When one sees students who seem to be yelling at each other, waving their hands in the air and making faces, they’re probably in Michelle Felten’s advanced acting class.

“We’re rehearsing a scene from a Sam Shepard play,” junior theater major Brooke Burrows said. “We’re making our scene over-the-top and awkward.”

Burrows and her class partner, junior theater major Karlo Ceria, and the rest of the students have worked in pairs outside the Studio Theater and prepared for a presentation scheduled next class meeting.

Felten assigned each pair a play written by Shepard, a modern American playwright, actor and director. Part of the task is to create their exaggerated and over-the-top versions of the scripts assigned to them.

“We tend to pursue studying playwrights that are not based on basic modern realism,” Felten said.

Felten said that in Shepard’s plays, the characters’ emotions are portrayed through big movements. “The scenes require a lot of physical and vocal exploration,” Felten said.

One advantage of rehearsing in an open space is the absence of limitations. Doing so allows students to “explore different ways” of portraying the characters’ emotions and to “work through (their) inhibitions” because people can pass by and watch, Felten said.

Compared to Theater 101 or Acting Study II, Theater 110 or advanced acting requires more physicality, Ceria said. “It takes your further outside your comfort zone.”

Theater 110 requires students to rehearse and perform advanced acting styles and techniques. It involves text analysis and the use of sharp language and subtext, which, in theater, is known as the unspoken thoughts, emotions and motives of characters shown through their actions.

Felten is an assistant professor in the department of theatre and dance at Sacramento State. Felten teaches voice, movement, rehearsal and performance classes and is a professional actress who has directed and performed several theatrical productions both in the East and West Coasts.

Kristine Guerra can be reached at [email protected].