a
HOW TO
Robert Graham Paris
1.
ARE YOU THE TYPE?
2.
S TARDUST IS MADE OF MANY THINGS
3.
A FOOT IN THE DOOR
4.
FIRST BEACHHEAD
5.
F AITH , AWARENESS AND UNDERSTANDING
6.
YOUR BUSINESS IS MY BUSINESS
7.
M IRROR UP TO NATURE
8.
S MOOTH , SVELTE AND FASCINATING
9.
A IR POWER IN CONTROL
10.
T HE CONSCIOUS , THE SUBCONSCIOUS — AND A MENTAL IMAGE
11.
"W HAT " PLUS " WHY " EQUALS " HOW "
12.
T IMING — DOIN ' WHAT COMES NATUR ' LY
13.
T IMING — FIRST LAW .- STOP FOR THE RED LIGHT /
14.
T IMING — SECOND LAW .- MOVE WITH THE TRAFFIC
15.
C O - ORDINATION
16.
A LCHEMY
17.
CLOSE-UP
is.
THE TRUTH SHALL MAKE YOU FREE
19.
A BODY WITH A VOICE
20.
HOW TO TALK ENGLISH
21.
W HO , W HA T , W HE N A N D W HE RE ?
22.
D OUBLE - TRACK YOUR DOUBLE TALK
23.
A TOMIC DRIVE TO IMPACT
24.
TORCHBEARERS OF A GREAT TRADITION
Have you always wanted to act? Do you daydream? Do you have a vivid imagination? When you were a child, did you like to make believe? When you are happy, are you very happy? When you are angry, do you get very angry? When a theatrical performance is funny, do you laugh easily? When it is sad, do you choke up? Do you have strong desires? At times, do you get very blue when you are alone? Do you sometimes get very happy when you are alone? Do you ever get lonely in a large crowd? Do you ever feel unusually friendly in a large crowd? Do you have FAITH in yourself? If your answer to most of these questions is YES, there's a fairly good chance that your emotional scale is flexible—and potentially broad; that you have some of the basic material to put into an acting career. You want to know what to do about it and how to go about doing it. You want to know how to develop for yourself a dependable set of actor's tools—and how to use them. How to develop your natural advantages and how to put them to work for you. How to become a good craftsman, and how to develop that craftsmanship to a point of artistry—and make a living while doing it Although directed to actors, anyone who is ever called upon to "stand up and say a few words" can profitably adapt this book to his uses. Much of the material vitally concerns the needs of every singer, entertainer, lecturer, teacher, business or professional man—everyone, in fact, who ever has to face the public. "All the world's a stage. . . ." Let's find out something about how to act on it—or any other stage. This is a book about acting, not actors. The incidental use of names well known on the stage, in motion pictures or television is simply to underscore a point about acting.
Some surprises, a few shocks and many important selfdiscoveries are in store for you. By the time you've mastered the material in this book you'll know your old self better, and you'll meet a new self that will develop as you go along. You will be more effective. You will project new power. You will have a stronger personality. You will gain poise. You will acquire authority. You will broaden your horizons. You will be more interesting. You will speak better. You will know how to concentrate. You will be able to think on your feet. You will add to your natural charm. You will be more attractive. You will be more feminine if you're a woman, more masculine if you're a man. In other words, you will reach a new peak of sex appeal. You will develop your character, dependability and perseverance. You will establish and justify new self-confidence. You will both feel and reveal added vitality. You will find out that everything about you—your strength and your weakness—can be used to your advantage. Stardust is made of many things. Tony Curtis started out as a tousled kid from the Bronx who turned into a glamour boy. From the superficialities of this second phase, he grew into a forceful actor. Rita Hayworth was a black-haired, chunky little girl who made a mediocre living as a dancer, until she gradually developed a new self that won her international homage as the embodiment of desirable femininity.
STARDUST IS MADE OF MANY THINGS
In 1947, there was no Rock Hudson. But there was a Roy Fitegerald, who worked in his father's electrical-appliance store and at other odd jobs after getting out of the Navy. In a period of transition he worked co-operatively with the perceptive agent who saw exciting possibilities in him, and he worked with the late great coach Sophie Rosenstein, of Universal-International Studios. In short, he worked, worked, WORKED twenty-four hours a day to become the Rock Hudson of today. Stardom has no physical limitations. Spencer Tracy is short on stature but long on stellar power. So are Alan Ladd and James Cagney. John Wayne, Gary Cooper and Gregory Peck tower over the six-foot mark—and hit the six-figure mark in salary. Stocky Edward G. Robinson's everyday appearance is reduced to a negligible fact when he becomes a lovable hero or a hateful villain, wondrously sensitive or appallingly brutal, intelligent or bestial, according to the requirements of the role he's portraying. Rotund Charles Laughton can transform himself into contrasting characters covering a tremendous range. Jimmy Durante's big nose never lost him a fan. Nor did Joe E. Brown's big mouth. Nor Martha Raye's, either. The late Humphrey Bogart's lisp might have been a liability to a lesser man. He, however, used it as a subtle instrument of characterization. Ernest Borgnine is no Mr. America, but that didn't keep him from winning an Academy award. Tab Hunter is what the girls call a dreamboat, but Frank Sinatra is by no conventional standards a handsome man. Their Stardust is made of entirely different things. Katharine Hepburn never could have won a beauty contest
HOW TO ACT
Elizabeth Taylor could. Debbie Reynolds is a doll-faced cutie. Academy award winner Joanne Woodward is nothing of the kind. Sometimes it's the off-beat qualities that sprinkle you with stardust Richard Widmark is way off-beat Yet his fan mail stacks up favorably with that of Sir Laurence Olivier, a star renowned as a classic hero. Stardust sprinkles Leslie Caron with an enchanting, elfin charm. It gives an irresistible sparkle to June Allyson's eyes. Remember this: In show business there is a place for every type. After acquiring self-knowledge and training under expert guidance, real stars learn to stylize their liabilities into assets and to develop their natural assets into symbols of an ideal. So can you.
First impressions are lasting impressions. In show business, the first impression can sometimes be the last impression. Producers, directors and casting directors are busy people. The deciding factor in giving an unknown (or even an experienced actor whose opportunities have been limited) a chance to read for a part is often based on first impressions. It's up to you to know how to handle yourself during an interview: how to be at ease, and how to be well poised. How to sell yourself; how not to oversell yourself. Diane Brewster, who rose from television commercials to Glenn Ford's leading lady in Torpedo Run, a picture with an otherwise allmale cast, worked for weeks to make the right impression when she got her first important interview. At the appointed time, she stepped buoyantly into the office— tripped and fell flat on her beautiful face. Diane's world went black, but months of training came to the rescue. She showed such poise and quick judgment in making neither too much nor too little of the incident that the director had her read immediately for the part When she left his office, the role was hers. The accidental fall itself turned out to be unimportant What counted was the director's first impression of her professional poise. To be as unshakably poised as this young actress is much more a matter of sound technique than of serene temperament Don't be fooled by the casual manner of a casting director. You may be sure he's studying you: looking you over, like a piece of merchandise. He's no window-shopper, either. When he looks, it's because he wants to buy. Always have professional pictures of yourself, and be ready to show them without apologies or explanations. Your graduation picture won't do, nor will glamour-gimmicked photos of the type displayed in night-club lobbies. The pictures should show you: some, headshots showing a fair range of moods; others, in various types of wardrobe. 8
A FOOT IN THE DOOR
Have extra prints of each picture. Your interviewer may want to keep one. Make certain that your name, address, phone number and vital statistics are written legibly on the back of each photograph. Don't be misled into thinking that the pictures he rejects are "no good." Almost every interviewer is likely to make a different selection. Each has his own professional purpose and his own taste as valid reasons for his choice. For the sake of efficiency and economy, it's a good idea to have a few eight-by-ten composites made up with four poses on each one. Have a neatly typed, short outline of your background, qualifications and (if you've ever appeared anywhere, in anything) your credits. Be honest. Don't invent non-existent credits. You'll only identify yourself as an impostor, a charlatan, or to use show-business terminology, "a phony." "Any casting director can spot a phony every time" is a show-business axiom. If your only credit is a single appearance in the chorus line of a high-school operetta, say so. Everybody has to start somewhere. Deborah Kerr began her career in the curtain raiser for a local show at Bristol, England. No one outside Bristol—and probably very few Bristolites—particularly noticed this modest debut of an actress who studied long and faithfully to prepare herself for intercontinental stardom. Nevertheless it was a beginning—a good one. It will look a lot better, and be far more plausible, if you state in your outline that you've put in your time and effort studying with a recognized teacher, rather than if you make up phony credits that won't bear checking out. Perhaps your teacher will give you a card stating your credentials. Some teachers and coaches periodically give the not-so-fully-
HOW TO ACT
established actor a card stating how long he has studied and what, in their opinion, he is capable of doing at that time. These cards help the actor in getting interviews and protect the teacher, or coach, from false claims by overeager job seekers, who claim to be a client of theirs after one lesson. Some of the first questions you'll be asked are: "Tell me about yourself." "What have you done?" "Is there any film on you?" You are in a spot However, every beginning actor has been in that same spot. But just remember—every actor had to be a "beginning actor" at one time. Tell the truth. If you have no film, say so. If you have no professional stage credits, say so. However, there is a way out Almost every casting director will help you. Ask for a chance to read for him, or to audition a scene you have already prepared. He's looking for talent, and he'll usually give you a scene, if you don't have one. You can take it home, study it, then come back and do it for him. If he likes the way you do it, he'll indicate the next move for you. After you've begun to establish yourself as a working actor, you may get jobs on a "cold reading"—that means reading a part at sight, with no preparation. When you do a cold reading, remember not to read too fast, and to listen to the other person reading with you. Rehearsed or cold, your reading will give you something extremely important: exposure—where it counts. He may not need you today, but he will remember you tomorrow. He'll remember how you read, how you handled yourself, 10
A FOOT IN THE DOOR
and whether you were able to live up to your claims. He casts something every day and he knows better than anyone that there is a definite place for the well-trained beginner. The need for talent is in an ascending spiral. Television, motion pictures, the legitimate stage, musical shows and night clubs are burning up talent as fast as it comes along. So almost everyone connected with casting is more than willing to give promising new people a hearing. The emphasis today is on speed, especially in television. Many parts are cast from a cold reading. More than ever in the history of show business, it is important to be a "quick study." How fast is a quick study? Well, a better-than-average quick study can memorize two pages of dialogue in thirty minutes. If you should get a two- or three-line part, congratulate yourself, its shortness is no disgrace but a good indication that your interviewer thinks you can "deliver." He believes you will look good to the director, the producer and—if only for one fleeting moment —to the audience. If you try to fake phony credits, the truth will come out the minute you are set for a job. At that time you will have to show proof of your professional union affiliation or affiliations. At the present time, all professionals must belong to at least one of the organizations in the "four A's." The four A's are the Associated Actors and Artists of America. There are more than four now, but they are still called the four A's. Among them are AFTRA (American Federation of Television and Radio Artists), SAG (Screen Actors Guild), Equity (Actors' Equity Association), AGMA (American Guild of Musical Artists), AGVA (American Guild of Variety Artists) and SEG 11
HOW TO ACT
(Screen Extras Guild), which is devoted primarily to the interests of people appearing as general atmosphere in motion pictures and in filmed television. Under the Taft-Hartley law, a newcomer is allowed thirty days after his first professional performance before he is obliged to join one of the professional guilds or unions. The one he joins first becomes his parent union. There is a reciprocal arrangement among the four A's that acts in favor of the performer who works in the various mediums under their jurisdiction. When an interview is over, leave. Don't drag it out, wasting the interviewer's time—and yours. If you've left pictures, or a list of credits, with the interviewer, tell his secretary on your way out of the office. Give her an extra word of thanks when you say goodbye. Secretaries fill a highly specialized position in show business. Often they are the trusted aides and "antennae" of their bosses. Besides, as guardians of "the portals through which you seek to pass," they can sometimes open the door to courteous and appreciative actors.
