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Acting for directors
When I was doing my 12-week Film Intensive at NYU SCPS, one of the things I heard a few times was that to be a good director, you should take an acting class. As I made UNTITLED, I realized that understanding what an actor goes through, how he/she prepares, can help a director in ensuring she gets the best performance from her cast.
Now, I have acted as a child but as I grew into my teens, I veered more towards debate than acting. Primarily because I started to become extremely self-conscious - the surefire way to be unable to act (clearly this was just my issue - both my siblings acted into their teens and both were freaking fabulous at it). So despite the high will, the self-consciousness meant low skill and the nervousness prevented me from really doing what I used to love.
Anyway, back to the present - or rather, back to early 2006. I signed up for another class at NYU’s SCPS, Beginning Acting: The ABCs ((This class was not specifically tailored for aspiring directors. It was a beginners acting class and I thought it would serve the purpose quite nicely.)), taught by Kathryn Rossetter - three hours on a weekday evening that I hoped would cure me of my mental block and help me learn more about how “real” actors do their thing.
I still remember the first class so vividly - she asked us each to share an experience that had an impact on us. It could be positive or negative, but it had to have had a big impact on you. I remember sitting in front of the semi-circle of fellow students and sharing my story. And as I did, I started to look inwards, seeing the events happen again. And I started to cry. As the tears welled up, I stopped briefly, held back, got control of myself and kept telling the story.
Each student told his or her story - some happy, some sad, some creepy. Then Kathryn gave us feedback. She pointed out how I had held back, not let the emotions flow. While it had been great that I could reach into my past and find emotion like that, I needed to learn how to go with the flow of that emotion and let it come out - even in front of a group full of complete strangers.
We are all conditioned in our lives to pretend, to not show our emotions. But acting is just the opposite - it is about reaching in and being able to bare your emotions for all to see. Yes, within the constructs of the character, but to bare all. To help lose the inhibitions, Kathryn gave me a little exercise to do - as I walked home, I was to skip, shout and otherwise act like a five year old. In the middle of Manhattan. With people all around me. Er… say what? She insisted that no one would look at me and if they did, they wouldn’t do so for more than a second. To prove her point, she started skipping down the street we were on, singing loudly. No one looked at her. And so, that day, I skipped home. I astounded myself - it was quite liberating.
That was the first class. We progressed from there. I learned how to relax my body - the vehicle that allowed me to act, to recognize where I stored stress and held my body stiff, and to loosen up with out embarrassment in front of my classmates. I learned how to react to words, translating them into images and reactions. She’d say “You’re under a warm shower” and then suddenly switch to “it’s scalding” or “it’s freezing” and we would react to the words as if there were events, all while seated in our chairs. There were a whole host of other exercises we practiced - each geared to loosen us up and just react.
We did impromptu skits and role play exercises. We enacted scenes where one person knows what is going on, but the other person, who was asked to leave the classroom, walks into the situation cold and has to adapt. I learned to make up conversation on the fly based on the character traits I was given. I happily flailed about as a lunatic, entangled myself with a classmate in a simulated make-out session (never fear, he was/is a friend, we were/are both married and we were/are patently disinterested in one another), and learned to draw on my life experiences to enable me to emote.
I loved it. Really loved it. From time to time, I would still hold back, but I was improving every class (even if I do say so myself!). We finished off the course with groups of two enacting scenes from David Auburn’s Proof - a great play that was made into a sub-par movie. Memorizing just a scene was harder than I would have thought, but it was worth it and it was so much fun!
To be clear, I have no illusions that I am an actor. I took a very, very basic course. A tiny baby step compared to what so many aspiring actors go through. Could I be an actor? Possibly, but a lot more training awaits me before I could even think of that. And honestly, that is not my dream.
But this class did help me move towards my goal of losing some of my inhibitions. I am sure I could easily slip into bit, fill-in roles if required. More importantly though, it brought back the fun I had a child - when I didn’t care who was looking.
My dream is to direct and in that regard, this class gave me a better understanding of actors and acting - the immense amounts of training they subject themselves to, the preparation required for any shoot, and the effort involved in doing an emotional scene (if you are drawing on real emotion from your personal life - a scene can wreck you for days).
I will definitely look to take more acting classes in my life - each will be a baby step compared to what a real actor will go through, but I am sure I will enjoy each one and that each one will make me a better director.
I would love your opinion - if you are an actor, do you see a difference in directors who have spent the time to learn more about acting? And if you are a director and you have taken an acting class - how has it helped you?
14 Responses to “Acting for directors”
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shripriya, it
Striker - I will take you up on that offer. And just to prove how much I don’t care, we can even do it on the street! :)
Or you can date an actor & hang out with his/her actor friends all the time. trust me i’ve learnt so much. I need to learn a lot more about acting myself. Acting itself just scares me. I’m a shy guy.
Thyere is also a very good book about directing actors.
Directing Actors: Creating Memorable Performances for Film & Television by Judith Weston
here
I have only read 2 chapters so far.
trust me people, if you are planning to direct actors someday its a must to learn their process or atleast to talk in their language. Like we make fun of bad actors all the time…the actors also cant stop talking about how clueless so n so director was.
I want more angry!!!!!
