In Honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day

When I enter into my thoughts on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. – I think of the tremendous service consciousness that he had to embrace in order to battle against the odds, and bring society a bit closer to compassion. He made the ultimate sacrifice by putting his life in harms way. Right now, people are stepping outside of their comfort zone and volunteering for the earthquake relief in Haiti. In our very own city, people donate hours of their time and energy to assisting people and organizations that they believe in.

Although I am loathe to compare the civil rights movement and natural disasters to an acting class — what can we learn from these brave individuals who have come before us?

Why not volunteer hours of your week in service to your own talent? In light of the sacrifices that many people make, everyday, how can we sit back and wait for Hollywood to recognize our talents? Why not volunteer hours of your week in service to your talent? Can you treat your talent as a gift from the heavens that is waiting to be recognized? There are many details and dues that aren’t fun to do, yet are necessary to move forward in your chosen career. Whether it’s delving into your sensory memory, keeping your mind/body/spirit in shape, writing a short film to star in or delivering pictures to agents – try treating these efforts as service work to assisting your talent in being of service to our society. If you don’t answer your Spirit’s call, who will?

HOW YOU DEAL WITH THE ISSUE… IS THE ISSUE

Tonight, the first night of the winter session (after Christmas break) –an agent and manager are attending my class. Being off for two weeks, I feel like I haven’t gotten my sea legs back yet. I immediately went to: “Why can’t they come next week?” “Why tonight, when not everyone is back from break yet?” “Why me?” Within two beats of a heart, I was able to shift it to – “What a wonderful opportunity for the students to be seen by viable representation!” “What a wonderful gift for me to have another agent know of my work!” “How exciting to start the year off with a bang!” I saw how my opinion of the situation enabled me to go from stress to appreciation, instantaneously. I then thought of how, as actors, when we get that call for an audition we can also go into the… “I don’t have enough time to prepare.”, “This part isn’t right for me.”, “What if I don’t do a good job and my agents find out?”, etc. In that same instant, we can shift it into – “Hooray, I get to act today!” , “What fun it will be to make another fan of a casting director!” or “ I love the challenge of creating something from nothing!”
Our perception is our reality. No one can change that for us. With discipline and mastery over our thoughts, we can change our future. What a powerful realization to bring into 2010.

How to Cry

So let’s say that you’re on the set, and the director, or the text, wants you in a highly emotional state (like crying). How would you go about getting there?

Usually, you would go into your emotional memory bank and bring up something that moves you to tears: i.e. a death of a loved one, a bad breakup, a time you hurt someone. You would remember the day, the time, the person, what was said, how they looked, where you were, what you saw, heard, felt, etc. Whether you labeled it as such or not, you would be doing a classic Lee Strasberg sense memory. I remind actors all the time that most of us go into sense memory when we fantasize. We don’t thing of general woman or man, we think of how someone looks, or smells, or sounds or feels. Men and women have been using sensory work to ‘get off’ for thousands of years before Lee Strasberg hit the scene.

Or…. You would imagine something happening that would break your heart in two. A classic Stella Adler ‘what if…” exercise. Which one is better? It depends. It depends on the day, your concentration, how much time you have, your given emotional state, etc. There is no right or wrong way to do it. Perhaps you’re so frightened with having to bring up the emotion, that your fear of being a bad and phony actor makes you cry.

The important thing is to know your instrument well enough to know how to proceed. I urge you to take some time every now and again to sow the field of your emotions and make tears and sobbing your friend. Don’t wait till you’re on the set and hope that it happens. Sometimes it does. Sometimes, even with practice it doesn’t. The important thing is not to fake or push it. The important thing is not let us see you trying to cry. We never try to cry (except in the exercise I just urged you to do), we usually try NOT to cry.

In closing, we really don’t want to go for the emotion itself. Emotions tend to come in waves. Sometimes sadness is mixed with grief, is mixed with guilt, is mixed with humor. Rarely is an emotion, stagnant – black and white. Sowing and seeding the field for the emotion to grow is the best way to approach it. Only God can make a tree. And only you know how to best get yourself in the mood.

Flavor of the Day

In the past, acting education would have you go into your past to dredge up the appropriate emotion and substitution (Strasberg), go into your imagination to create emotion (Adler), endow objects with emotional weight (Hagen), etc. I find that if it works out for you, then have at it.

Old master painters also used to spend months and weeks on almost photo-realistic paintings. Writers would labor intensely to find just the exact word or phrase. Dancers would spend years at the barre and musicians would cut their teeth on the most challenging classical compositions. All well and good and admirable.

Modern Art, Modern Dance and Rock and Roll seems to have changed the urgency and immediacy that we want from our art.

I have always found that the Universe, or Spirit, tends to give me roles that directly correspond to where I am at any given moment in my life. Looking back over my scene work as an actor and my professional acting work – I can now see how the roles that I was working on directly corresponded to where I was in my life.