12
Many people work a long time, perhaps an average of six years is typical, in order to secure the first beachhead on the island of success. Some actors, and it happens all too often, mistake that first beachhead for the island. They think they've clinched the career itself when all they've really got is a foothold on it: a foothold on the first rung of a very tall ladder. There are many beachheads to be taken, many rungs to the ladder. Each new role that can be made to serve as a springboard to the next, and better, role is a beachhead. Each new level of your career is a beachhead. As you work your way up the ladder from being a "day player" to that first enviable niche, an actor with an "established" weekly salary, and from there to the point where you are paid a certain sum for playing a part, and on to a guarantee of X number of pictures a year at a fixed sum—all these are beachheads. But you, as an actor, haven't got the island of success secured until you have taken the last beachhead; the one that assures you of continuity in your career and a genuinely solid place in the entertainment world. In the early phases of his career an actor is as great as his last show. Only the seasoned star rises above his vehicle and has the staying power to survive a bad show, lift a fair one above mediocrity, and always enhance a good one by his very presence. If you want to "live your own life," don't become an actor. As an actor you will have to live the life that will be best for your career. And you will have to accept one final source of authority to determine what that best is. You will have to put your money into the right kind of clothing and accessories for the furtherance of your career, not into a helter-skelter assortment of clothes that you happen personally to prefer. You'll have to get the haircut that will get you a job, not the one that follows a fad. The world of the actor is made up of highly competent spe14
FIRST BEACHHEAD
cialists who are vastly important to the entertainment industry— and to your career. No single person ever "makes" an actor. Many people have a hand in creating him—possibly from some of the very substances inherent in you. The head electrician, you will eventually discover, is just as much a specialist in his particular field as the writer or director is in his. The man in the cutting room is, in his way, just as important to a film as its producer. The people in wardrobe, hairdressing and make-up departments know how the actor should appear in relation to a production as a whole. With their specialists' eyes, they "see" the actor as he can rarely see himself. The sound engineers, who have learned to hear as the sound system hears, know how the actor should sound. The publicists know how to spotlight public interest in him. The agents know how he should be presented for available roles that are right for him, just as the teachers and coaches know what he is professionally capable of doing. All these people, along with other specialists, know best what is right for the actor. They are not prejudiced by personal whim. They arrive at their decisions by workmanlike co-operation, functioning in a chain of command that goes, link by link, to the top. At the top is a single source of authority that must be the lodestar of the actor's faith. If you are going to fulfill your purpose here, you must take this book as your single source of authority, until you have absorbed its entire contents. Then, and only then, can you evaluate it and intelligently accept or reject it, in whole or in part. You will have earned the right to your own decision.
HOW TO ACT
Thousands of careers have been wrecked by actors who "changed horses in the middle of the stream." Those actors go from teacher to teacher without ever finding out what any of them have to offer. They switch from agent to agent before a long-range plan for their career can be developed. They go from one publicist to another, destroying the valuable groundwork of every publicity campaign. Finally, they fight their way out of legitimate contracts —and into oblivion. The entertainment field is the only business on earth in which a girl who might never make more than forty dollars a week running an elevator can be molded by specialists into a commodity worth thousands of dollars weekly to one of the major industries of our time. Actors today have unprecedented prestige and social standing. Most of them use their advantages to good purpose, as does Bob Hope, globe-circling, good-will ambassador extraordinary to the court of humanity. Royalty welcomes Danny Kaye, and so, in many lands, do the underprivileged children to whom he has brought the vitalizing nourishment of laughter. While the successful actor acquires prestige and social standing in plying his well-paid profession, he attains other gratifying goals. Almost without exception, every notable performer refers nostalgically to some artistically worth-while venture about which he says happily, "I didn't make much money with it, but it was a great satisfaction to do." Where does this satisfaction come from? It comes from giving an audience something he believes in: something that to him represents, either inspirationally, dramatically or amusingly, the truth as he sees it.
16
FIRST BEACHHEAD
In a discussion of acting, John Mason Brown, distinguished critic and lecturer, paid a tribute to the men and women of the profession when he said, "An actor turns pretense into truth." Actors work considerably harder than most people think they do. I have heard more than one parent say of his own hard-working, well-established son in show business, "Yes, he's doing all right, but I wish he'd get a real job." He has one. Acting is a very real job. As the standards of the profession grow continually higher, and the taste of the public keeps pace, the demands on the actor are more exacting. Those who fulfill these demands will win the ultimate beachhead and earn the right to live securely on the island of success. Lucille Ball cried her eyes out the night she was fired from RKO as a stock player. But she never stopped working to improve herself. When she was at her lowest ebb, half frightened and altogether frustrated, she put more drive than ever into her career. She went on the road with a stage production of Elmer Rice's Dream Girl and steamed full speed ahead on the upgrade again. Today, with husband Desi Arnaz, she is co-owner of the studio lot where the name DESILU STUDIOS looms high on a sign replacing the letters that used to be there—RKO. This book can guide you toward the threshold of a successful career, but you will have to cross that threshold and take the final steps yourself. On your own. The professional actor has here a refresher course. The recruit is being indoctrinated in his basic training: self-knowledge and his immediate goal—building the tools and laying the foundations of a career.
17
Underlying every art is a science. The science underlying an actor's art is the mechanical system of a soundly organized technique for transmitting emotions, words, actions and ideas to an audience. Technique is simply another word for KNOW - HOW or CRAFTSMANSHIP . There is a know-how, or technique, for everything— from flying a jet airplane to taking out an appendix, from upholstering a chair to enacting a scene in a play. Your knowledge and application of acting technique will make it possible for you to give consistently effective performances and to find freedom of expression at any time, under any circumstances. Without technique, there is no control. In the making of a motion picture film today, the actor must know how to act—plus ........ The actor must have such control, such know-how, that he can quickly and accurately give the director what he needs, the cameraman what he needs, the cutter what he needs—and the audience what it wants. Now let's give the subject of acting a question-and-answer breakdown. What is acting? Webster's dictionary says that to act is "to produce an effect." To produce an effect upon the emotions of his audience is the aim of every actor. What is the actor's starting point? You start with every great actor's three fundamental laws: THE LAW OF FAITH, THE LAW OF AWARENESS and THE LAW OF UNDERSTANDING.
Apply these laws right now. Have FAITH in me. You will become AWARE of what you can do. Then you will UNDERSTAND how to build and use the tools of acting. 20
FAITH, AWARENESS AND UNDERSTANDING
How do you act? You act by using the three primary elements upon which acting is based: the VOICE, the BODY and the MIND. They're the materials that go into your acting. They're the tools of your craft They're the eloquent instruments of your art. THE VOICE AND THE BODY MUST BE MADE SO FLEXIBLE THAT THEY WILL INSTANTLY OBEY THE COMMANDS OF THE MIND WITHOUT CONSCIOUS EFFORT.
