Drama and Shakespeare · Grade 5
In Grade 5 you get fluent with: scripts, acts, scenes and stage directions.
Plays are written to be performed, so a script looks different from a story: it has speakers' names, dialogue and stage directions. Playwrights use special conventions to show what characters think. Shakespeare's plays (all public domain) use some older English that you can learn to read.
Key facts
- A play is divided into acts and scenes. A script gives each speaker's name, then their words, with no quotation marks. Stage directions, in parentheses or italics, tell actors how to move and speak: (whispering).
Worked examples
Example 1
Turn this into a script line: Dad said angrily that Sam had to tidy his room.
Answer: DAD: (angrily) Sam, tidy your room!
Example 2
Find the stage direction and say what it tells the actor: LILA: (whispering) Is anyone there?
Answer: (whispering): say the line quietly, as if afraid someone will hear.
Example 3
Write a stage direction to open a scene in a kitchen at night.
Answer: A dark kitchen. A clock ticks. BEN creeps in, holding a candle.