How to Approach Training

Every year

Across the globe

Actors commence their acting training

And every year

Countless time and energy is wasted

Here is my take on what is worth focussing on most

First things first

There is no such thing as a truly lazy actor

But there is such thing as an uninspired one

I don’t care if your studies in acting last six weeks or four years

Staying inspired becomes essential in sustainably rocking up every day

Nothing will kill your work ethic faster than working toward goals you don’t truly care for

So

Let’s get inspired

How?

Simple

Ask yourself

What makes your body come alive?

What is the art that makes your body feel energised, awake, open, free?

And who are the artists making it?

As many examples as you can find

Music, history, stories, rappers, ballet dancers, an olympic performance, your grandmothers ring, a photograph, a painting, etc

Next

Boil that list down to a handful of examples that resonate with you most

That if I told you - “at the end of your training you will be giving work at that level of generosity” - It would make you feel like your efforts have been worth it

Then

Find the pattern

Those few standout examples will have some things in common

Authentic

Vulnerable

Raw

Open

Dangerous

Fierce

Honest

Whatever

Pick the two or three words that represent those pieces of art

That becomes the harbour we want to start steering our ship toward

Why is this important?

Why is giving our brain a clear and honest place to start focussing on?

The Reticular Activating System

RAS

A bundle of nerves at the base of the brain

Acts like a secretary between the conscious and unconscious

Consciously we can handle about 30-40 bits of information per seconds

Unconsciously?

Millions

Over your studies

You will have millions of bits of information coming toward you every day

How does your RAS know which bits of information are worth sending through to your conscious mind in order to focus on?

The ones you tell it to!

Look around the room you’re sitting in right now

Look for everything that is blue

Blue blue blue blue blue

Now close your eyes and tell me everything you remember seeing that was yellow

Yup

Our brains are incredible at proving us right

Acting like a lawyer in every moment to prove the stories we tell ourselves are true

Always finding evidence to back up our beliefs

(Very helpful for evolution)

What’s important here is the RAS doesn’t understand the negative

Example: DON’T think of a pink elephant

Yup

“Don’t fuck up this audition”

You get my point

Want to sustainably remain inspired?

Help your brain out

Give yourself a clear focus for what your body honestly wants to work toward

Now

A quick history of acting lesson

Modern actors are inspired and influenced by the generations above

We grew up seeing the same actors in the spotlight

Meryl, Deniro, Pacino, Davis, etc

These artists changed the game for all actors today

And of course

They were inspired by the generation before them

Monroe, Brando, Dean

Dean is widely regarded to be the first man to cry on screen

This was a big turning point for acting

But why did this shift occur?

Who were steering these actors toward more “real” performances?

Stella Adler, Sandy Meisner and Lee Strasberg

Three giants in the world of acting coaches

And all of these three coaches

Studied under the great Russian director

Stanslavksi

They then took his “system” and over the years

Started to refine their own methodologies

Adler focussing on imagination

Meisner on presence

And Strasberg on emotions

To clarify

Stanislavski

Influenced Adler, Meisner & Strasberg

Who taught Brando, Monroe, Dean etc

Who influenced Streep, Deniro, Davis, etc

Who have influenced all modern day actors in the western world today

But an important question becomes

Who the hell influenced Stanislavsky?

Man I tear up every time I think of this next person

In 1800’s

Eleanor Duse

A fourteen year old Italian actress

Got up on stage

With no makeup

And blushed

She actually blushed

In a time when it was the norm to use facial gestures & hand movements to express emotions

This little girl had the courage to throw away limitations

And do things her way

She gave herself permission to feel things

And Stanislavsky lost his mind

It was watching young Eleanor

Which inspired Stanislavsky to spend the next few decades building a “system” for acting

The very system that has influenced all modern day acting in the western world

What’s my point?

We are standing on the shoulders of giants

We are standing on the shoulders of an incredibly brave young girl

Who was famous for saying

“Every actor must find their own way”

Yes

Every actor must find their own way

So

Let’s talk about how we can spend the next few years training

Whilst doing it our own way

Let’s begin at the end

Death

Death gives our lives meaning

Without death

What would be the point in doing anything?