The more you know, the more those words will mean to you. And you will know more—much more—later. Where do you begin an acting technique? You begin with the physical apparatus—arms, legs, torso, tongue, eyes, facial muscles and so on—from skeleton to skin. Technique is mechanics. Technique is scientific. Isn't a scientific technique very mechanical? Indeed it is. But you must have at your command, ready to serve you immediately—at your director's will—a practical knowledge of the mechanics of modern acting. The seven tones of the musical scale are mechanical too, but they can be used artistically to create a great piece of music. The three primary colors and their divisions are mechanical, but they, also, can be used to create a work of art. To take another example, the frame of any house in skeleton form, with its cement, two-by-fours, steel girders, and so on, is a matter of good, sound mechanics. It has very little to inspire you emotionally. But when a Frank Lloyd Wright applies his creative talent to 21
HOW TO ACT
it, the framework becomes the foundation for a piece of architecture that is artistic and inspiring in its finished form. If the foundation weren't mechanically sound, a Frank Lloyd Wright's inspiration would go to waste. The structure would collapse. Do I believe in mechanical acting? No. But I believe an actor must build a solid mechanical mold before he can flood and color the performance of a role with his own talent and personality. Without a substantial technical framework and foundation his performance will be subject to both hidden and obvious weaknesses. Among other shortcomings, it will lack continuity of line and, above all, authority. A basic technical foundation can be the deciding factor in whether you work—or don't work—in the acting profession today. Is it possible to teach the technique of acting, as it is to teach the techniques of music and salesmanship? Yes, it is, to you—or anyone—if you have the desire and drive to learn what you're taught Is it possible to give an inspired performance without technique? Yes—but not night after night on the stage, and not going over the same scene time and again in motion pictures, and not under the tensions of fast production in television. There are some inspired amateur performances in America every year. Some of them are extraordinarily effective. But those who give them can rarely duplicate their performances—and then only by accident—because talented amateurs haven't developed either voice, body or mind as dependable technical tools. The important thing is to give an inspiring performance. It's hardly possible that Judith Anderson could have been in22
FAITH, AWARENESS AND UNDERSTANDING
spired during the entire run of Medea, in which she played a heavy emotional role. But with her magnificent technique and dramatic art she consistently created the effects of inspiration and was therefore inspiring to her audiences. What is dramatic art? Dramatic art is acting PLUS. It may be described, all too briefly, as acting which inspires an emotional response over and beyond the immediate and obvious word, action or situation in any given performance. Is there any difference between good acting for the stage and screen, or for television and radio? Basically, no. The fundamentals are the same. The differences lie in the way an actor or personality adjusts the same tools and materials to the various mediums. What is the difference between actors and personalities? An actor is a performer who can up to a point efface himself and, motivated by a playwright's words and a director's guidance, can, within the limits of human feasibility, create and interpret any character. A personality is a performer whose individuality is so distinctive and strong that it dictates the color of every role he plays. Do you have to have talent to be an actor? No. Many actors have made a very good living by being such capable craftsmen in their use of the tools of acting that they have overcome the handicap of not having native talent. They've made up for what they lack as inherent artists by becoming highly skilled, superior artisans—experts in the mechanics of acting. 23
HOW TO ACT
If you have talent, and know you have it, why must you study? Even if you have talent, it may be blocked and jammed up by inhibitions and tensions, dissipated by lack of discipline, or cluttered and confused by egotism. Intelligent training in the technicalities that support talent and compensate for its lack frees you from these drawbacks. However great your talent, you have to build a mechanical foundation in order to organize that talent and use it most effectively. What is a "good, actor"? In the final analysis, a good actor must excite an audience, must be interesting to look at, and pleasing to listen to. He must be able to transmit these qualities with impact. He must have polarity and balance. What does polarity mean in this context? For an actor, polarity is the quality of having opposite, or contrasted, poles of feeling. The world in general has countless examples of physical and emotional polarity. The North Pole at one end of the earth and the South Pole at the opposite end illustrate physical polarity. Happiness and sadness are an example of emotional polarity. Black and white, heads and tails, courage and cowardice, night and day— all these opposites are examples of polarity. Ed Wynn offered a sensational demonstration of polarity by his swing from wild buffoonery to poignant drama. Comedian Red Buttons did, too, with his dramatic Academy-award-winning performance in Sayonara.
24
FAITH, AWARENESS AND UNDERSTANDING
Henry Fonda's polarity is exemplified by his equal effectiveness in portrayals of laughable comedy and emotional depth. Tallulah Bankhead's dramatic power and comedic punch proclaim her polarity. There are two reasons an actor must have polarity, or opposites, in his emotional scale, even when playing a role that does not call for obvious contrasts of emotional expression. 1. Polarity is the basis of dramatic conflict. 2. The skillful use of contrasting extremes in the emotional scale enables an actor to project these extremes with authority while not actually experiencing them himself. It is not an actor's function to "feel" per se, but to make his audiences feel that which he wants transmitted to them. He can show anger without being angry. He can depict love without being in love with his leading lady. He can portray pride without being in love with himself. To clinch the argument, an actor need not die to play a death scene convincingly. By using his well-developed and thoroughly trained poles of feeling, he can play on the emotions of his audiences and make them feel they have seen someone die. What does balance mean in this context? By balance I mean the ability to equalize and to compensate. By offsetting one factor against another, an actor establishes equality and achieves symmetry, or balanced form. Through symmetry he gains poise. Balance is a key word to poise for an actor. Perfect balance between the desire to express and the ability to express contributes to poise. This balance between the desire and the
HOW TO ACT
ability to express any given idea or emotion can be achieved by correct knowledge and use of technical tools. What else should you know to start with? You should know that the late, internationally famed authority, Constantin Stanislavsky, in his book An Actor Prepares, points out the necessity for an unusually well-trained and responsive vocal and physical apparatus. The vocal and physical requirements are either suggested or actually dictated, of course, by the mind. So there you have a restatement of my declaration that acting must be based on three primary elements—the VOICE, the BODY, and the MIND . This is an unchangeable fact for you to remember always. Thorough training of voice, body and mind requires work. Start this training by meeting your first problems with enthusiasm and vitality. What are those first problems? They're really quite simple—things like how to stand and sit and walk, how to exercise your face and eyes. What has all this to do with acting? It has a great deal to do with acting. If your physical apparatus is flexible, alert and well enough controlled to obey the commands of your mind, your body will be able to do its part in projecting thoughts and emotions—with or without dialogue. Basic parts that add up to the sum total of the science underlying the art of acting—the technique—craftsmanship—mechanics —know-how—are what this book is all about 26
This book is for actors in all phases of the entertainment industry. Their problems are my business. I must keep in step with scientific advancement in lighting, acoustics, sound systems, cameras and film. I must keep an eagle eye on changes of "style" in acting—as demanded by the public. I must continually try to keep myself aware of where jobs for actors are most plentiful. Then—I must help the actor to learn the know-how to get, and hold, these jobs. The relationship between the actor and the audience has reached a very high level of intimacy. Each part of the entertainment industry has certain rigid requirements of its own to establish this. In the legitimate theater, audiences can hear and see better than ever before, creating a sense of closeness. On the forty million television screens in America, they can choose their own distance to create intimacy. And on motion-picture screens the close-up brings the relationship between actor and audience to its highest peak. I have lived and worked for many years with people whose livelihoods depend upon the result of their appearance on film. Within recent years, film production has become such a major part of the industry that there are more jobs available as film actors than in any other branch of the entertainment world. Therefore, many actors who are building—or starting—a career are vitally concerned with the part of their business in which they can work most frequently—and get the most experience. At this writing, there is an estimated income of one and twotenths billion dollars paid to see motion pictures, against one hundred and twenty-five million dollars paid in admissions to other segments of show business—including legitimate theater, opera, symphony, night-club, circus and carnival performances. This is about ten to one. This figure does not include the thousands of feet of film made 28
YOUR BUSINESS IS MY BUSINESS
for television and television commercials, paid for by commercial sponsors. Nor does it include the hundreds of pilot films made yearly, which are never shown, but which mean jobs, experience and money to many actors. Two of the recent developments most important to the film actor are enlarged screens and electronic advancement in sound systems. On a CinemaScope screen, a half-inch lift of an eyebrow can mean an elevation of ten feet. Imagine a close-up of an actor, with a pair of "wild" eyebrows whipping across the end of a theater; or a chronic blinker; or an actor who has no control over the muscles of his face. In all phases of the entertainment industry, the demands of the audience are great. It has had a lot of practice in putting actors under a "microscope," through the mediums of the spotlight and the close-up. It can look intimately into the actor's eyes, watch each subtle movement of his face, and believe or disbelieve him. The audience is well trained in listening. It instinctively knows that there is something more to voice than just what it "hears." Each member of the audience knows that there is another quality in a voice that causes him to "feel" —lets him feel satisfied or makes him feel irritated; causes him to "like" or "dislike" an actor. These are only two of the areas in which an actor can develop an added "plus" that gives impact and excitement to his personality. The actor who recognizes and accepts the concrete, scientific principles and laws that govern his art can use them to observe 29
HOW TO ACT reality and translate—through his VOICE, BODY, and MIND—his observations. He can apply these translations to words written by someone else, under direction conceived by someone else, and under conditions supplied by someone else. There is a Mexican proverb that says: "Though we are all made of clay, a jug is not a vase." True; but the actor has to try.
30
At this point you feel ready for something concrete to work on. You're all set to stand up in your room and start practicing something. Anything. So I'll tell you how to practice standing. You've been standing since you were thirteen months old? I wonder. But even so, stand in front of a long mirror and look at yourself in profile. Is your head thrust forward? Are your shoulders pulled back in "military fashion"? Is your posterior jutting out astern? Are your feet pressed tight together? If that's the way you're standing— stop. Let's correct that stance right now. Imagine you are suspended from a big hook fastened under your breastbone, or sternum. As your body starts to respond to the power of suggestion, your chest will go high. You'll grow long through the middle. The buttocks will flow smoothly in a plumb line with the rest of the body. The abdomen will flatten out. Pretty soon you'll get tired of standing like this; your shoulders will relax and come slightly forward and down. For the time being, let it go at that. You look fine. Here is a further explanation of how to stand. Raise your chest high by lifting your upper ribs naturally and easily. To do this, you're using the intercostal muscles. Now keep the shoulders relaxed. No stiffening of the back and shoulder muscles. For the sake of experiment, look in the mirror and pull your shoulders back in so-called military style. Then bring them forward to a relaxed position, letting the arms hang comfortably. You will notice that when you bring the shoulders forward —still keeping the chest high—you increase the shoulder width almost an inch on each side. Within the limitations of your own physique, this position gives you the V-shape that Robert Mitchum, Burt Lancaster and some of the other famous film figures are noted for. Remember, all you have to do is to keep the chest high, the
32
MIRROR UP TO NATURE
shoulders relaxed and slightly forward, the buttocks pinched and the lower abdomen flat This is good posture. After lifting the chest high with the upper rib muscles, you will find upon close examination that all the upper ribs are fastened solidly to the sternum or breastbone. Below the upper ribs are four more ribs that float around the lower part of the thorax. The thorax is that part of the body enclosed by the rib cage. The semidetached ribs are called floating ribs. Don't worry about them —for the time being. Suspended from an imaginary hook, with the chest high, shoulders relaxed and slightly forward, you achieve the upper part of the V-shaped torso. Complete the bottom part by pinching the buttocks together—keeping them more under than behind you. At the same time flatten the abdomen. Having absorbed and applied these posture instructions, look at yourself in the mirror again for a checkup. What an improvement! To appear at your best when standing—always with the imaginary concept of suspension in mind—keep Chin level Chest high Shoulders relaxed and slightly forward Spine straight Waist long Abdomen flat Buttocks pinched in and tucked under Weight resting lightly on the balls of the feet That's good posture. 33
HOW TO ACT
All posture instructions, unless otherwise noted, are the same for both men and women. Feminine students will soon have proof that the effect of the V-shaped posture on their figures gives them something of that Elizabeth Taylor look, that Esther Williams style. The Venus de Milo has it too. EXERCISE Assume the V-shape posture. Retain it as you tighten every muscle in your body. Then, still in position, relax as much as you possibly can without any collapse of the muscular structure. In other words, keep the same mold, or position, but use an absolute minimum of tension to hold the mold. Repeat this contrasting tension-and-relaxation eight or ten times throughout the day, whenever you have a chance. Every time you do this, you'll be working on a lesson in RELAXED CONSTRICTION.
