Some notes on directing actors
January 22nd 2007 00:03
Jotting down a few thoughts.
In "Counting the ways" by Edward Albee, people are supposed to say their lines "curiously excited", "chatty", "with a vague intimation of having heard", "a trifle strident", "quietly authoritarian", "as if it were a sad, soft truth", "transparent", "glum and impatient", "bitterly and hopeful", "sort of a dare"...
But... "curiously excited"? Recall the scene in "Lost in translation" where Bill Murray is told "more intensity", and thinks "What the hell..."
The point is that directing is more than speaking a stage direction. You might use "curiously excited" to describe something if you were already seeing it, but it's difficult to start from scratch and instruct someone in how to do it. This is a difference between the scriptwriter's point of view and the actor's.
The problem, firstly, is an issue of intellectual understanding. "More intensity" is simply too vague. But, secondly, good acting isn't about reaching into a grab-bag of tricks, and pulling out a particular set of behaviours. When you go to actor school, you don't really learn "angry", "embarrassed" or "sad" -- much less "curiously excited". Rather, the emphasis is on not getting in the way of yourself.
Good acting isn't acting at all -- it's not faking -- it's more like a pinch and an ouch -- not consciously intended -- a real, instinctive response. In everyday life you don't know how you're going to behave from moment to moment, and you don't rigidly control your behaviour, and neither should you in stage life.
So, for the director, what's required, among other things, is the art of translating scriptwriterese. You take the description, and you turn it into an action. You give the actor something concrete. Verbs are much better than adjectives. "Quietly authoritarian" might become "Use the lines to make the other actor afraid of you, but without raising your voice." "Sad, soft truth" might become "Say this line as if you're repeating advice that your mother gave you on her deathbed." And something like "more chatty" might become "You're not putting the other actor at ease -- really put them at ease."
Other dangers in stage directions:
-- that the actor will try to please you without knowing how -- that they will do something like reach into a grab-bag. The performance will become stilted, artificial. "With a vague intimation of having heard" will be rendered as some sort of clumsy, cliche mannerism.
-- that you'll constrain creativity. If the actor is trying to act angry, then they might have a particular idea of limits, of what the word encompasses. But if, instead, they're imagining a situation or are actually doing something, then they have room to move, options.
This is also one of the dangers in trying to show the actor what you want: you constrain them to mimicry.
-- that, to put it bluntly, you'll make the actor think too much.
Good actors are either childlike, playful; or they are very intelligent. But thought only assists before the scene starts: it's an enemy of acting while you're doing it.
After all, there's no time. The audience is hungry for information -- they want to see the momentary flickers of the character's thoughts, feelings, emotions, in response to what's happening around them. And this sort of quicksilver reactiveness also makes a scene more believable.
But any mental bandwidth you spend on yourself -- any focus on yourself -- will detract from the attention you can give to your scene partner and to your environment generally.
Other tools for obtaining a truthful performance:
-- there is sometimes specific advice, specific remedies. "Start with actually combing your hair to ground you in the given circumstances." "Try to seduce him again, but this time you're not allowed to touch him." "Remember a time in your life when you bit into a fruit and let its juices trickle over your chin." "Close your eyes. Imagine what will happen if you don't succeed. Now give me more detail. What does the expression on their face actually look like. What time of day is it. What colour is the table."
-- every director I've watched really does take the actor aside and explain motivation or offer psychological insight. "A powerful person doesn't need to bluster; they're assured of their own power." But the psychological approach is tricky to do well. Results might not be immediate. Does the director have enough knowledge in the first place? Have you made the actor too cerebral? And there's no guarantee that the description (which might simply be a matter of character's backstory) will at all produce or translate into observable behaviour.
-- there are any number of rehearsal games -- which might, for instance, "free up" the actor and give them new options, or connect them to their scene partner, or solve problems of blocking...
