Fast Food Acting...The American Tradition

Happy New Year Everyone!!!

It's a new year and I, like many folks, are thinking toward the future.  What will 2012 offer?  It is also a time for resolutions and setting new goals--"I want to save more money, I want to be a nicer person, I want to give more to charity, I want to lose weight, or I want to get out of debt."  We give ourselves all kinds of inspiring challenges with the hopes to better ourselves. 

I've been thinking about what I want to change.  I like to start small.  One thing at a time.  You know attainable goals.  Like, I'm going to donate any clothes I haven't touched in a year to the Salvation Army.  Or instead of "losing weight" I'm going to go to the gym at least once more a week.  Or in 2012 it's time to cut fast food out of my diet.  And you know I love me some fast food.  Are you kidding???  McDonald french fries?  Wendy's double stack?  KFC!?!?!  To tell the truth I've been cutting back for years but let's be honest--even if it may not the best thing in the world for you--it taste AWESOME!!  Of course an hour after eating it I have the sensation of ten pounds of gravel in my gut and my will to live is replaced with sloth and ambivalence--but it's worth it because it tastes so great, right??

That got me thinking.  Fast food is actually a HUGE American philosophy for life!!  Isn't it?  It's all about quick and efficient "nourishment" so we can get more done in our day to day lives.  We don't even have to get out of our cars!  We don't have to spend our valuable time in the kitchen cooking or preparing our food.  We don't have to spend too much wasted time communing with others over a meal.  Someone else does the work for us.  It's fast, it's addictively tasty, and we're gone!  But we don't just do this with food--we do this in so many areas of our lives.  We are ALL about short cuts at every turn.  We want to get every where we're going faster and quicker.  We want to jump to the head of our careers before we've even put in the work that makes us CREDIBLE at our jobs!  Why?  Because we are ALL entitled and if we can find a short cut then we take it--folks lie and say to themselves, "I can learn what I don't know when I get there"--right?!?  So if there is so much FAST FOOD in our everyday life then it makes sense that in our artistic life there must be Fast Food Acting as well!

When you are developing your technique you are always experimenting with new avenues into the work.  Acting teachers are always looking for ways to get actors out of their heads and out of their own way so that truth can happen.  This takes all sorts of shapes--"Don't try to act, Just speak louder, Speak faster, Let's paraphrase, Now whisper the lines!"  Then there is the calculated coaching (God forbid sometimes berating) from the side lines to frustrate the actor into not ACTING but BEING so that--once again--TRUTHFULNESS happens.  But to what end?  Who's truthfulness?

I recently witnessed a teacher coaching an actor with some of these techniques and I was very disturbed. (And for those keeping score it wasn't Mr. Pendleton) This teacher was trying to shake things up and get the actor out of his head.  Which makes perfect sense--we all get bogged down in our "ideas" of how it should be played.  Or we get insecure and are distracted and as a result become in-active.  And I have NO problem with using an exercise to push an actor through a block so they can be inspired...BUT! What bugged me and what I would like to have seen after the exercise was completed was the APPLICATION!  Sure it shakes things up.  It gets you out of your head and we can all get behind this but then what?  My curiosity needed to be fed so I asked him why he suggested an exercise to trick the actor instead of talking about the events in the character’s life or the given circumstances or -- I DON'T KNOW, THE CHARACTER'S NEED-- to create the same response?  And he actually said “well the tricks, as you call them, are faster.”  Then he went on to explain that by doing the exercise the actor is no longer thinking about "acting" but actually getting out of the way so that the actor's "true" behavior can come out of their own self.  As a result there is no acting but true behavior.  Well challenge accepted--because I have to disagree!

Now before you all say WAIT A MINUTE!!!  Let me clarify that I do not disagree that some kind of true behavior can be the result of these exercises.  If pushed an actor will stop "acting" and engage in true behavior because what is existing between the actor and the teacher IS a real experience grounded in real life actions.  If you watch it and think "Wow that was so amazing and natural!"  Well of course it is because the actor, NOT the character, is reacting to the actions of the teacher within the REAL TIME of the class.  I'm sorry but anyone can squeeze an actor hard enough to produce juice--but at the end of the day all you are left with is mangled fruit.