Relaxed constriction is disciplined freedom, or controlled ease. To give yourself a simple example of relaxed constriction, stand up and pu t your ar m o u t (palm u p) at a r igh t ang le w ith your body. Make a fist and bend the arm at the elbow until your fist is on an approximate level with the top of your head. Your forearm is now at a right angle to your shoulder, like a carpenter's square. Tighten that arm. Tighten every muscle in it until the arm trembles with tension. That tension is constriction.
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MIRROR UP TO NATURE
Now relax all the tension except that which is needed to continue holding the arm in its right-angle position. When you can feel all the excess tension drain out, walk around, sing a song, recite a poem. But keep right on holding that arm in position. Without a great deal of weariness, your arm will be able to stay there, at its right angle, as long as you tell it to. You can almost forget its existence. That's an example of RELAXED CONSTRICTION . Of POLARITY (the opposites: tension-relaxation). Of BALANCE (the harmonious equalizing of these opposites). This is the first time I have used the words "polarity" and "balance" since explaining them to you. Be sure that you understand them thoroughly, because they will recur many times throughout this book. George Fenneman, Groucho Marx's "Able Aide" who has also gained popularity elsewhere, is an expert in the effective use of relaxed constriction, balance and polarity. His use of these principles enables him to put exactly the right degree of energy in the right place at the right time. It helps him to make his points with relaxed animation. To experience something is quite different from merely reading or talking about it By going through the motions and actually experiencing relaxed constriction, you have begun to integrate its principles and practice into your very being. Further experience in other phases of the mechanics that go into acting will help make the technique of the art genuinely a part of you. In your experiments with relaxed constriction you have dis35
HOW TO ACT
covered how to free yourself from unnecessary physical tension; to retain and project vitality. There's another key word—VITALITY. It, too, will be used here frequently. Its possessor radiates energy, controlled but not "switched off" in repose, animated but not uncontrolled in action. No finer example of this quality of infinite vitality exists than that which emanates from Yul Brynner. There are a few simple observations for posture in relation to characterization. In a straight modern role there's quite a lot of latitude regarding a man's stance, but a certain standard does exist Ordinarily, the base, or space between his feet, should approximate the width of his shoulders. In the classics the feet are usually close together. For a character role, the less the intelligence of the character, the wider the base. Drunks, too, sprawl with legs apart. But as sobriety and intelligence return, the base gets smaller. Loretta Young, playing a dual role in a television show, once gave a dramatic illustration of character contrast between a narrow and broad base. As a well-bred young matron, she used her own graceful narrow base, while opposite herself on the same screen she sprawled as a drunkard. The more dignified, feminine and ladylike a female character is, the smaller the base on which the actress stands. Except to suggest tomboyishness, a rugged outdoor type, or vulgarity, an actress always stands (and sits) with feet close together. Now let's go back to where I left you, standing up in front of the mirror with your V-shape. Tense your body in this good position till every muscle trembles. Then relax all the tension you
36
MIRROR UP TO NATURE
possibly can, still retaining the exact form and posture you've been working for. Remember to fit movements using the principles of relaxed constriction into various spare moments of your day. The exercise will serve you well in coping with bulging bay-window tendencies and broad hip problems. Before you know it, you'll have a pleasing new posture. Always keep in mind: an actor must look symmetrical—must look EXCITING.
You should be able by this time to read over the following list of words and have each one bring you immediately a clear mental image of what you've learned so far. High chest Relaxed shoulders Long waist Flat abdomen Pinched buttocks Balance Polarity Vitality Relaxed constriction Experiencing Energy Base
37
Were your midriff muscles sore during the first few days of suspension on the posture hook? Did the muscles in the back of your legs get a bit stiff? Good! That's because you've been giving them a real workout It proves you've practiced. Your new posture started as a mind picture, came into being 39
HOW TO ACT
through your physical apparatus, and by now it should begin to fit you like a glove. But don't expect to be absolutely comfortable with it at first, especially if you've been careless about posture in the past. After all, a stoop-shouldered person may well be more comfortable when he lets his shoulders sag than when he starts to straighten them. Or if he has a bay window, he is much more comfortable with his paunch protruding than when he occasionally pulls it in. Consequently, his shoulders slump worse and worse, or his bay window grows more flabbily entrenched. His muscles get lazily comfortable as time goes by. Finally comes a day when he can do very little to help his appearance. I hope you understand that my use of the word "he" throughout most of this book is a matter of convenience, and that "she" is also implied. Young Academy award nominee Diane Varsi is among the feminine players who always call themselves "actors." "I get paid for being an actor," she says, "and I like being one." She uses the word deliberately, somewhat in the spirit that a physician who happens to be a woman would refer to herself as a "doctor," not a "doctoress." So never let it be thought that I mean to slight the ladies. Their dowager's hump and spreading beam must also be very comfortable, or we wouldn't see them so frequently on what should be the lovelier sex. But can you imagine Marlene Dietrich with a dowager's hump? Or Burt Lancaster with a bay window? Never! Keep yourself consciously suspended on your hook until you've mastered good posture with relaxed constriction. You're going to
40
SMOOTH, SVELTE AND FASCINATING
put your hook on an overhead "traveler" and start walking. Your physical mold for walking is the same as for standing. The chin is level, the chest is high, the shoulders relaxed and slightly forward, the waist long, the spine straight, the buttocks pinched in and the abdomen flat The base is narrow. In walking, as in standing, let your weight rest lightly on the balls of your feet It will give you a feeling of leaning slightly forward. That's all right It's balance in operation. Disturb the air around you as little as possible when you walk. Move through the surrounding air the way a good swimmer moves through the water—directly, smoothly, without splashing. You can do it if you keep in mind that you're on a hook, your hook is on a traveler, and you move yourself along barely touching the ground. Try to give your walk that lithe, highly charged quality of Yul Brynner's walk. A normal, intelligent, virile man walks with his arms swinging naturally and easily—fairly close to his body—his shoulders and hips almost immobile. Lower levels of intelligence seem to walk with the arms swinging out from the body in an apelike movement A woman is most pleasingly feminine when she walks with her arms almost immobile, her shoulders and hips entirely so. Next time you're out among people, look around and see how much a sloppy walk detracts from good appearance. Does the shuffling of that man's feet remind you of Clark Gable's virile stride? Does that woman, trotting on her highheeled shoes and signaling port-to-starboard with her hips, bring to mind Loretta Young's gracefully feminine yet vital walk? No, certainly not 41
HOW TO ACT
Walking is very important to an actor. An actor's walk is often an "action bridge," spanning a gap between shots cutting from one scene to another; a gap that might otherwise have to be filled with extra dialogue or narration to hold the audience. Walking should never be merely a slipshod way of propelling the body from one place to another. Remember how Gary Cooper walked down that deserted street in the Western classic High Noon. His walk alone suggested strong drama, danger being met with courage. All through a way of walking. Once you know how to walk right, you'll be able to work out any tricks of stylization that defy the usual rules. You'll walk at will like a cowpoke or sailor, a "B" girl in a cheap dive or a highfashion model on Fifth Avenue. Make it your general rule to keep in mind the theory of walking in partial suspension and disturbing the air around you as little as possible. I tell my students in Hollywood that when they're walking around a studio lot they should feel they are holding themselves so that their bodies don't quite touch their shorts. With the girls it's girdles, of course. But the principle is the same. The very thought of holding the body away from its clothing helps to keep the body in line and build up muscle tone, or habitual muscular alertness. When you look at television or go to the theater you can, merely by observation, learn a great deal about walking. Hitch your "walkin' wagon" to the stars. Most of them are models of relaxed constriction as they move around a set. By following the few simple suggestions in this chapter you will 42
SMOOTH, SVELTE AND FASCINATING
become body-conscious in the best possible sense. You will discover that you can move your arms without awkward distortion of the rest of your body. You will learn that you can walk very fast or very slowly without throwing yourself off balance. You will even begin to sense the centralized control—the co-ordination— that fine dancers and great bullfighters have. If you've heard that you ought to practice walking with a book on your head, go ahead and do it It's basically a good exercise. David Belasco used to tell us to walk as though we were hanging by a forelock of our hair. Everyone has his own special descriptive imagery to bring about the universally desired goal of good posture and well co-ordinated movement So get on your feet again and start walking. If you have a partner, drill each other till that sergeant you used to have (or that hard-driving gym teacher) seems like a sissy in retrospect Then reverse roles. Check up on whether you disturb as little air as possible when you walk, and every time you turn make your pivots smooth and well balanced. When you can't walk any more—try sitting. That's an exercise too. Keep your tail-piece in line with the rest of your body. Don't thrust it out, but tuck it under as you seat yourself, and again as you rise. While you're sitting, stay on your hook to keep your chest high and your physical apparatus free for speech and movement You'll find that you can even slouch and fall into all kinds of "natural" positions while you're on your hook. Sit down and stand up a few times, still imagining that the
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HOW TO ACT
hook is under your breastbone, both to take the weight off your feet and to pull you straight up. As you rise you should feel a sense of pushing down lightly with the feet. When you rehearse sitting and rising over and over again, disturb the air as little as possible. Sit down. Stand up. Walk around the room. Walk around the furniture. Break the monotony by lifting articles from a table or desk and then putting them down again. Go through some of the actions you ordinarily make during the course of a day. When you light a cigarette or take a bite of food, let your arms and hands bring the cigarette or food up to your mouth. Don't meet them halfway—or even a fraction of an inch of the way —by ducking your head, stretching your neck forward, or contorting your shoulders. Always be sure to: DISTURB AS LITTLE AIR AS POSSIBLE. MAKE YOURSELF LONG THROUGH THE MIDDLE. KEEP YOUR SHOULDERS RELAXED. SUSPEND YOURSELF FROM THE HOOK ALWAYS. LET YOUR ARMS, NOT YOUR SHOULDERS, DO THE WORK. ALERT YOUR MUSCLES FOR MUSCLE TONE.
