Actor Growth

I was reading some conversations today that had a bunch of acting school owners trying to convince actors that they are the best schools to go with. At the same time, former students were giving their reviews of them which created some heated debate.

While I think it is important to make sure you are staying on top of your game as an actor, choosing an acting school or coach is one of the most tedious parts of the actor life I’d say. Basically, there are so many schools that just want your money. So usually the recommended way to finding an ideal school for you is to audit everyone before committing to them.

These places aren’t cheap usually either. For example, I’ve seen prices here that charge $225 for a one day workshop and six month programs that go well over $10,000. So that should be an incentive for you not to just abruptly throw your money to just any school. Of course, some actors just opt to do it the alternative way to get better at their craft where they just act in a bunch of independent films.

Funny enough though, out of all the places I have trained at I only audited one place. I think the only place I would have really reconsidered was the place I went for the full time program as I don’t think it has really helped me too much overall when you factor in the cost and time I committed to it compared to others.

What really turns me off is when a school advertises itself as if they were the ones that discovered such big stars and that you are guaranteed that type of success if you spend your money with them. It just feels too much like a sales pitch. Class sizes are a big issue too as if the room is constantly crammed with a bunch of people that is sure a good indication that they are just trying to maximize profits.

I was given the advice before too that a good way in choosing a school and instructor is to see if they are working actor themselves. That way, they can better keep you in the loop with current happenings and what certain casting directors are like.

Today was kind of funny for me. The scene that was given was extremely awkward when it came time to perform it. The idea of the audition side revolved around a law firm where there was an older female lawyer who hires a younger paralegal to help her out. While reading the sides, there were sections such as the paralegal asking the lawyer to reveal her “stuff” as if she did it he would help her finish her work faster. Basically, sexual tension. From what I read, the lady was married too.

My choice was based on all this information the scene was all about a power sparring match where the young guy thinks he can charm the lady very easily and vice versa she is a lady that uses sex to get what she wants in life. Example, she married her husband for money using sex appeal and has no real reserve in cheating with others as everyone is just a way to gain something.

Although, there was one part I was a bit unsure about as there was a part in the script where they talked about her trying to get pregnant where the husband was just dumbfounded on why they can’ conceive. Right after it talked about how she begins to pop so many pills at night too. So my first assumption is she was trying to avoid becoming pregnant which kind of matched with persona I had of the character I would be talking to.

Turns out, that wasn’t the case as at all. You see, usually when you walk into an audition you can ask the casting director questions about the scene to help you make the best decisions in your performance. Of course in class the acting coach is acting as the casting director. I asked him about the lady character and the scenario was completely different. Basically, she was trying to get pregnant. And the character that I would be reading for was basically kind of like a Viagra for her, I guess you can say, where she gets turned on from younger men who find her attractive.

It definitely pretty much destroyed what I had planned before as my vision was that this was going to be a really subtle yet powerful scene where two characters are trying to outdo the other. Instead, it’s more cheeky I guess you can say. That completely threw me off. So that was an interesting experience and it’s a good thing I experienced that in class as oppose to a real audition.

It’s was funny too as he asked me what my decisions were before and I explained it. He was just floored at how I was able to come up with so much stuff based on those five pages. One person in class said that when I make strong choices I sure make strong choices. Another comment was that I might be watching too much sci-fi stuff. lol. Although, I haven’t really watched too much sci-fi….have just been working on Sci-Fi shows a lot.

Wasn’t sure if there was going to be a class today since it is Thanksgiving holiday week here and many people have left for a long weekend vacation. But, it did happen as enough people were around still. It was fairly the same routine today where we got a script ahead of time and then auditioned it.

For some reason today I don’t think I really learned too much compared to the other days as it felt more like a staying on top of your game day. Basically, it’s like exercising where you are just doing the same thing to build certain strengths. I guess that is good and bad depending on how you look at it.

There was one discussion that came up where one actor asked if it was appropriate to ask your agent about your career growth and what projects they have submitted you for. The coach said that many times when you ask agents this they will respond in an apprehensive way where they interpret it as you are questioning them if they are doing their job or not.

Another person mentions that his agent gives him like a submission breakdown every two weeks and it is great. He then came up with a point where if the agent is submitting you and all then there is no reason for them to be apprehensive over this. That is what I learned personally in school before too and so did this guy. Interestingly enough, the coach said that is not the norm though which kind of surprised me.

If anything I guess it was more about learning some different perspectives of the business side of the industry today. I’m still kind of surprised at that response to that question.