I feel that part of our job as actors is to see what we are working out physically, emotionally, psychologically, and spiritually with each opportunity that we have to work – whether it be an audition, a class scene or a movie/television/stage job. What can you heal in yourself? If we, as an audience witness you REALLY working your process; we can’t help to be healed vicariously. Be a detective. Explore, look inside and ask Spirit – why was I given this opportunity today. Right now. In this moment. What is present for me? What are my issues? How can I use this character to heal myself? What have I got to substitute for this event? Some days I feel like chocolate ice cream. Sometimes, only peach will do.

Accessing the Moment

The way into being present in a scene is through the individual moment. The moment is the actor’s greatest life-saver. Much like life, if you are in the present moment – all things are available to you and there is nothing to fear. One of the most significant differences between improv and scene study is that — in scene study we prepare for the moment. How you behave in the moment is different than how I would behave in the moment; due to our life-histories, experiences, points-of-view, and opinions. In scene study, we create the back story of a person in service to being. A character doesn’t necessitate a different accent or walk (although, sometimes it does!), but it does demand that you leap into the imagination of a person that is not you. In improv, we often just operate from the moment without any depth of values. It can be the difference between a snapshot from a disposable camera and the richness of a professional photo. We create the values of where to bring light, and what remains in shadow. We create what is focused on, and what is in the background. We decide whether to use color, or allow for black and white. When a character is created out of our fertile imaginations, we bring the magic of art to it. When we create out of our imaginations, we invite Spirit’s assistance. We end up with the gravitas of artistry and leave the pettiness of our mundane lives in the dust. Remember, the reason that we don’t have a camera crew following us around all day is that most of us would need an editor, make-up, hair and lights. And, for most of us, our lives are just not as interesting as our imaginations would allow.

Accessing the Magic

When you’ve done the homework of finding where you and the character meld… When you’ve learned the lines by heart (allowing your heart to speak, rather than your head)… When you’ve figured out where you are (time, space, motion) and what you want from the other actor(s) in the scene…
Then, and only then, are you able to let go. You are able to surrender to the moment and let the universal energy play through you. This creative energy will allow you to fly higher than your simple thoughts could have ever imagined. You will be tapping into the brilliance, not of yourself, but of divine inspiration.
We all have the potential to enter the portal of what the world calls creative genius, but it is not our genius that we are accessing. It is our inherent divine nature at work.

Being Extraordinary

Everybody wants to be extraordinary. Yet, some of the most powerful performances in the last few years have been from actors playing ordinary people in extraordinary situations. The paradox is this… the more extraordinary you attempt to become – the more ordinary you seem (because everyone is trying to be extraordinary, see above premise). The more ordinary you allow yourself to be, the more extraordinary you seem (because everyone is trying to be extraordinary, see above premise) as you are unique!

Sure, there are extraordinary performances – I’m thinking of Meryl Streep and Johnny Depp, to name a few. But, if you look at their early performances, they were playing ordinary people in extreme circumstances. Sometimes, with an accent. As their careers grew, so did their artistry.

Everybody is unique. You do not have to find your uniqueness, it is already there. It’s like looking for your car keys and discovering them in your pocket. You can’t try to be somebody, you can only be yourself. Acting is simply bringing forth some aspects of yourself and letting other aspects fall away.

Uniqueness is not something to be discovered or found, it is already there. Just allow it. It is your gift to the world. As long as you’re running to find your “specialness”, you won’t be able to stop to accept what is divine about you.

As long as you try to be extraordinary you will be ordinary. When you become ordinary, you find what it is about you that is extraordinary. I love a good paradox!

Why Train?

Why Train? An athlete, musician, or doctor, would never ask such a question. If acting were such an easy career, wouldn’t everyone want to do it? If you want to be an artist who affects people then you must prepare your craft. As Stanislavsky said, “Love the art in yourself, not yourself in the art.” Of course, we can all act passionately and emotionally all by ourselves. But when the stakes are high and tension and self-consciousnesses creep in, we need techniques to fall back on in order to soar.

Can Acting Be Taught?

Can acting be taught? No. A child is electrifying to watch because the focus and concentration, elegance and economy, are all there. So is a cat. As self-consciousness creeps in – so does ego and the desire to ‘perform’. Anyone can be interesting to watch – as long as they’re not conscious of being observed. What can be taught is ways to take the focus off of the self in order to do truthful, organic behavior in imaginary circumstances.

Tension is talent unexpressed. Through practice, you can turn fear into excitement and tension in astonishing behavior. It’s all just energy. Learn to channel it correctly!

It is my belief that each actor has the talent, wisdom, courage, and boldness already inside them. I assist in training the artist to unlock their potential. I have found that as we transform as individuals, so do we transform as artists. As we transform as artists, so do we transform our audience.

Giving Yourself Permission

We tend to create things in our life that feel familiar to us.  One of the common things that actors have inside them, as part of their upbringing is the need to be given permission.  If you have ever found yourself with the feeling that you’d love to be a working actor — if only the agents/managers/casting directors/producers/God would let you; then I ask you, “how are you not giving YOURSELF permission to star in your own life”?  There is rarely a good reason to ever wait for permission to do something that your heart desires.  The more you internalize the waiting for permission, the more you’ll find life reflecting it back at you.