You could just handle it in a couple hundred thousand years

Death makes survival meaningful

And for the last two hundred thousand years

Survival has been incredibly meaningful

Why?

Because it’s been so bloody difficult!

Before the 1940’s a little scratch could mean death

Now what helped us survive as species?

What allowed us to go from the middle of the food chain, to the top?

Technology, yes

But something else even more important

Connection

Our ability to connect as Homo Sapiens

Resulted in more resources, more protection, more reproduction

A human being

Alone in the wild

Is a pretty useless creature

But together we were able to do some amazing things

Lasting 200,000 years as a species on this earth

So

Connection

Equals survival

Which equals meaning

Now

What helped us connect?

What have we done since the beginning of time?

Stories

Meaningful stories

Both literal

“Doug went to water hole, eaten by lion, don’t go waterhole”

And metaphorical

“In ploughing the field today we will help pull the sun across the sky”

Now

How do we share meaningful stories to the tribe so we can connect and help our species survive another day?

We could sing, dance, paint, speak poetry, direct, edit, make a meme or a tik tok

Or we could act

As actors

We get to play a part in sharing meaningful stories which helps the group connect and survive

“But what if the work isn’t meaningful?”

I hear you say

Quick story

In my third year of NIDA

At the height of my pretentiousness

I want sitting in an ICU ward with my mate who had become paralysed after eating a slug

It was a very fearful time

No one really new what was happening with Sam

But he had a wonderful Ugandan nurse called Baba who came to see him every day

Baba and I were talking about film one day

I asked her what her favourite things to watch were

“Home & Away and Love Actually”

She said

I scoffed arrogantly and proceeded to share the most “artistic” examples of work I could think of

She smiled at me

“You know Mike

Most people don’t enjoy their lives

They work very hard

Try to handle their responsibilities

And at the end of the day

Want to spend 30 minutes or maybe an hour

Getting some sense of relief or ease or joy

They want a little story to help them breathe a bit easier”

I never scoffed at the idea of working on Home & Away again

I might not think its the most humanly complex work in the world

But there is a reason why it keeps getting made

Or why anything keeps getting made

It’s providing some kind of value to human beings

And that is bloody meaningful

So

We as actors

Get to play

We get to be a part of sharing meaningful stories

Which helps our tribe connect

Helping our species survive another sunrise

Let’s keep going

Let’s dive into acting

Specifically

Screen Acting

Now

No one here is spending their time, money and energy with the end goal of becoming an extra

You want to be as generous as possible within your field

So I’m going to assume that giving leading work on screen is your focus

All acting coaches have their biases

And I certainly have mine

I’m not a comedy specialist

I’m not here to help you get better at three camera sitcoms

I’m not trying to make you better at Shakespeare

I’m very boring

Leading work. Drama. On screen.

Thats our context for our development.

Let’s distill acting down to it’s most essential parts

And then look at how those parts might change due to our arena of screen

Acting

We have a character - a human being

We have a context - a moment in time

And that character is connecting - relationships

Our three core areas of skill development in acting become:

Character / Context / Connection

In one sentence

Our focus in acting becomes:

Having moments of human connection

(Pleas note: “Having”, not “showing”)

Over the following months and years

It will be our responsibility to create powerful systems for each of those three areas of our training

But

What about for screen?

What adjusts or shifts because we are trying to get better at screen acting as opposed to stage?

At the end of the day

If I go sit in the back row of a theatre production

At the very least

I need to be able to hear the story

So voice becomes an essential area of training

But what about for screen acting?

Let’s look at how most people approach skill development for screen

You get a scene

It usually involves some high stakes

And we are pushed in the direction of extremes

Darkness and light

Why?

Well its bloody fun

You get to do the kind of work that people remember

But let’s explore this a bit more

The actors you love

The scenes that you remember those actors by

They’re usually doing one of two things

Extending themselves toward darkness (fear)

Or extending themselves toward light (love)

And damn we get some magical moments when skilled artists stretch themselves in those directions

But

Here is an important question

What percentage of a leading actors performance is spent in those two areas of light and darkness?