And don't get me wrong--LET ME SAY AGAIN--exercises are good!  It is good to push ourselves out of our comfort zones and safe places.  And many actors miss out because they don't like experimenting with new exercises.  They make them feel uncomfortable.  Or maybe they experience something new and interesting but don’t know what to do with it.  So when an actor experiences a break through how does it tie back into the character and the story?  After an exercise like this--what will an actor discover for the character?  THIS is what I'm interested in!  So if there is a new sensation then how does it feel?  Can you identify it?  Or does it just feel "good" because it's NEW? Or what if the exercise unlocks inspiration that is more than just nuance and moves you in the appropriate direction, which many times it does, then HOW do you find your way BACK to that sensation for each performance?  Just speak louder?  Just speak faster?  That’s like moving stage right because the director said to and not because the Character NEEDS to…EVERYTHING needs purpose behind it.  Otherwise, the trick/exercise is just a one off.  Or worse is something that can lose its effect and then you find yourself looking for new tricks every performance to trigger your truth. 

Obviously this is a class and what happens in the studio is not the same as in production but the end game IS for production.  We do not only train for personal breakthroughs...we train to be better story tellers.  So you may not always FEEL something in production and honestly it is more about what the AUDIENCE feels than what you do as an actor.  As I mentioned before Acting is something we CREATE not something that we live.  We do not act the experience.  We act the action and through the DOING of the action the audience HAS the experience.  But as actors we crave the honesty of sensation.  We crave TRUTH.  It has to feel sincere in our soul!  We somehow believe that if we don't "FEEL" it then the audience can't either.  Well that just isn't true!  However, if we don't BELIEVE in the purpose of our actions then the audience most certainly WILL NOT have an experience.  An actor has to KNOW what it is they are after and KNOW how to get there.  As an actor you have to discover your character's purpose to the function to the story.  Some may say this is over intellectualizing or more like working from the outside in but I believe that in acting everything MUST HAVE purpose!  You can always tell when something is without purpose.  An actor looks lost or like he/she is hydroplaning across the story…just skimming on the surface of their performance.  The actor shows up and the character takes a holiday--floating in an actor limbo.  But when when an actor is all over that Character NEED then BAM!!  Crazy good acting happens!  TRUTH happens!!


Sometimes I think the American thing is more about "I need to know WHY I have "X" purpose" v. "I have a need to FULFILL "X" purpose!"

And of course as I have been working on this post--and challenging this teacher's methods--I came across a quote from Stanislavsky to shake all my thoughts up...

"Tempo-rhythm helps actors to live their roles truly when they don't know anything about psycho-technique.  This is an important discovery.  And if it is so, then we learn that the correct tempo-rhythm of the play or the role, by itself, subconsciously, almost mechanically may arouse actors' feelings and thus the true living of a part.  Tempo-rhythm acts directly upon our feelings.  Isn't that an important gain for our psycho-technique?" -Vakhtangov Directs, Ruben Simonov

This presented an interesting revelation.  As I mentioned above certain exercises can yield truthful results--even if they ARE truthful from the actor in the given circumstances of the class and relationship/actions of the teacher--these are still truthful results.  The exercise links the physical or tempo-rhythm of action to an emotional/behavioral experience that can help the actor discover a truthful experience on stage.  But I think it is important to point out that this discovery is associated with actors who do not have a background in technique.  The discovery of Performance Truth and Sincerity of Emotion is essential for an actor to be able to identify.  Therefore exercises such as these are incredibly useful in aiding with that identification.  They enhance awareness and get the actor in touch with what Performance Truth feels like in the body.  Sometimes by simply jacking up the intensity (tempo-rhythm) an actor can then really LAND on top of their purpose and make a huge discovery.  But again, I urge that the discovery MUST be linked to the NEEDS and TASKS of the character.

I cannot express enough that I am not challenging the use of experimenting with acting exercises to push actors.  Exercises are HOW we learn!  Each actor has different challenges within their training journey so a variety of exercises are needed to facilitate each students needs.  But roughing up and breaking actors down so that they produce "true" behavior and emotions is not helpful.  I believe it shifts the focus away from the character's truth and makes the performance more about what the actor is feeling.  And if I'm honest, I don’t approve of exercises/tricks without direct application because I feel it treats actors as dumb “emotional” animals--who exist to be malleable truth zombies within performance.  I think actors can get there on their own with imagination, Character needs, and tasks.  Tricks and short cuts are the fast food of our art.  Too many young actors are in such a hurry they don't give their characters the undivided attention they deserve.  The attention to discover who they are and what they need.

So in 2012 say no to Fast Food Acting...to Fast Food Art!  It may seem like a good idea...it may taste great at the time but in the long run it will leave you slow and sluggish.  You will be artistically out of shape and weighed down with bad habits.

Remember it only takes a little more effort to make healthy choices.