-- and there are tricks and manipulation. Though (a) these might only work the first time you try them; if you get person A to slap person B, for the sake of the moment of shock, person B will be expecting the trick in future; and (b) these are sometimes cruel or psychologically damaging.
The quote is from Shomit Mitter, Systems of rehearsal: Stanislavsky, Brecht, Grotowski and Brook, 1992.
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia articles Konstantin Stanislavski, Woody Allen, Marlon Brando, Viola Spolin.
The image of Bill Murray came from this website.
The image of Kabuki came from this website.
In "Counting the ways" by Edward Albee, people are supposed to say their lines "curiously excited", "chatty", "with a vague intimation of having heard", "a trifle strident", "quietly authoritarian", "as if it were a sad, soft truth", "transparent", "glum and impatient", "bitterly and hopeful", "sort of a dare"...
The point is that directing is more than speaking a stage direction. You might use "curiously excited" to describe something if you were already seeing it, but it's difficult to start from scratch and instruct someone in how to do it. This is a difference between the scriptwriter's point of view and the actor's.
The problem, firstly, is an issue of intellectual understanding. "More intensity" is simply too vague. But, secondly, good acting isn't about reaching into a grab-bag of tricks, and pulling out a particular set of behaviours. When you go to actor school, you don't really learn "angry", "embarrassed" or "sad" -- much less "curiously excited". Rather, the emphasis is on not getting in the way of yourself.
Good acting isn't acting at all -- it's not faking -- it's more like a pinch and an ouch -- not consciously intended -- a real, instinctive response. In everyday life you don't know how you're going to behave from moment to moment, and you don't rigidly control your behaviour, and neither should you in stage life.
Older theatre forms can effectively have step-by-step behavioral instructions, though every musical score still involves interpretation
***
Other dangers in stage directions:
-- that the actor will try to please you without knowing how -- that they will do something like reach into a grab-bag. The performance will become stilted, artificial. "With a vague intimation of having heard" will be rendered as some sort of clumsy, cliche mannerism.
-- that you'll constrain creativity. If the actor is trying to act angry, then they might have a particular idea of limits, of what the word encompasses. But if, instead, they're imagining a situation or are actually doing something, then they have room to move, options.
This is also one of the dangers in trying to show the actor what you want: you constrain them to mimicry.
Act from the neck up instead of from the gut, and you get... Woody Allen
Good actors are either childlike, playful; or they are very intelligent. But thought only assists before the scene starts: it's an enemy of acting while you're doing it.
After all, there's no time. The audience is hungry for information -- they want to see the momentary flickers of the character's thoughts, feelings, emotions, in response to what's happening around them. And this sort of quicksilver reactiveness also makes a scene more believable.
But any mental bandwidth you spend on yourself -- any focus on yourself -- will detract from the attention you can give to your scene partner and to your environment generally.
***
Other tools for obtaining a truthful performance:
Brando was always physically active in his scenes -- stroking a cat, eating, dressing, opening a door...
-- every director I've watched really does take the actor aside and explain motivation or offer psychological insight. "A powerful person doesn't need to bluster; they're assured of their own power." But the psychological approach is tricky to do well. Results might not be immediate. Does the director have enough knowledge in the first place? Have you made the actor too cerebral? And there's no guarantee that the description (which might simply be a matter of character's backstory) will at all produce or translate into observable behaviour.
The American Grandmother of Improv
-- and there are tricks and manipulation. Though (a) these might only work the first time you try them; if you get person A to slap person B, for the sake of the moment of shock, person B will be expecting the trick in future; and (b) these are sometimes cruel or psychologically damaging.
| Stanislavksy designed an improvisation to help the actress Molchanova to enter the experience of the blind girl she was playing. The lights were turned off and Molchanova was asked to find her way to Stanislavsky through a space crowded with objects. As she began to inch forward, Stanislavsky moved away and instructed the other actors to keep completely silent. "Excuse me," she said in an odd tone... But no one answered her... "Konstantin Sergeyevich, have you moved from where you were?" Only silence answered her... Molchanova suddenly stopped in a corner of the room, sobbing terribly... "Put the lights on now", Stanislavsky said... "Now you know what blindness is like." |
Konstantin Stanislavsky
***
The quote is from Shomit Mitter, Systems of rehearsal: Stanislavsky, Brecht, Grotowski and Brook, 1992.
