The following is the text work session taken from the full episode with Ray.

In this excerpt, Ray will be discussing a speech from John Webster’s The White Devil, which is a Jacobean play and comes in the period right after Shakespeare. As Ray shared, plays in this period were much darker and a definite departure from many of the themes you’d see in Shakespeare’s work. It’s not a play I was familiar with and really glad these guests are introducing us to other classical works. As I mentioned in the complete episode with Ray, this may be a great play for you to find a lesser-known monologue for your auditions.

You’ll hear Ray discuss:

why this speech fascinates him

how language was the CGI of the day

why classical theatre and plays like this are still so relevant today.

It’s a great session and a wonderful discussion about theatre, politics, and acting!

About the guest

Ray Porter grew up in Indiana and studied at the California Institute of the Arts. Shortly after college, he auditioned for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and stayed with them for 18 years

Outside of OSF, he has appeared at ACT in San Francisco, the Mark Taper Forum, Berkeley Rep, and just last year in Henry IV with Shakespeare Center LA alongside our past guests Harry Groener (Ep 4), Geoffrey Wade (Ep 5), and Peter Van Norden (Ep 7)—and Tom Hanks played Falstaff!

Ray has 40+ film and tv credits and includes roles in Modern Family, Shameless, Sons of Anarchy, Monk, Justified, Argo, and Almost Famous.

He has narrated multiple best-selling books, covering all types of genres, including the Joe Ledger series by Jonathan Maberry, The 4-Hour Workweek, Silver Linings Playbook, and The Idiot’s Guide to String Theory; I really cannot emphasize enough that Ray has had a major career in audiobooks and is one of the best in the business. He has multiple Earphones Awards and has been nominated for Audie awards for his narration.

Please enjoy the text work with Ray Porter!

Total Running Time: 16:06

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Want to hear more from Ray? Check out my full talk with him here!

Show Notes

Ray Porter around the web

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Ray’s monologue from The White Devil by John Webster