Insert silence between measures

Is there a way to insert silence between two measures without inserting new measures? The goal is to create time between the last note of one measure (which is followed by a rest) and the first note of the following measure (which is preceded by a rest) without adding additional measures to the score.

Best I can think of is to insert a tempo change (e.g., to one beat per min) surrounding the rests and change it back in the next measure, but that's kind of a kludge.

Use case is to allow time for spoken dialog which is not rhythmic and is not part of the song.