I agree 200% that as a Director you MUST understand how various actors approach a given scene. I also noticed (Striker, back me up on this ok?) that once an actor picks up on the fact that you know a thing or two about performing, their trust in you totally increases, which more often than not allows them to follow your insticts in terms of performing a scene as you’ve perceived it (as opposed to say when an actor has a different interpretation of the scene).
The opposite is also true, in that if you know a bit about acting, then you’d know where to allow the actor to perform freely.
There’s nothing like relating and building a good rapport with your actors.
I started my stint in the “performing arts” with stage Drama classes. I loved them. Right from learning about the importance of body language to constantly being aware of your eyeline to (perhaps most importantly) learning how to control your voice (projection, tonation), you learn that acting is quite a science in its own right.
That helped me later on when I was taking classes on how to direct performances for TV/Film (as each medium has different requirements). Initially I thought since we’re all still learning it wouldn’t make such a different. But it does, in that you understand what’s happening on BOTH sides of the camera.
I finished watching the 1st season of SOPRANOS last night. The last DVD has a long interview with DAVID CHASE. Its a must see.
There is a quote from ORSON WELLES -
” The director is someone who presides over accidental events”
or something like that. Welles meant to say was that sometimes director is the most useless person on the set.
I cant remember it very well. Just rent it.
Today i will watch the 2nd season.
On that note alvida!
tony, most definitely. the more a director can empathize with an actor, the more the actor’s trust in the director increases. even if the director can’t relate with the actor, sure they can still share good camraderie with on a personal level, but that usually has more to do with friendship than the director-actor relationship.
mainak, oye just chill chill, just chill :)
Mainak - “dating an actor” hilarious. But fair point - you can absorb a lot of their process that way, I guess. And re: Orson Welles’ quote - totally! If you can get your actors going, then just let the camera roll and see where it takes you. Of course that is much easier to do on DV than on film where you are watching every minute of film like a hawk! (sadly)
Tony - great points. The other thing is that for film, the expressions and everything should be much “smaller” than on stage. I think with student films and a lot of actors who are early in their careers, the emotions are too big. The camera picks up everything. There is a GREAT Michael Cain DVD on acting produced by the BBC - he shows how even a lift of the eyebrow is more than enough in many places!
Striker - have you seen that DVD?
shripriya, no i haven’t seen the DVD.. i’ve put it on my netflix queue, but there’s no release date.. i do have the book though.
I haven’t seen the Micheal Cain DVD but I have heard similar things in classes/seminars. Its true. See, TV is an intimate medium, so it involves alot more closeups and thus facial expressions. Cinema is often about subtlety of facial expressions, expressions through your eyes (THE most important thing) and body language (which also plays into how a scene is set up/blocked).
I have heard about the Michael Cain DVD also…thanks for reminding me….
I will look it up.
Shripriya…why do u think i’m such a huge fan of DIGITAL?
Thats a big reason. I can let the actors play with the lines forever.
hi priya
dont think i am being very specific or pessimistic when i write this but i have seen that many directors who i have worked with and who have taken courses like acting or handling of actors tend to think that they know it now. they start to throw terms towards actors to show them that tehy too know it .. well this is sad becuase every actor has his own method and directors should take acting classes only with a view to go through the pain of the demands directors makes on them and not to show off what one has learned only on a part time basis.
well a good performance is almost instinctive. There are times when a medoicre actor can pull off a great performance just because somewhere down the line he/she starts relating to dat character. IF YOU CAN LIVE IT YOU CAN PLAY IT. a typical example is Forest Whittaker in THE LAST KING OF SCOTLAND. Although he did intensive training(learned to speak in Swahilli) and all, but I think its as if this role was his calling and the director was instinctive enough to dig out Forest Whitakker to play IDI AMIN.
@ Megh - I’m sure it is a pain when someone tries to show you they know stuff that is your full-time job. Yes, a good reason for directors to take acting classes is to understand the process better and while I agree they should not show off (!), I also feel that that need not be “the only” reason. Directors might just enjoy acting - the freedom of letting go, of learning to play a character and all those things that actors also enjoy. They may not be very good at it, but they can keep learning if they choose :)
@ GWL - While I agree with the premise that for some actors a role may be a calling, but I also feel that for truly great actors, they can convince you that a lot of roles was their calling. What that really implies is that they are so good in so many things precisely because they are great actors… did my logic make sense there?
good read.
i have been through similar workshop routines-mask exercises, movements, body, face, word games, shadow games, mirror, secret partner etc. though i sailed through all of that somehow, the thought at the back of my head was always to be a director. and though i might not have made any substantial inroads into direction, all that experience makes me understand the craft better whenver i instruct actors on a scene, or any other specifics of a film. i would rather refrain from showing how a particualar scene would be framed by me were i the actor, i like them to be free in their mind, cus i can relate to that conflicting state of mind. how the interpretation of an actor differs from the director’s vision, and how it creates a whole new unimagined entity, which actually might not be conducive to the project in some instances.
IMO, acting classes should be more liberal, unfortunately i am yet to come across one which gives a person a free approach to the craft, from any side that you look at it. the workshops that i have conducted, i try and include this multi-perspective approach, dunno how much it works, but at least the actors dont complain ..lol.