Notes on acting
August 15th 2006 10:45
Is it cowardice for directors to shy from working with difficult actors? Should they select the person who's right for the character, and not who's right for the "role"?
Peter Sellers in Strangelove, Brando in Apocalypse…
A weird sort of intensity, concentration, that holds the audience, especially in monologues or speeches… Perhaps it's the reality of the actor's belief in what they see… Perhaps a sort of frenzy or possession… as an oracle is captivating… as the person who believes so utterly in something makes you believe… Holds audience and draws them in… emotional seriousness and pointedness…
Stanislavsky dreamed of a theatre that was alive -- and not just "fresh". A theatre that was new in every performance.
Sheer persistence, and you'll improve more than you realize faster than you realize. But is persistence enough?
For ten years I've been doing 40 sit-ups a week. They don't get much easier, and I can't do much more than 40.
No pushing of the envelope? No progress.
It's the same with anything. It's not work that matters, it's effortful work. Or else you're stuck with ten years of sit-ups, 3000 chess games, and nothing to show for it.
Per Chris Howard: all the benefit from push-ups comes in the last few reps.
As an actor, you have to take risks.
Why bother with this standard of acting? Are you doing it because the director tells you to? Are you doing it for the experts in the audience, or the few audience members conditioned in such a way as to respond? Do you believe that people will feel it in their guts even if they don't consciously see it? Or are you doing it for yourself, simply improving your ability in this arbitrary activity, according to some arbitrary standard?
What about any form of art -- literary, musical… Why write yourself out of an audience?
Three markers of genuine emotion? -- Firstly, that your face is constantly changing, is a "kaleidoscope", rather than fixed. Secondly, that there's "ambivalence", there's impurity, such that you don't show just the one thing -- if you're embarrassed you try to hide it, if you're angry you try to hold back. Thirdly, that there's gradualness, and you don't snap from one state to another.
At least three parts to preparing actors. There's rote memory of script, movement, blocking. There's behaviour and action, underneath the script. Then there's the joining of the two, the breathing of life into the role, meaning into the words -- "organic flow" -- naturalism -- and it's here that there's possibility for innovation and insight, and the greatest opportunity for the actor's creativity.
Peter Sellers in Strangelove, Brando in Apocalypse…
***
A weird sort of intensity, concentration, that holds the audience, especially in monologues or speeches… Perhaps it's the reality of the actor's belief in what they see… Perhaps a sort of frenzy or possession… as an oracle is captivating… as the person who believes so utterly in something makes you believe… Holds audience and draws them in… emotional seriousness and pointedness…
***
Stanislavsky dreamed of a theatre that was alive -- and not just "fresh". A theatre that was new in every performance.
***
Sheer persistence, and you'll improve more than you realize faster than you realize. But is persistence enough?
For ten years I've been doing 40 sit-ups a week. They don't get much easier, and I can't do much more than 40.
No pushing of the envelope? No progress.
It's the same with anything. It's not work that matters, it's effortful work. Or else you're stuck with ten years of sit-ups, 3000 chess games, and nothing to show for it.
Per Chris Howard: all the benefit from push-ups comes in the last few reps.
As an actor, you have to take risks.
***
Why bother with this standard of acting? Are you doing it because the director tells you to? Are you doing it for the experts in the audience, or the few audience members conditioned in such a way as to respond? Do you believe that people will feel it in their guts even if they don't consciously see it? Or are you doing it for yourself, simply improving your ability in this arbitrary activity, according to some arbitrary standard?
What about any form of art -- literary, musical… Why write yourself out of an audience?
***
Three markers of genuine emotion? -- Firstly, that your face is constantly changing, is a "kaleidoscope", rather than fixed. Secondly, that there's "ambivalence", there's impurity, such that you don't show just the one thing -- if you're embarrassed you try to hide it, if you're angry you try to hold back. Thirdly, that there's gradualness, and you don't snap from one state to another.
***
At least three parts to preparing actors. There's rote memory of script, movement, blocking. There's behaviour and action, underneath the script. Then there's the joining of the two, the breathing of life into the role, meaning into the words -- "organic flow" -- naturalism -- and it's here that there's possibility for innovation and insight, and the greatest opportunity for the actor's creativity.
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