Ok, by popular Twitter demand here is my extremely nerdy write up on breathing and breathwork in Our Flag Means Death, specifically looking at Ed and Stede’s “Your Wear Fine Things Well” scene. I’m a professional theater person and coming at this from a live performance lens, and this is film/TV acting, so take some of this with a grain of salt, but most of our best actors come from a theater background (I know Taika studied theater in college ). So fuck in, let’s dive in and overanalyze the hell of out something. 

THE BASICS

Breath is fundamental to acting. In the most technical sense you need to have enough air to get all the words out or you’re not gonna get through your impassioned speech. On an emotional level it’s how your ground your body in the moment - the body responds to things before your brain, or your words, and your breath is therefore good predictor of how you feel and what you want to do. 

Also, in the scripted world where people listen patiently to someone talk without interrupting, the way you stay an active scene partner is letting your body respond to the words even if you don’t speak.  (Big exception for anything written by Aaron Sorkin, where people do constantly talk over each other at lightning speed. Breath work is still happening there but Christ you need a racecar to follow along)

Finally, sharing breath with your scene partner is a way to connect. It gets people in sync on things like pace, intensity, rhythm - if done right, it makes people say things like “wow they’re so in tune with each other” this is and eye contact are a huge part of *chemistry*

Voice, and breath, generally comes from 1 of 4 places:

• Belly - think low chuckles, grunts, deep moans, it’s a little animalistic, often associated with masculinity because it’s our lowest voice, it’s also your biggest store of air. So if you get the wind knocked out of you, it’s coming from your belly. Those dangerous sounding low tones that Blackbeard gets - they come from here. A lot of the crews free and relaxed laughter also comes from here.

• Chest- The powerhouse of acting, your big projecting voice comes from here. Your big chest laugh comes from here, along with any yelling or shouting. Gasping in, heaving breaths, sobbing - all chest.  If someone drops into a whisper while staying in their chest voice (not lifting into their throat) it usually flags as intimate or sexy. Anytime Blackbeard is speaking to the crew, it’s from his chest. Stede when he’s confident comes speaks in his chest voice - because he’s dropping his voice to match Ed. Cute.

• Throat - softer voice, if you would categorize it as “breathy” or “tight” or even just lighter or lilting it’s probably coming from the throat. While the chest is a place of power, the throat is a place of tension, your control your throat by constricting that passage way, so a sudden release of tension does as much as suddenly drawing in. A whisper usually comes from the throat, along with gasping, stuttered breaths, and some panting (wink). If Stede is speaking to the crew, loud but somehow sounding weak or unsure - it’s because he’s speaking from his throat and not his chest, it’s unsupported by his diaphragm. Ed at his most soft and vulnerable - exclusively when talking to Stede, comes from here. Again, changing to match each other.  Fun Fact, despite having a lower pitch, Izzy speaks entirely from throat tension, so tense it sounds like he’s squeezing the words out. Amazing because as a Broadway actor Con is definitely trained to breath in from his diaphragm. What a gem.

• Head - Speech from here comes out in a falsetto or a shriek. Stede certainly gets into these registers a lot when flustered or upset. In breath this is where whining, keening, and sighing come from, along with breath that has so much tension you skip your throat entirely and don’t pull in air. I can’t pull an example of that for you because it would be NC17…

YOU WEAR FINE THINGS WELL

This is one of my favorite moments and there’s so much to dig into here. Let’s start at the top.

Stede enters this scene already pulling his voice down to a whispers, releasing a lot of breath on the end of his sentence, you can hear it on “bust” and “sophisticated” Ed starts out a more of soft neutral, but joins him in this intimate breathy place by “thank you” 

Its got such a low and final quality it could be the end of the conversation right there. But Stede presses forward by bringing up the silk. He lifts his voice a little indicating his interest is piqued, and it brings us out of the intimate whisper place, but only barely. Ed’s voice Does Not come up to match him though, he stays down. This is not a fun conversation for him, and not an invitation for Stede to go on a lecture about silk. Stede picks up on this immediately both in words and tone. He reassures Ed with the “Sometimes old things are the best things” with no hesitation while having zero context for this silk being meaningful. His folks comes right back down to match Ed’s. Listen to all the breathiness on “best things” and completely sotto voce on “may I” 

But important to note, this is not a tense whisper. Stede is completely at ease, his breathing is steady. Breathing in before speaking and letting out any excess air with the end of his sentence. His not holding onto breath and it’s not regulated. 

On the other hand. Ed completely stops breathing the second Stede touches that silk. You can literally see him hold his breath as the silk slides through his fingers. His whole body freezes actually and only his eyes track Stede’s movement. It’s so vulnerable. The tension in his body as he doesn’t know what Stede is going to do. Stede has a very critical eye, there’s every possibility he find fault with the scrap, or chides Ed for ruining it with his rough fingers. But of course he doesn’t, he steps in close and places it on Ed like it belongs there. 