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia articles Konstantin Stanislavski, Woody Allen, Marlon Brando, Viola Spolin.
The image of Bill Murray came from this website.
The image of Kabuki came from this website.
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Comment by katyzzz
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Hmmmm, interesting, but too long for my attention span, I'm into doing rather than talking about it, hope you understand,
katyzzz....I acknowledge that this is very well done.
Comment by Adrian
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Comment by postmoderncritic
Postmodern Critic
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Padsoc
Terrific post!
Apparently the self-directing cast of The Blair Witch Project were totally isolated from any human contact for days (their meals were dropped off noiselessly at a set location at some point in the day) and there was a team responsible for making spooky noises in the middle of the night to help 'get them into character'.
In Buffy's Restless, Joss Whedon made funny faces at Sarah Michelle Gellar to make her giggle spontaneously (she's supposed to be lightly ridiculing her old-fashioned mentor's attempts to hypnotise her):
You know how Mark Ruffalo opens up a fridge at a crime scene and recoils at 'squirrels' in the Zodiac trailer? Someone put a picture of Harris Savides (the director of photography on the film) with a sunburn in the fridge to make him react creatively, though I'm not sure if it's the take that ended up in the final cut.
Viggo Mortensen on being part of the director's vision:
You supply the blue and they supply the other colours and mix them with your blue. And maybe there's some blue left in the painting and maybe there isn't. Maybe there wasn't supposed to be any there in the first place. So have some fun and make a good blue, and walk away. I try to do that. Sometimes I succeed.
Jake G. on working with a reticent Ang Lee:
He would say ‘You [and Anne Hathaway] go together like milk and water,’ and I’d think what the heck does that even mean? Milk and water don’t really go all that well together, but then again if you pour milk into water is could kinda spread out all pretty? Is that what he means? Who knows?
Comment by Damo
I am helping to make a film and it is a hard slog.
I am suprised at how little dialogue is required to make a story work. There no budget and the actors have varying degrees of experience. However the director is very experienced and professional. Some how after hour of torture things start to work. The actor become characters and for a while we forget it is not real.
Comment by Adrian
Philosophy Blog
Dear Damo, re little dialogue -- I empathize with your surprise; I had the same surprise when I first read a film script. There's a lot of gap, but a page of script equals about a minute of film. Film is a visual medium, as they say. Standard wisdom is that words should be cut if possible -- why should the actor do with a pararaph what can be accomplished with a look.
Re you making a film, I envy you the experience. I've never even made a short film, though I have spent long hours sitting around sets as an extra.
Dear Epiphanie, some random thoughts provoked by your stories:
Blair Witch: Was rewatching this recently actually. And I remember reading a lot of interviews about how this was made at the time it came out. Fascinating process!
One story I remember: the lead talks about how she woke up, really tired, and went outside and saw some piles of rocks, and thought, "Oh great, a pile of rocks" but had to force herself to make a big deal about them.
Mark Ruffalo: Reminds me of a scene from the Tom and Nicole movie where they play Irish immigrants to America.
At one point, Tom is lying on a bed with a bowl over his privates; Nicole lifts the bowl up to peek. On all previous takes, there had been a cloth under the bowl: on the take that made the final cut, there wasn't.
Viggo Mortensen: It seems to me that the other colours he has in mind are things like lighting, camerawork, the other actors, etc. But the idea of adding colours is also quite relevant within an individual role.
