The first thing to say about a good contentless scene is that it needs to be ambiguous. There should always be several ways to play the scene. The scenes are genderless and maybe experiemented with in every combination. The challenge of using these scenes is that actors are asked not to predetermine or restrict themselves to one interpretation. A good classroom exercise with these scenes is to simply read the scene with a partner and only work with the available stimulus. The actor can only respond to what she is receiving from her partner. Often when both actors submit to such an open approach to this exercise, meaning is generated and discoveries made about relationship and context. Alternately, several contexts may be discussed prior to playing the scene and each group in a class will no doubt arrive at very different interpretations.
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