We can see Ed adjust as this happens, the tension in his hands releases and his shoulders straighten. It’s too dark to see it but he must take a breath here. The tension doesn’t release though, so it’s a likely a breath in without exhaling. This is a thing we do when someone we like gets close to our face, we don’t breath out. The last thing you’d want to do it make someone decide they don’t want to kiss you because your breath is unpleasant on their face. (THIS WILL BE IMPORTANT 5 SECONDS LATER) The breath in is also anticipatory. Breath in, fill out your chest, pull your shoulders back - because he’s touching you softly and what’s going to happen next? 

Stede meanwhile is in his softest voice. “There we go” is so gentle you would never speak like that except to a lover or a child. Listen to how much air is happening, it’s almost like talking and gently shushing someone at the same time. Soothing. 

As Stede steps back, Ed looks down to see the silk on him. He still hasn’t exhaled. Because Stede hasn’t given his opinion yet. On “Look at that” his eyes come up, so vulnerable - because it’s not a snap up, more like a tentative look up through his lashes. Stede goes back to his gentle breath out on the end of his sentence, we hear it on “That” and “well” - no tension, a gentle smile. It’s very unlikely this is an intentional flirt because there’s no way Stede would be so relaxed and unguarded. And that’s what makes it hit Ed so deeply. Someone calling you attractive because they want to f*ck you is expected. Someone gently asserting you are worthy with no end goal in mind, devastating. 

Finally we get that breath out. BUT THE TENSION DOESN’T RELEASE. You can hear at the end he either breaths in again just a tiny bit, or just resumes tension. It’s less like he intentionally exhaled and more like the breath just escaped out his mouth. It’s halfway a scoff like -  “shut up you’re lying to me” and halfway the old fanfic cliche of “he released a breath he didn’t realize he was holding” It’s a mouth exhale and it’s tension in his throat.

Stede doesn’t try to press the conversation forward this time. He’s content to sit in this moment. He matches Ed’s breath. But Stede exhales more confidently through his nose with placement in the chest. It’s the literally sound of a smile. If there were words they they’d be an answer to Ed’s scoff “you’re lying” - “of course I’m not” or “God you’re pretty”. Stede’s breath happens not to release tension but to release emotion - his fondness for Ed overflows and he breathes it out. 

Ok, now this is moment my soul left my body. Order of operations is very very important here. Stede breaths in first. Big and noticeable, like he’s about to do something. Then Ed takes a breath in too and steps in to Stede. The thing I said I’d come back to in 5 seconds - this is the thing. You breath in before you kiss someone. Until we’re comfy with a person, or heavy making out, we hold our breath for a kiss. You don’t want to risk turning someone off by breathing all over them. Or you better be REAL confident about your breath smelling appealing. 

Here’s the kick in the pants though, we also breath in before speaking. This builds inherent tension because what’s gonna happen next?? Well in this case Ed breaths in and then steps in. That tells us. He didn’t need to step in to speak, they’d already been speaking, he stepped in for a kiss. It’s also telling us that’s how Ed interpreted Stede’s breath. He didn’t step in to kiss Stede, he stepped in to be kissed BY Stede. WHICH IS SO MUCH WORSE. 

Because what happens next? Stede opens his mouth to speak. It happens so fast you might need to watch a couple times. But Stede opens his mouth and then Ed quickly aborts mission and says “OK” and pulls back just slightly. Stede answers with a very tight “Yup”. Unlike all the rest of his lines in this scene, there is like zero breath released here. Ed is so close to him Stede is holding his breath. It’s not until they both turn that we hear them breath out. 

Stede is all breath when he says “night night” it’s just seeping out of him the “oh god back on safe ground, what the hell was that” While Ed mirrors him and also whispers “night night” - which is… not a normal thing the fearsome pirate Blackbeard would say?? He’s so flustered he just repeats Stede, I fully believe he would have said any ridiculous thing at this point. Look at that pat on the shoulder, he has no idea what to do. He’s lost it.

And then they go their separate ways closing with that double look back that’s filled with so much longing it makes me want to eat my own hands. And mapping the trajectory of of the rest of the season it fully makes sense that this is the moment Ed realizes he’s down horrendous for this man, following this it makes sense he’s losing his shit at the thought of killing Stede. Stede meanwhile is half fond half confused. He definitely felt *something* in this exchange but I genuinely don’t think he thought there was a possibility of a kiss at this moment. It’s still baby’s first crush and the idea of it being real and attainable has not dawned on him yet - based on his relaxed breath and pattern of speech here. 

Part 2 ??

Part 2 of this will be a compare contrast with the Kiss scene, when he DOES realize. Cause wow. This is already getting so long I’ve written 2,000 words on this 90 second scene and I need to stop. Please like/share/comment if you want a part 2 analyzing the kiss scene! 

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