I'm sitting in on some monologue classes at the moment. The lady's technique (mainly Stella Adler inspired) is, among other things, to ask "What else?". Add more to the mix. Find the humour in the character -- even Hamlet has humour. Find the child. Find the sexuality. Make it more specific and less generic. Go and study a real cop/hooker/salesman and incorporate at least 5 different aspects of their behaviour. Etc. More depth, more complexity.
Comment by Damo
Don't envy me yet. The film is in a foreign language and not yet finished.
Extra work HUH? My wife does that that too. I did a little my self but I do bore easily and over the years my work prevents me doing too much.
Comment by MelissaA
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Comment by Adrian
Philosophy Blog
But the plus side is this: each person can inject their own creativity. There is room for something unexpected, and better than planned, to come around.
Comment by postmoderncritic
Postmodern Critic
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Padsoc
Tom looked remarkably like he was trying to stifle a grin in that scene... though I bet the director felt he couldn't *not* include it after that!
I admire Viggo for being able to put himself out there like that - I think I'd have to *really* trust the ppl I was working with to participate in a film as an actor. I'm much more of a behind-the-scenes sort of person.
Speaking of LotR-related things...
I think Andy Serkis found out about Gavin Hood's Rendition film from my 'Things aren't what they seem here' article... I left a message on the official film blog with details of my site address, and he replied with a "thanks for the write-up"... someone also put PmC on the blogroll for about a week (I was surprised they put it up in the first place, since right now I'm blogging more on film and creative writing than politics).
I spent some time on the Stanford campus in California (living with a student) for about 8 months a few years ago, and my flatmate was studying Drama with a very wealthy and influential person who one day walked up to him and faux-casually announced that he had just come from an interview with Orlando Bloom... I didn't know whether to laugh or cry, as I actually written 'these ppl are so soulless that I can actually see them working with Orlando Bloom' to my friend Debra before it happened, regarding most of the graduate dept.
I'm proud to say that I managed to talk my flatmate out of torturing himself further with the department.
Best of luck with your acting workshop!
Comment by Adrian
Philosophy Blog
I don't know if this is true, actually... There seems to me to be a lot of experimentalism in comedies. Think Theatresports, for instance...
But it does seem true to me that Bryn has given a window into some of the enormous creativity that goes into horror special effects.
You remind me of Tolstoy -- that happy people are everywhere the same, but everyone is sad in their own way.
And the idea that happy writers don't write.
I don't actually know who Andy Serkis is, but congrats on your blog's exposure. Must be nice to know that it's making a difference.
Postmoderncritic.com is STILL on their blogroll, incidentally.
Comment by Adrian
Philosophy Blog
Asking someone to make their scene partner scared, or to act as if they're repeating their mother's deathbed advice, are arguably stopgap solutions. The director gets the basic effect that they want, but there are prices.
For instance: the impulse doesn't "organically" come from the actor's connection to their character; the actor's creativity is to some extent impinged on and limited; and specific behavioral instructions can put the actor too much in their head.
There are other ways of doing things that don't impinge so much... You can NOT give specific advice at all, but just the most general criticism, or ask the actor to "try it this way", but leave them to make all their own choices for each specific moment.
Most of the time, though, I reckon these are prices that are worth paying. Most actors simply aren't good enough that the performance doesn't benefit from director's interference...
Comment by postmoderncritic
Postmodern Critic
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I wasn't seeking to impose my truth upon you, sorry if it came off that way... though I shouldn't get into that again before I've had my break from Orble.
Hey, I'm really sorry that I implied you hadn't thought through Communist theory at JohnDoe's blog... I think only a person who has done a lot of thinking about it would endorse it as a solution, so please forgive my momentary surliness. I respect your idealistic fervour, and that's why I like your blog - you're passionate about your multiplicity and are constantly looking for new ways to contextualise the wide variety of thoughts you open yourself up to. It's very admirable...
It's 6:35am which is almost my bedtime, so I must go, but I'll be back later ~
Have a great Wednesday,
Epiphanie
Comment by Adrian
Philosophy Blog
Hope you have a great Wednesday (and Tuesday) as well!