How to Rehearse Without a Reader

What You Are Actually Rehearsing

You are not rehearsing your lines in isolation. You are rehearsing what happens to you. The other character's lines are the stimulus, and your lines are the response. Whatever method you choose should make the cue arrive from outside you, in time, so that you have to listen before you speak. A method that lets you skip the listening is rehearsing the wrong thing.

Record the Other Lines

Record the other character's lines on your phone or computer, leaving a gap after each one for your own line. Then play the file and run the scene against it.

• Speak the recorded lines plainly. If you perform them, you will rehearse against a performance you invented.
• Leave more space than you think you need, including room for a pause before you answer.
• Re-record the gaps when your pacing changes. A fixed recording fixes your rhythm along with it.
• Use it for repetition and timing, then put it down before it becomes the only way you know the scene.

A Friend on a Call

A friend or a fellow actor on a phone or video call can feed you the other lines with a live rhythm that no recording has. The cost is scheduling, time zones and patience.

• Send the sides ahead of the call, with the lines you want them to give you marked.
• Ask them not to act. You need the cue and a plain response, and a performance from them gives you something to react to that you will not have in the room.
• Start the scene cold two or three times without stopping, then talk about it afterward.
• Keep the session short. Twenty focused minutes beat an evening of discussion.

Mark the Script

Marking costs nothing and works without a second person. Underline the cue words that change what you want. Put a slash where a beat turns and a verb in the margin for what you are doing to the other character. Mark the places where you listen, not only the places where you speak.

Then use the page against yourself. Cover your own lines with a card so that only the other character's lines are visible. Say each cue aloud, as the character would hear it, and answer from the moment instead of from memory.

Layering the Methods

No single method covers everything. Mark the sides first, so you know what each line is doing. Use a recording or a voice to build timing and repetition on your own. Save the run with your friend for the end of your preparation, to test whether the moment is alive. On the day of the audition, a short run against a recording is enough to warm up without over-setting the scene.

Decide What Each Run Is For

Before you start a run, decide what you are testing: the timing, the listening, the lines themselves or the ending. A run with one purpose teaches you more than three runs that try to fix everything at once. Stop when you have the answer, and write down what you found.

Rehearse the Silences

The pauses are part of the scene. Recordings and voices tend to leave an even gap after every line, and an even gap can teach you an even rhythm. Vary it on purpose. Answer quickly once, take a long beat once, and cut across the end of a cue once, to find out which one is true. Let the cue land, notice what it does to you, and speak when you have something to say.