Today we were challenged with another cold audition session. The interesting thing about this one is that for the role of the guys there was literally only like 4 lines of dialogue and the person before had like 2. However, there were large amounts of pages before this which doesn’t have the character speaking but it did give you an idea of what the story was about.

With that I did the scene. As it turns out, I over analyzed the scene and read a bit too much on it. As usual when you get sides for an audition you are only given the pages that relate to the scene that the casting director wants you to perform. Besides what is on these pages everything such as the back-story and character relations are up to you to figure out. Because of that, people can come up with completely different interpretations on the mood and energy level of a scene.

As a crazy example, let’s pretend your character had one line saying “I am going to fall down that hole” and the other character says “Don’t do it!”. That is literally the entire dialogue on the sides that you were given. Now think about how vague that is. You basically need to figure out what the scene is about by trying to say research the show/film online or read as much as possible into the other pages that were given to you even if they are crossed out.

Think about it. If you interpreted that scene as a guy about to end his life then the delivery will probably be more dramatic/mellow. If you made a choice to say these guys are like playing a video game on this huge projector outside then it will be more fun and anxious. Those are the types of choices that you are forced to make otherwise nothing will really come across when you perform the scene. That’s why it is important to try and find as much about the scene as possible.

Now by over analyzed what I mean is like in that situation I would say things like “These two are best friends where they know it is the end of the world and so one guy doesn’t want to live anymore. One guy is a sports athlete and the other is a ex military guy”. Basically, that results in a “How in the world did you get that out of reading those sides?”

The lesson is that sometimes things can be a lot simpler than necessary. It is kind of contradictory too at times as you need to make strong choices in situations like these and therefore it is more about getting right I’d say.

This week we actually did the exact same scenes as last week due to a technical difficulty where we were unable to watch our scenes and the fact that the camera wasn’t functional anymore. In many ways, I guess you can consider this like a callback audition. So, I basically did it with the notes I was given last time.

For the first take the mood definitely was more focused on the lady while trying to get a baby out of her. I was actually surprised at how realistic the frantic it looked on film as I was literally just improvising the whole thing on a bare floor. Although, the factor this time around was that because I didn’t look at the paramedic enough it appeared like I was simply shouting all the time and basically getting them to cooperate through fear.

It took me a few tries to get this right as I basically had to find the balance between being crazy-mad and frantic while still trying to convince the people around me that the character was sane, so to speak, where he was in control and could be trusted to perform this on the fly operation. In the end I was able to do that.

That is a hard thing to do many times. I know for myself I often have a habit of either going too big or too mellow. It’s finding that balance to make it perfect. There was an interesting comment too as the coach was saying in reality if he saw me yelling and all where I wasn’t paying attention to the paramedics that he would believe me. For the sake of film though, it just works a lot better for me to pop my head up. So many little unnatural details you have to keep in mind too. balance

So this week all of the guys were given a pretty crazy scene where the character was literally mad and yelling pretty much through the whole piece. Basically, he was a guy that was going to do a C section on a lady to get a baby out and has a lot of complicated issues personally.

Beforehand I made a choice where I was going to play this guy with a very angry and annoyed direction where during the scene near the end I would stand up as he was being confrontational with a couple of medics. Now keep in mind in the scene there was a dying lady who he cared about right in-front of him and my choice was to start off by kneeling on the ground as the character was contemplating how to get the baby out.

From I read, he needed a knife and the medic was spending way too long going through this kit which aggravates the character. Therefore, my decision was to stand up that time. Now I brought that up as usually in the audition you have to warn the camera person on your movement intents so that they can prepare for it.

Right when I said that the coach told me not to do that. He was basically saying how in real life if you were trying to get a baby out of a women like that there is no way you would leave her side. Regardless of how angry you are you will want to stay there and it would be more powerful for the scene.

That was kind of a throw off for me as I know in a normal audition a casting director wouldn’t give you that benefit of providing direction. So, that was kind of odd. But, I went with the direction and did everything kneeling down and never got up. It was kind of funny as last week’s advice was counter productive for this week’s scene.

Essentially, last week the takeaway note was to face the camera more and not staring at the object. So, for this scene a subconsciously decided to look up at the reader as I knew if I looked down to much you would only see the top of my head. But, funny enough that is what I should have done for this scene where I would be more focused on staring at the dying lady.

The coach did mention though that he should have informed us ahead of time about the camera. At the same time he said that in an audition you can request the camera guy to say lower the camera if that was the direction you chose to do your piece. That was an interesting note I thought. Was a crazy scene though.