And once again: DISTURB AS LITTLE AIR AS POSSIBLE WHEN YOU MOVE.
I'll continue hammering away at you in your training, and, while I do, keep this in mind: There isn't a star in New York or
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SMOOTH, SVELTE AND FASCINATING
Hollywood who hasn't been through what you're going through. Actors are diligent, hard-working men and women. Even after years of rigorous schooling, they spend additional months of training to prepare themeslves for every new role. Weeks became months as Marlon Brando worked on Guys and Dolls, perfecting his tough stance and other mannerisms until they appeared natural and spontaneous. Robert Alda worked equally hard on the same role for the New York stage production. Each of these actors interpreted the character differently, but with individual artistry and success. Rita Hayworth spent a full six months making ready for the hit performance she gave in Cover Girl. Her beauty and her stellar name were only two elements, however important, which she brought to Cover Girl. To them she added interpretation of character, arrived at by understanding. She researched her role as painstakingly as a scientist researching a formula. She took full advantage of every bit of expert guidance the resources of Columbia Studios made available to her. The result of this concentration of collective talent and technical know-how was a glamour picture that remains to this day a classic of its kind. These people, and others whose names you see in lights, weren't born stars. They became stars.
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In a manner of speaking you have, naturally, been breathing all your life. But the chances are you haven't been breathing naturally for a long time. With your good posture, stand in front of a mirror. Put one hand on your chest, and the other hand on the upper part of your abdomen. Take a big, deep breath. Did your chest swell up with that breath? Did you get small around the waist? If so, you need some reminders about correct, natural breathing. We have in the lower part of the thorax, or chest cavity, a floor of muscle that is also the roof of the abdominal cavity, separating one from the other. This is the diaphragm. Try an experiment by lying down on the floor. Just relax. Don't even think about your breathing. Place your hands flat against your floating ribs at the sides and notice how the entire region, all the way around to the back, contracts and expands as you breathe, while your chest remains immobile. Notice, too, how the floating ribs now seem to have a very direct contact with the diaphragm. Get a piece of string and make a lasso. Slip the lasso around the diaphragm region and, keeping the end of the string taut, notice how it lengthens and shortens as you breathe, while your chest remains immobile. Stand up again and attach your chest, fixed and high, to your imaginary hook. Breathe just as you did while you were lying on the floor, again checking the expansion and contraction of your diaphragm with your lasso. It may seem strange for you to breathe this way if you've been told most of your life to "take deep breaths with your chest." But don't be disturbed about it You are now following nature's way of breathing, and she'll help you acquire the habit of breathing in her own sensible manner. Nature is on your side. All animals breathe in this fashion. You breathed in the same correct, natural way when you were an infant
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AIR POWER IN CONTROL
Here is a co-ordinating exercise in breathing and performing a specific action at the same time. EXERCISE Start from a sitting position with hands on knees. As you inhale, move one hand up to your top shirt button. Start the movement and a breath at the same instant. End the movement (at the top shirt button) at the exact peak of your intake of breath. As you exhale, return the hand to its original position (on the knee). Arrive at this original position at the same instant the final expiration of your breath takes place. By coordinating a movement exactly with your breathing, you have experienced the use of a potential power tool of acting. So keep practicing until you have mastered it Focus your mind on diaphragmatic breathing and let your mind tell your body what to do. You'll soon get back to breathing as well as you did when you were born! Nature intended that you should breathe with the diaphragm. It's healthful for your general well-being in daily living. And it's necessary to you as an actor. With diaphragmatic breathing, you control the breath and get compressed air, necessary for keeping balanced energy under all the vibrations of the speech instrument. As you may know, compressed air is one of the strongest sources of power known to science. It's used to stop trains, to drive pneumatic drills, and in many other mechanical processes requiring enormous power.
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To acquire vocal vitality and control, make use of the same kind of power that science has found so useful . . . Nature has already given you the necessary equipment. Later, we'll go more extensively into the use of this source of power in speech. Meanwhile, breathe easily, rhythmically and diaphragmatically. The following poem can be used as a muscular exercise to strengthen the muscles that control the diaphragm. Whisper the poem in a bass-baritone whisper—using no sound—with a high fixed chest (this means no movement of the chest). This whispering exercise will help develop the habit of breathing from the diaphragm. It also develops control of the air as it leaves the lungs. Control of the breathing-out process is more important than control of the breathing-in process. You may become dizzy when you first try the exercise, and you will feel that your diaphragm is pulling up inside the lung cage. That's good, just make sure that you don't stop the rich outflow of air by tightening your throat.
EXERCISE No Movement of Upper Chest THE CONGO *
Fat black bucks in a wine-barrel room, Barrelhouse kings, with feet unstable, Sagged and reeled and pounded on the table, * From Collected Poems by Vachel Lindsay, copyright 1933 by The Macmillan Company and used with their permission.
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AIR POWER IN CONTROL
Pounded on the table, Beat an empty barrel with the handle of a broom, Hard as they were able, Boom, boom, BOOM , With a silk umbrella and the handle of a broom, Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, BOOM. Then I had religion, THEN I had a vision. I could not turn from their revel in derision. THEN I SAW THE CONGO, CREEPING THROUGH THE BLACK, CUTTING THROUGH THE JUNGLE WITH A GOLDEN TRACK.
Starting now, and in your daily practice of the exercise poem, whisper each line twice. Hold one hand on your chest, the other against your floating ribs. Keep your chest absolutely immobile no matter how difficult it may be at first. Whispering strengthens the muscles in the region of the diaphragm and places the power of these muscles squarely under the column of breath. It also allows the small, delicate muscles of the throat to relax and builds up general muscle tone throughout the entire body system. Florence Reed, noted for her magnetic voice and whose Shanghai Gesture became a landmark in theater history, once told me that before starting rehearsals in a new play she used to go up to her cabin in Maine and rehearse her entire role for one week IN A LOUD WHISPER.
Whispering will work wonders for you—and that's no secret!
There was a time when actors were taught to pose in a particular way to depict grief, arch an eyebrow to portray doubt, and shift the weight from here to there to express haughtiness. That sort of thing has no place in the technique of today's enlightened actor. The emotional scale is not played by moving from one specific pose to another. An actress like Judith Anderson doesn't portray grief the same way Audrey Hepburn does. Katharine Cornell—or, for that matter, any actress worthy of the name—does not delineate grief exactly the same way in two different charactemations. Watch your family and friends. Take a look around you at a wedding, a story conference, a political meeting, an accident, a theater—anywhere you like. You'll see at once that emotion is highly personal. It is intensely individualistic in the way it shows itself. Since different people have different ways of expressing emotion, the actor must develop understanding as well as technical tools—for flexibility and control—which will enable him to portray emotion in many molds. The tools are the same for everyone. The end result of their use is individual. Through training, your voice, body and mind can become so flexible and so well controlled that they will automatically obey your commands without conscious effort. Any acting theory that cannot be proved and improved by actual use is excess baggage in the actor's tool kit. Throw it out. Bit by bit, the science underlying the actor's art will become concrete in concept, defined in detail, and clear in purpose to you. When it does, you will be able to use the science with personal selectivity and professional judgment, as do the greatest actors of our time. We are all creatures of the habits and characteristics which influence our personality pattern. Our own personalities are made
THE CONSCIOUS, THE SUBCONSCIOUS—AND A MENTAL IMAGE
up of habits, fears, gratifications, inhibitions, complexes, personality mannerisms and traits, etc.—most of which are subconscious. We all know there are two parts to the mind—the conscious and the subconscious. The conscious is your voluntary mind. Your aware mind. The mind that functions when you're awake. The subconscious is your involuntary mind. It functions without your knowledge and control when you're asleep, as well as when you're awake. You can use your conscious and subconscious mind as tools of acting to develop, heighten and enhance your own personality by making this mental image. Picture yourself in a sailboat at night, floating on a dark, uncharted ocean. On the prow of the boat, put a searchlight The person in the boat is you. The boat is your conscious mind. The dark ocean is your subconscious mind. The beam from the searchlight is your aware-beam. The size of your sailboat can be compared to the size of your measurable, conscious mind—and the unmeasured ocean to your subconscious mind. The subconscious-ocean conceals many things of which you are not aware. But they are there. Anything you can think of is there—and everything you have ever known is there. A fraction of all this passes through your aware-beam. Beautiful fish and dangerous fish. Big habit-waves and little habitwaves. Good habit-waves and bad habit-waves. Fear and daring. Destructive floating mines and beautiful colored-glass fishing floats. As some of these things pass through your aware-beam you become conscious of them. At will, you can focus your aware-
HOW TO ACT
beam all around your boat to see something of what's going on down in your subconscious-ocean. You can focus your aware-beam on potentially dangerous things like deep-hidden fears or on habits and personality mannerisms. Let's say you've focused your aware-beam on a live, floating mine (which is just our figure of speech to represent a potentially dangerous fear). As soon as the mine is in your aware-beam, you can cope with it. You can pull it into your conscious mind, examine it, find its detonator and remove it. The mine-fear then ceases to be an instrument of potential destruction. You can safely throw the pieces back, and they will sink to the bottom of your subconscious-ocean. Or let's say that with your aware-beam you spot a bad habitwave, such as poor posture, sloppy walking or incorrect breathing. After focusing your aware-beam on the bad habit, you can use what is called: THE LAW OF SUBSTITUTION
to correct the bad habit You start by constructing a good habit pattern in the conscious mind. By your conscious perseverance the new "good habit" pattern will be absorbed into the subconscious, replacing the old bad habit. You can also use the law of substitution in dealing with undesirable personality traits. While fears, bad habits, undesirable personality traits, etc., are within your aware-beam, you may know they're there—and yet refuse to recognize them. Figuratively, you hold your hand up in front of your eyes, like a blinder, to hide from yourself whatever you don't want to see. We will refer to this, figuratively, as a hand-inhibition.
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THE CONSCIOUS, THE SUBCONSCIOUS—AND A MENTAL IMAGE
It's up to you to overcome and consciously dispense with your hand-inhibitions and look squarely at what is within the focus of your aware-beam. By using the law of substitution, you can transform your liabilities into assets. Now, since all these traits and habits—regarding the conscious and subconscious—are true of our personalities in real life, it stands to reason that they should exist in every character an actor creates. To ring true, a character's "personality" should be made up of habits, fears, gratifications, inhibitions, complexes, personality mannerisms and traits, etc. These should consciously be built into the character's subconscious: by the actor. This is creativity. With all the imagination and training at his command, the actor should set aside his own personality and—as far as possible — represent the character's personality. TO DO THIS—HE USES THE LAW OF SUBSTITUTION.