A very very small percentage

Maybe 1-5 percent of a leading actors work is spent shouting or crying

So what are they doing the majority of the time?

Not shouting

Not crying

Breathing

They spend 95-99% of their time on screen breathing

So

We have to be really honest

The majority of screen classes

Are focussing their time on building the minority of skills required for screen acting

This is a big thing to admit

It might feel good to spend your time trying to shout or cry

But we as actors can move a hell of a lot further and more sustainably

If we allocate our resources toward building the skills that will actually be required most

In an ocean of technique

There are a small handful

Which will apply to the majority of actors

The majority of the time

These are the ones worth focussing on getting great at

Bascis

Like breathing

I’m going to say this as clearly as I can

The movie star is dead

Screen work is moving away from actors who can technically do things “right”

And moving toward humans who are willing to give themselves permission to be where they actually are in front of the lens

Said another way

YOU are the most valuable currency you have in this industry

Not who you think or feel you SHOULD be

And it starts with breathing

Want to have a conversation on screen?

Start with breathing

Want to connect with another human being on screen?

Start with breathing

Want to be a leading actor on screen so you can do those big scenes where you get to cry or shout?

Start with breathing

Remember

Being interesting is not in your control

Just like your reputation

It’s determined by others

But if a mouse or bird can hop onto a theatre stage and steal the audiences attention

It tells us that being present in the most interesting thing a human can do

And what can we do which will result in us being present?

So we can have moments of human connection on screen?

Breathe

Now

If youre like me you might have moments in the shower or alone on the couch where you think

“Damn that was a good little moment of acting I just did”

Sorry to say

But sadly its true

Acting in isolation doesn’t count

It’s never about acting well

It’s about acting well when its difficult to do so

Why?

Because its almost always difficult to do so

The conditions on set are almost never perfect

Things are rushed, time is money, someone is sick, lines are changing, losing light, its 4 am, no one has eaten in 8 hours, people are stressed and over caffeinated

It’s hard

And we want training to reflect realities

So

The first stage of training becomes

Can you breathe as yourself in the actual arena

In front of the lens

On camera

With that lens boring into your soul

And all the stories or beliefs you carry about how you think or feel you should be start to raise their heads

Again

You are the most valuable currency you have in this industry

And something that’s really hard for young artists to understand…

What you regard as your weaknesses, ugly bits, faults, etc

On screen

Those are your fucking superpowers

So find comfort in the chaos of baring your soul as you breathe in front of the lens

Now

I havn’t shut up for a while

This all might sound like a lot

I half apologise

It’s a first lecture before you commence your studies

But why attempt to break acting down into many parts?

Mastery of craft develops as you increase your ability to split things into smaller parts

And why is that important?

Any one can work hard

Anyone can rock up with a bulldog mentally

Try to push through with resilience

This is not what creates artists

Intelligent adaptive progress creates artists

Where we keep following curiosities

Curiosity

Become incredibly valuable

Curiosity is absolutely a super power

The ability to let your body lead you toward your next revelations and stages of growth

That is bloody sustainable

Okay

Let’s wrap this up

I’ll make my last important point

Remember

Live

Live your life

Do not put your life on hold for acting

Casting directors want actors who are full of life

So don’t make acting your life

Instead

Prioritise living as a human being on this earth

Have things you care about

People you would die for

A body that feels things

A mind thats curious

Now

If you haven’t listened to a single thing I’ve said

Fine

Let me just give the one piece of advice

If you make virtuosity the goal

Everything else will become easier

So much of your career will take care of itself if you make getting better the goal

Virtuosity

Is the most valuable thing

The wealthy can’t buy it

The impatient can’t rush it

Nobody can take it

You can only get there through slow and honest work

Make being good your priority, and everything else will take care of itself

Let me know how your training goes :)

Huge love

Hope this helps

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