Music-Theater Master Plan | |
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| The Four Dramatic Building Blocks | |
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| Developing the Action in the Stock Dramatic Structure | |
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| Developing the Action in a Typical Plot | |
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| The Music as an Emotional and Dramatic Voice | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Your Character's World: Fashioning a Theme Statement | |
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| Defining the Theme | |
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| Defining the Qualities of the Most Useful Theme Statements | |
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| Fashioning a Theme Statement | |
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| Fashioning a Theme Statement Using Research | |
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| Troubleshooting | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Your Character's Heart's Desire: Fashioning Super-objectives | |
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| Defining a Super-objective | |
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| The Qualities of the Most Useful Super-objectives | |
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| Fashioning a Super-objective | |
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| Why a Single Super-objective is the Most Helpful | |
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| Troubleshooting | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Motivating Your Character's Actions: Fashioning Objectives and Acting Beats | |
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| Defining Objectives and Acting Beats | |
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| Defining the Qualities of the Most Useful Objectives | |
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| Fashioning Objectives for Operas and Musicals | |
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| Fashioning Objectives for Songs, Art Songs, and Lieder | |
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| Using Objectives to Strengthen a Role or Scene | |
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| Fashioning Acting Beats | |
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| Using Acting Beats to Motivate Repeated Text | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Your Character's Inner Voice: Fashioning Subtext and an Internal Dialogue | |
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| Defining Subtext | |
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| Considering the Score as a Source of Subtext | |
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| Fashioning Subtext | |
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| Fashioning Internal Thoughts for Music Without Words | |
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| Integrating an Internal Dialogue into Your Dramatic Analysis of Operas and Musicals | |
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| Integrating an Internal Dialogue into Your Dramatic Analysis of Art Songs, Lieder, and Songs | |
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| Troubleshooting | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Preparing for Performances | |
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| Being Believable in Any Role on Any Stage: Heightening | |
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| Defining Heightening | |
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| Heightening Your Feelings and Gestures by Energizing Your Body and Breath | |
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| Heightening Your Gestures for Period Pieces | |
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| Heightening Your Gestures for Melodramas and Farces | |
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| Using Heightening to Support Hyper-melodramatic and Hyper-farcial Roles | |
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| Troubleshooting | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Getting the Part: Auditioning | |
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| Introduction | |
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| Preparing to Audition | |
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| Doing Auditions | |
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| Solving Auditioning Problems | |
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| How to Improve | |
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| A Final Note | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Getting Good: Rehearsing | |
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| Introduction | |
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| Preparing to Rehearse | |
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| The Rehearsal Process | |
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| Troubleshooting | |
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| Summary | |
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| A Rehearsal Checklist | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Delivering a Believable Character: Performing | |
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| Preparing to Perform | |
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| Preparing to Enter | |
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| Entering | |
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| Performing Operas and Musicals | |
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| Performing Art Songs, Lieder, and Songs | |
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| Troubleshooting | |
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| Summary | |
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| Exercises | |
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| Appendices | |
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| Ten Maxims of Believable Singing Acting | |
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| How to Analyze and Prepare Vocal Material from a Dramatic Viewpoint: An Overview | |
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| A Short Glossary of Stage Terms | |
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| How to Research Period Practices in Movement, Manners, and Gesture | |
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| Notes on the Exercises for Teachers and Directors | |
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| Index | |