By substituting the character's personality for his own, the actor establishes a common denominator, a connector, between an invented image and its interpreted reality. This is CONSCIOUS-Subconscious technique. As you progress with these mechanical exercises, focus your aware-beam steadily on each new element we take up—in the science underlying the actor's art The brightness, scope and penetrating power of each person's aware-beam is in accordance with his intelligence. The greater the intelligence that powers your desire and drive, the brighter your aware-beam will shine; the deeper it will penetrate the subconscious; the wider will be the area it can illuminate. 57
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Keep yourself alert to the many uses of the law of substitution. It is within this law that a teacher can change and develop an unfulfilled personality into an exciting personality. The law of substitution is an important part of the formula used to develop a plain, average boy or girl from any walk of life into a big star. But—without an indestructible inner urge, without great desire and drive, without great singleness of purpose—no teacher on earth can make a star of anyone. To help you learn—you can always make use of these two important facts: 1. Your subconscious, your system itself, learns during periods of relaxation. 2. Your conscious self learns during periods of concentration. These are important tools for the actor. These are the words to remember from this chapter: Habit-wave Aware-beam Hand-inhibition Habit pattern Personality mannerism Law of substitution Conscious mind (boat) Subconscious mind (ocean) Once you've absorbed this chapter, you'll be surprised by the added values you will find. Have FAITH in what you learn and you will become AWARE of the truth that is fully revealed in UNDERSTANDING. 58
Actors like to work on what they call "something solid": something they can "get their teeth into." Student actors, in particular, are primarily concerned with things they can immediately experience physically. Most of their early questions begin with the word "what" rather than "why." They're looking for action. Now that you know something of the function of the conscious and subconscious in learning how to act, the exercises have more significance, more meaning. You understand their psychological as well as their physical purpose. By synchronizing the "why" with the "what"—getting them together—you achieve the all-important "how." Through study and practice you have acquired good posture, which is a poised, well-balanced, graceful manner and method of standing. It puts into operation the principles of relaxed constriction. Bad posture is a bad habit. Good posture is a good habit. By using the law of substitution, you exchanged a bad habit for a good one. Your bad posture habit was in the dark subconscious-ocean— you were not aware of it First you focused your aware-beam on the bad posture. Then you consciously constructed a good posture habit pattern in your conscious mind. Next, by conscious—and conscientious—practice of the new pattern, the law of substitution automatically operated. The new habit "pattern" became a habit in the subconscious. Through this process, you made good posture your own. But remember, as long as something you have learned remains restricted to your conscious mind, it's still on "temporary loan." When your subconscious absorbs it, it's really yours. The CONSClOUS-subconscious process is neither too difficult nor too complicated for a sincerely ambitious actor. Understanding and putting it into practice simply takes will power and common sense. If you haven't completely absorbed the previous lesson, read it over—again and again if necessary—until you have thoroughly 60
"WHAT" PLUS "WHY" EQUALS "HOW"
grasped the theory of habit transference through the law of substitution. Take all the time you need to go back over the exercises. Synchronize them in practice with the CONSCIOUS-subconscious theory. If you have thoroughly absorbed these lessons, you're going to find that the processes of learning have become much easier. Your entire outlook has broadened. You have learned that the subconscious is a vast natural reservoir of creativeness, inspiration and emotional power. This reservoir is an inexhaustible treasure chest of your imagination. When you see your ideal self—your perfect self—in a daydream, you are tapping the reservoir of your subconscious. A great actor, either through knowledge or intuition, taps his subconscious to construct consciously the whole personality and image of a character. Then, using the law of substitution, he substitutes that character's personality for his own. Among the great men and women of the theater none are more universally honored than Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne, stars both individually and as a husband-and-wife team. During one of his rare guest appearances on television, Alfred Lunt, referring to himself as a portrayer of characters conceived in a playwright's mind and born in an actor's performance, said, "You don't react as yourself, but as the character you are playing."
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There are two times people move: when they're talking—and when they're not talking. Notice the two general patterns. When people move during a pause (while they're not talking), the movement does not overlap either the end of their last spoken phrase or the beginning of their next spoken phrase. Usually they pause to take a breath. Sometimes to emphasize their words. When people move during a spoken phrase, they generally start moving on the first syllable of the phrase and stop moving on the last syllable. By watching others in natural conversation, we find them using these over-all movement-speech patterns. Instinctively, they are obeying two laws: the laws of timing, which are these patterns organized and codified. People completely fill a pause with movement or they exactly synchronize speech with movement because—they're doing what comes naturally. Their dialogue is spontaneous conversation, created under real-life conditions. Consciously or subconsciously, they direct their own scenes, in settings and situations they voluntarily accept or reject. The actor speaks dialogue created by someone else. He does it under conditions deliberately created by someone else. He is directed by someone else, in settings and situations arbitrarily devised by someone else. In other words, he plays a part. The source of what he has to say and do, when, where and how he has to say and do it is outside himself. The actor's problem is to make what he says and does, where, when and how he says and does it seem real. As IF he were the source. The actor's solution to that problem is the use of common denominators, or connectors. One of the tremendously important common denominators to help the actor in his substitution of a character's personality for his own is the dual pattern of movement and speech.
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TIMING—DOIN' WHAT COMES NATUR'LY
There are two times people move: when they're talking—and when they're not talking. That pattern becomes your TWO LAWS OF TIMING. FIRST LAW OF TIMING—MOVEMENT DURING A PAUSE:
Move during the whole pause and nothing but the pause. SECOND LAW
OF
TIMING ---- MOVEMENT DURING A
VOCAL
PHRASE:
Start the movement on the first syllable and end it on the last syllable. Now that you've focused your aware-beam on the two laws of timing as a connector and common denominator between acting and real life, burn them into your conscious mind. Start with the eyes, face, arms and hands in some single actions you make every day. We'll arbitrarily use them in some flexibility and control exercises. We will call each single action a UNIT OF MOTION . Before you start your first flexibility exercise, sit down and look straight front Imagine your head completely filling a motion-picture screen with your nose at dead center. Your chin touches the bottom of the screen, and the crown of your head touches the top. Mentally pinpoint your nose at dead center of the imaginary screen. Don't let the pull of gravity draw your head down, thereby dragging your nose below dead center. Don't let your head drift or tilt to one side. In practicing the exercise, follow the numbered order of the units of motion.
HOW TO ACT
You're establishing a technique habit of making one clean unit of motion. Do each unit of motion to a count of four. If you're working with someone, take turns calling off the drill. If you have a tape recorder, pre-record the drill for yourself. If you have no outside assistance, call the drill mentally as you do it. Be sure your eyes move in clean, straight lines. All right, now. Head-on close-up. Nose dead center. Let's go. EXERCISE {Repeat Ten Times) 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.
Eyes right Eyes center Eyes left Eyes center Eyes up Eyes center Eyes down Eyes center
9. Eyes right oblique up 10. Eyes center 11. Eyes left oblique up 12. Eyes center 13. Eyes right oblique down 14. Eyes center 15. Eyes left oblique down. 16. Eyes center
In your next exercise, while still completely filling your imaginary motion-picture screen with your head, and still keeping your nose pin-pointed at dead center, make—separately—some eye and head movements. Make them without moving the shoulders or any other part of the body not specifically mentioned in the drill. No drift. At "eyes right," for instance, focus your eyes on a definite point at your far right. Hold this point until you get another eye order.
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TIMING—DOIN' WHAT COMES NATUR'LY
Take four counts for each single unit of motion, and take the units in numerical order. The center of the screen is always "your center" in the exercise. EXERCISE (Repeat Ten Times) 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16.
Eyes right Nose right Eyes center Nose center Eyes left Nose left Eyes center Nose center Eyes up Nose up Eyes center Nose center Eyes down Nose down Eyes center Nose center
17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32.
Eyes right oblique up Nose right oblique up Eyes center Nose center Eyes left oblique up Nose left oblique up Eyes center Nose center Eyes right oblique down Nose right oblique down Eyes center Nose center Eyes left oblique down Nose left oblique down Eyes center Nose center
You're ready to add other arbitrary units of motion to this exercise. One is a full smile. When the drill calls for "smile up," it means show your molars and hold the smile without drift, until you get a further smile order. "Smile down" means simply no smile. It has nothing to do with making a grimace. The other
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units of motion use the hands and arms, but not the shoulders. We'll call the complete exercise a "continuity cavalcade." Follow the units of motion in numerical order. Still seated comfortably, look straight ahead. Rest both hands on your knees in a starting position. EXERCISE {Repeat Ten times) 1. Eyes center 2. Eyes left 3. Left hand to top shirt button 4. Smile up 5. Nose left 6. Right hand to top shirt button 7. Left hand down 8. Eyes center 9. Smile down 10. Nose center 11. Left hand to top shirt button 12. Eyes left oblique 13. Right hand down 14. Smile up 15. Nose left oblique up 16. Left hand down 17. Smile down
18. Eyes center 19. Right hand to top shirt button 20. Nose center 21. Right hand down 22. Eyes right oblique down 23. Left hand to top shirt button 24. Smile up 25. Nose right oblique down 26. Right hand to top shirt button 27. Eyes center 28. Smile down 29. Right hand down 30. Nose center 31. Eyes right oblique up 32. Left hand down 33. Right hand to top shirt button
TIMING—DOIN' WHAT COMES NATUR'LY
34. Nose right oblique up 35. Smile up 36. Left hand to top shirt button 37. Eyes center
38. Nose center 39. Left hand down 40. Smile down 41. Right hand down 42. Relax
You have just done an exercise using arbitrarily selected units of motion. A whole procession of them—a continuity calvacade. Practice this exercise until each independent unit of motion follows the other with clocklike precision. There must be absolutely no overlapping between units. No drifting, jiggling, or squirming before, during or after the units of motion. It may take several days to get the precise perfection of custommade machinery into this continuity cavalcade. But they'll be interesting days. Days of important achievement. Focus your aware-beam on the arbitrary units of motion. Pull them firmly into your conscious mind. Work on them till you have absorbed them into your subconscious. Then they will become your tools. You will be able to use them automatically—on command.
