That's the message at the top of the National Forensics League's home page. In response to my post on dramatic license at the Globe Theatre, Ryan Miller wrote that
...high school thespian competition on a national scale in the United States is under the auspices of the National Forensics League whose rules are the following:
1) Any amount of cuts can be made as long as the original word order is not changed.
2) Up to 10% of the production by time can be words or phrases not actually present in the original.
3) The above changes must be consistent with authorial intent.
Well, Colin Hurley's version of what Shakespeare wrote for Thersites wouldn't pass muster with the NFL, since the original order was changed. But Peter's performance on the cell phone would be fine, since the message received was exactly what its author intended...
Posted by Mark Liberman at August 1, 2005 12:32 AM