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No book on acting is complete without calling on Shakespeare. We're going to use an excerpt from Portia's trial scene in The Merchant of Venice—as an exercise. Memorize the following quotation. Get it letter-perfect so you can rattle it off automatically. Don't try to act it. The quality of mercy is not strain'd, It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath: It is twice blest— // blesseth him that gives, and him that takes. Tis mightiest in the mightiest, it becomes The throned monarch better than his crown. His sceptre shows the force of temporal power, The attribute to awe and majesty, Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings. But mercy is above this sceptred sway, It is enthroned in the hearts of kings, It is an attribute to God himself; And earthly power doth then show likest God's When mercy seasons justice. Go through the speech again. This time notice that you automatically take pauses. Breathe naturally—diaphragmatically—in your pause. During each pause, take only the breath you need to speak the vocal phrase comfortably which follows the breath. Keep going over the speech until it feels natural for you to breathe this way during your pauses. Repeat the speech and signal with your finger or hand during each pause. Fill the complete pause with synchronized breathing and action. You have just experienced our FIRST LAW OF TIMING : FIRST LAW OF TIMING—MOVEMENT DURING A PAUSE:
Move during the whole pause and nothing but the pause. 72
TIMING—FIRST LAW: STOP FOR THE RED UGHT!
Obeying the first law of timing, do the "quality of mercy" speech, substituting one of our arbitrary units of motion in place of the hand signal. Again, you have just experienced our first law of timing—plus the law of substitution (arbitrary unit of motion substituting hand signal). You have completely filled each pause with an action. But you have never overlapped action and speech. This is the time to memorize a speech from a modern play, about the same length as the "quality of mercy" excerpt. Take pauses in the new speech wherever they suit your interpretation. Only a director has the authority to change your pauses for the sake of over-all interpretation, which is his responsibility. Once your pauses are set, however, make sure they're permanently and definitely set. You have no right to change them. It is on your pauses that other actors, working with you, pin some of their reactions. If you continually change your pauses, you become a difficult performer to work with. You are being thoroughly unfair to your fellow actors. After your pauses are "set" in your contemporary play speech, fill each pause with one of our units of motion. Practice this until it becomes automatic. Back to the "quality of mercy" speech, this time substituting a normal movement toward a normal body objective, such as taking off your coat, using one single unit of motion in each pause. Substitute your modern play speech for the "quality of mercy" and go through it with a normal body objective, such as taking off your coat, using one single unit of motion in each pause. Let's see exactly what you've done in the last two speeches. Let's break down this business of objectives. 73
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In almost every scene you play, there are usually two objectives. First is the speech objective. You reach it by using dialogue. Second is the movement objective, or the body objective (the terms are interchangeable). The movement objective can be either direct or indirect, conscious or subconscious. Whether the movement objective is direct or indirect, conscious or subconscious, all body movement, or body phrasing, is used to fill the important function of enriching characterization. These exercises will prepare you for that. When a cowboy points with his hand and says, "They went thata-way!" he is using a direct, or conscious, movement objective. The "business" Bing Crosby does with his pipe when he sits at the piano doing "White Christmas" is all unrelated—indirect— subconscious—movement objective. His pipe and what he does with it have nothing at all to do with the song—everything to do with naturalness. The kind of naturalness performers can't cut corners to reach. That is, performers like James Stewart, Thelma Ritter, Perry Como—and Bing Crosby. As an exercise in not cutting corners, try the following "piece of business" with a book. EXERCISE While seated, hold a book in your lap, but don't do anything with the book until after you start speaking the lines of any speech with enough pauses to carry you—in single units of motion—to an indirect body objective. This body objective is to locate and point to the last word on page 100 of the book.
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TIMING—FIRST LAW: STOP FOR THE RED LIGHT!
During the reading of your speach fill each pause with a single unit of motion. Make only one clean movement in one direction during each pause. Let there be no possibility of misunderstanding. By movement I mean any small action of any part of your body. If you move your finger to the top of a page and then take hold of the page, you have used two units of motion. Lifting the page is a unit of motion. Releasing the page from your fingers is another unit of motion. Make each unit head toward your body objective, always obeying the first law of timing. After you have gone through this experience in not cutting corners, try other "action objectives" while doing the "quality of mercy" speech. For example, lighting a cigarette, dusting a lamp, taking a pair of socks out of a drawer—anything—as your indirect body objective. Substitute your modern play speech, using any of these body objectives. Make each unit head toward your objective. Any movement you make, with any part of your body, is a unit of motion. Each unit must be a single, clean, concise movement. Each unit must be directed toward an ultimate objective. By taking its precise place in a chain of action, each unit becomes related to the ultimate objective. This is what Stanislavsky meant by units and objectives. That versatile actor Bill Williams can do the "quality of mercy" exercise with such precise and detailed control that he can saddle his horse from start to finish, while going through the exercise exactly twice. 75
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Alternately practice the "quality of mercy" and modern play speech. Make a consecutive series of natural, single, units of motion in each pause. Make these lead toward a natural—indirect—subconscious—body objective. This will start you toward the habit of synchronizing natural actions, with any speech, using the first law of timing. Our first law of timing is a great common denominator and connector with real life. The things you do while getting dressed, putting on make-up, setting a table, making a bed, working in the garden, and so on, all make good natural subconscious body objectives. Remember, whatever the action, an actor arrives at his movement objective by a series of units of motion. Make yourself aware that you are following the principle of units and objectives when you take a cigarette out of your pocket and light it, while talking about a subject completely unrelated to cigarettes. Your subconscious objective is to smoke a cigarette. As you learn to support your scenes with consciously-arrived-at subconscious actions, built of units and objectives, you will grow into what is known as a natural actor. You will be on your way toward acquiring the technique of timing.
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Every day on motion-picture sound stages, in television studios and the theater, you have changes thrown at you. When you're cast in a production, you're given a final script, but this does not insure you against changes. During the actual production, scripts are constantly being revised. You may receive revisions at the last minute.
Here your training and experience show up. You must wipe out what you've memorized and use the law of substitution— quickly, accurately and automatically. You used your own pauses in the "quality of mercy" speech. Relearn the speech with these arbitrary pauses: EXERCISE The quality of mercy is not strain'd (pause), It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath (pause): It is twice blest (pause)— It blesseth him that gives (pause), and him that takes, (pause) Tis mightiest in the mightiest (pause), it becomes The throned monarch better than his crown (pause). His sceptre shows the force of temporal power (pause), The attribute to awe and majesty (pause), Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings (pause). But mercy is above this sceptred sway (pause), It is enthroned in the hearts of kings (pause), It is an attribute to God himself (pause); And earthly power doth then show likest God's (pause) When mercy seasons justice. Another great connector and common denominator with reality is the SECOND LAW OF TIMING—MOVE DURING A SPOKEN PHRASE.
Always start the movement with the first syllable of the first word and end it with the last syllable of the last word. 78
TIMING—SECOND LAW: MOVE WITH THE TRAFFIC
Repeat the "quality of mercy" speech with the "revised" pauses well memorized. The first vocal phrase is "The quality of mercy is not strain'd." The first syllable you hear in that phrase is thuh. The last syllable you hear is ain'd. Touch your knee with your fingers at the same time you say thuh. Now touch your shoulder with the same fingers saying airid. Do this several times. Fill in the remaining sounds and read the whole phrase, "The quality of mercy is not strain'd," touching your knee on the thuh and your shoulder on the ain'd. Let your hand remain on your shoulder. The second phrase is "It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath." Let your hand leave your shoulder on the sound of ih in the word "it" and touch your knee precisely on the eath sound in the word "beneath." Your hand remains on your knee. The third phrase is "It is twice blest" Start your hand up on the ih sound in the word "it" to reach your shoulder exactly on the est sound in the word "blest" Your hand remains on your shoulder. Obeying the second law of timing, continue doing your knee-toshoulder and shoulder-to-knee action, in sequence, throughout the vocal phrases only of your "quality of mercy" exercise. You've just used the laws of ratio and proportion that you learned in school. They'll keep your reading of the speech from becoming visually monotonous. Here's why and how: The number of words in our arbitrary vocal phrases varies considerably. But in this particular exercise the same distance must
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be traveled by the physical action during each vocal phrase. Therefore, either the physical action must be speeded up (or slowed down) to accommodate the length of the vocal phrases; or the speed of the vocal phrases must be drastically changed to accommodate the actions. In this case, it is much better, as you can see—and hear—to accommodate the speed of the physical action to the length of the vocal phrase. Going back to the beginning of the "quality of mercy": instead of using the knee-to-shoulder and shoulder-to-knee action during the vocal phrases, substitute our units of motion (eyes—head— smile—hands), using only one unit to each phrase. Next, substitute any contemporary play speech for the "quality of mercy," using our arbitrary units of motion. Now, still adhering strictly to the second law of timing, go through the "quality of mercy" speech, using a natural subconscious body objective, such as taking off your coat. Then, for the "quality of mercy," substitute any modern play speech, using a natural, subconscious body objective. You may have heard that some people are born with a sense of timing. If you've been blessed with it by nature—fine. If not— a sense of timing can be acquired. Practice these exercises on the two laws of timing until you have perfect synchronization of movement and speech. Never underestimate the power of a pause. It gives you a chance to do nothing—with sustained energy. Jack Benny has been pausing with sustained energy for a full career. His public loves his pauses as much as his lines.
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TIMING—SECOND LAW: MOVE WITH THE TRAFFIC
So far, your pauses have been logical. Now try the psychological pause. The psychological pause interrupts a body phrase or a vocal phrase. By starting a body phrase and interrupting, or stopping its action, while you insert a vocal phrase, you produce suspended motion. By starting a vocal phrase and interrupting, or stopping the speech, while you insert a body phrase, you produce suspended sound. In both cases, you momentarily dam up time. You create SUSPENSE.
Mae West parlayed the psychological pause into a career. The psychological pause is the actor's "cliff hanger." Its suspense stimulates interest, causes surprise, stirs the imagination of the audience, and vitalizes the actor with a quality of excitement The psychological pause is so potent it must be used sparingly, with sound motivation and good judgment. Otherwise it becomes too much of a good thing. At one time or another almost every actor stops short in the middle of a scene, flaps those things hanging on the end of his arms, and asks desperately, "What shall I do with my hands?" You'll never have to go through that crisis. Timing body phrases —in units and objectives—has given you the answer to that bugaboo question of WHAT TO DO WITH YOUR HANDS . N OW , your sense of timing is substituting habit patterns, constructed in the conscious mind, for relaxed habits in the subconscious.
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Co-ordination is a beautiful thing to see. Co-ordination is form in rhythmic motion. To experience it, we will simultaneously co-ordinate three units of motion into one multiple unit of motion—a body phrase in which each individual part begins and ends at precisely the same time. Sit comfortably—hands on knees. EXERCISE Eyes right—hold it Smile up—hold it Left hand to top shirt button—hold it Hold all three positions—with energy. Simultaneously, move to: Eyes center Smile down Hand on knee Start all three units of motion at the same instant and end them at the same instant, regardless of the different distances each unit has to travel. The longest unit governs the various speeds of all the units. The hand has to travel farther and faster than the "eyes and the smile," in order to reach its objective at the same split second as the "eyes and smile." You have just used the laws of ratio and proportion to combine—simultaneously—three units of motion into one co-ordinated unit of motion. By combining three units, under a controlling law, you have made a new unit. You have experienced co-ordination. CO-ORDINATION EXERCISES Create your own continuity cavalcade made up of three-way units of motion.
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CO-ORDINATION
Sample Eyes right 1. Right hand to top shirt button Smile up Left hand to top shirt button 2. Eyes center Smile down Right hand down 3. Eyes right oblique down Smile up etc. Construct many similar co-ordinated three-way units of motion and practice them according to the following "formula"; FORMULA FOR CO-ORDINATION EXERCISES 1. 2. 3. 4.
"Quality of mercy"—first law of timing. Modern play speech—first law of timing. "Quality of mercy"—second law of timing. Modern play speech—second law of timing.
Use this formula for the following two exercises leading toward controlled freedom. An actor needs freedom to grow, expand and develop according to his needs. However, when the desire for freedom has no chart or "blueprint" to follow, power is dissipated and impact is 85
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lost Without organized freedom the subconscious cannot create. Undirected freedom causes the performance—and the career to suffer. Uncontrolled freedom is a violation of basic principles. An unforgettable example of freedom controlled by co-ordinated timing was Maurice Chevalier's performance when he sang, "I'm Glad I'm Not Young Any More," in the film Gigi. To move on toward a balanced habit of controlled freedom; use the co-ordination formula and apply some full-body actions to it. This means using the entire body in free-form or abstract motions. Feel free to go into any wild pose you can take—and hold. Make sure that every bit of motion—of the entire body—begins at the same moment, as though an electric current had been switched on. Make equally sure that every bit of motion ends at exactly the same instant, as though the current had been switched off. It is important in this exercise that there is absolutely no drag or drift—not the slightest extra movement—of an eye, a hand or a foot, etc. Make these abstract movements with energy and hold them with energy. Use relaxed constriction to hold with energy. Holding the vitality at the ends of these movements helps develop a continuous line of energy. The last of these co-ordination exercises has to do with the everyday work of an actor: the application of consciously organized form to a subconscious objective of a character. Select a speech from any play. Search the speech carefully for any word—or words—that will give you a clue to consciously invent and develop a definite subconscious objective. Head toward this subconscious objective—one unit at a time— 86
CO-ORDINATION
by applying the first law of timing, the second law of timing or both laws of timing, as needed for interpretation. If you do not find sufficient clues for a subconscious object in the text of the speech, create them from the storehouse of your imagination: playing a game of solitaire, writing a note, mixing a drink or even looking up a number in the telephone book. To develop a dexterity and a fluidity of form in rhythmic motion, create and apply many subconscious objectives to each speech you select to work on. You are now aware of another common denominator for acting and reality: how to use units and objectives as controls in the two laws of timing.
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It is your job, as an actor, to interweave a character's personality with your own. You must be so intimate with the character that you can consciously supply it with its own subconscious. In order to attain this relationship, a CONSCIOUS-subconscious technique can be vital to the actor.
You—have—a—very—meager—introduction. If, in real life, you are told a few things about a complete stranger whom you are going to meet— If you meet that stranger and hear him speak a few hundred words— If you overhear a few people say a few hundred words to him— If you overhear a few people say a few hundred words about him— I doubt if you could consider this man a close acquaintance, you would not consider him an extremely close friend, and you certainly would not consider him your second self. Yet, this is exactly what actors are expected to do. An actor must take a few words, written by a writer, describing the character he will play— Take a few hundred words said by the character— Take a few hundred words said to the character by other characters in the play— Take a few hundred words said about the character by other characters in the script— Take a few hundred words of explanation and interpretation by a director and— From this meager introduction, an actor must develop a relationship that is intimate enough to create audience identification with the character he is portraying. An actor is the alchemist who is expected to take all the elements and put them together and produce an illusion that is spell-binding to an audience. He must make gold from the base metals. Each actor eventually develops his own way of accomplishing 90
ALCHEMY
this, but the basic know-how is the same for all of them, and the end results must be the same: AUDIENCE IDENTIFICATION . To develop this character relationship between the actor and the character—the actor must use every common denominator between real life and acting that he can possibly learn. We have discussed one of these common denominators: the two laws of timing—which organize action and speech. We will now use a second: the law of SUBSTITUTION —to CONSCIOUSLY construct a subconscious for a character. By using the law of substitution, the actor can substitute the character's personality for his own while interjecting his own personality to flavor the character he is portraying. I'll list five scenes from a motion picture script, including a "description" of the central character by the author, and some "direction" by the director. You'll obtain: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
A few words of description by the writer. A few words of direction by the director. A few words spoken by the central character. A few words said to the central character. A few words said about the character by two different people.
From this information, you must pick enough "clues" to thoroughly know your central character: his personality traits, characteristics, inhibitions, fears, environment, social background—every clue you can find pertaining to the central character, Mackey, and his situation. From these you will give Mackey a subconscious of his own. 91
HOW TO ACT (Memorize Mackey's Speech) FADE IN I
INT. CELL—NIGHT—MED.
I
on EARL MACKEY , a slender red-headed man with clear gray eyes and slow, lumbering movements. He is sitting on a bunk. On a small table in front of him we see the trial transcripts and newspaper scrapbooks from which the context of this picture was taken. ( DIRECTOR 'S NOTE ) Mackey must play this scene with numbness. It must be with the feeling of a man who has completely given up. MACKEY
My name is Earl Mackey. Three times I have died. Most people will only die once. Sudden death is easy. But when you know the week, the day and the hour that you are going to die . . . you die a little with each second. When they pull the switch, you're already dead. (pause) I have died three times ... three times I have gone through the last twentyfour hours of my life.
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CLOSE SHOT—JACOBS
IO
JACOBS Little Frankie was my little girl, and now she's dead . . . she didn't know who it was. She just said "an old redheaded man, Daddy." That's all my little girl could say. DISSOLVE TO:
II
CLOSE SHOT—MRS. COOK
II
MRS. COOK Why, Earl Mackey lived with us for just about two years. Why, he could take care of my little girl just as well as I could, and if he was free today he could come right back here. I'd still trust him with my children. 20
INT. COURTROOM—DAY—CLOSE SHOT OF RUTH, FRANKIE'S SISTER, ON WITNESS STAND. RUTH
Yes, sir. We asked her, "Who did that?" and she said, "The red-headed man at the boathouse."
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HOW TO ACT 75
MEDIUM SHOT—DEFENSE ATTORNEY ANDREWS
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ANDREWS
There's still a lot of difference between "an" and "the." There just might be enough difference to save a man's life . . . at least to get another reprieve. After you have listed the clues, compare them with the following sample clues. Clues from Playwright Death cell Slender Red-headed Gray eyes Clear eyes Slow Lumbering Clues from Director Numbness Given up hope Clues from Character Name Faced death three times In a position where he's been made to think of it each time over a set period of time
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ALCHEMY
Clues from One Person Talking Which Indicates Some Background of Incident A little girl is dead She lived a little while after the incident that brought on her death She didn't know who brought on the incident She knew it was an old man She knew it was "a red-headed man" Clues from Woman Who Knew Mackey (Character) lived in household lived there two years Took care of little girl as well as the mother could If he was free he could come back The mother trusts him completely with her children Clues from Victim's Sister on Witness Stand Victim lived for a while after the incident that brought on her death Only made one statement The man Red-headed man From Boathouse Clues from Defense Attorney Conflict between "an" and "the" Save a man's life Another reprieve
HOW TO ACT
Study both lists for conflicting clues. For instance, Mackey's attorney, Andrews, must have found conflicting clues that made him say, "There's still a lot of difference between 'an' and 'the.'" Focus your aware-beam on the clues and the conflicting clues, and from your imagination develop an image of Mackey. Focus your aware-beam on this image until Mackey becomes vividly clear. Use the clues and your imagination as material and tools to construct—consciously—Mackey's subconscious personality, made up of his fears, gratifications, inhibitions, complexes, habits, personality mannerisms, traits, etc. By using the law of substitution, move your own personality aside as far as you can and function atuarely within Mackey's personality. Answer the following questions as if you were Mackey. What is your name? (Answer: Earl Mackey) How old are you now? Where were you born? What nationality were your father and mother? Do you remember the house you were born in? How long did you live there? What was it like? Describe in detail the house, each room—particularly your room. (As you "remember" it.) What did your father do for a living? Did your mother work? Any brothers and sisters? What is your first memory? When did you start to school? Make up more questions—and give the answers. From your storehouse of imagination, recall every possible detail that can help you develop your "Mackey" personality.
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The "if" consciously puts you into Mackey's not-so-imaginary subconscious life. You can't give Mackey a full psychoanalysis, but you can develop a background of findings which will serve your purposes as an actor. Develop your background to the point of the memorized dialogue with a consciously constructed subconscious. Don't try to act the speech. Let it be the outgrowth of this background you put into Mackey's "if" life. What you are able to do now is the result of a steady progression which started with your aware-beam focused on a hand signal in the pauses of the "quality of mercy" excerpt; and flooded with life by the imagination from your subconscious-ocean. By breaking the life of Mackey down into its finest parts (lowest common denominators), you will find that it will reassemble itself into a complete whole with a solid line made up of small units. In building a part, if you have trouble at any particular scene, go back to the segment that motivated that scene and break it down to still finer detail in your imagination. Because you have had FAITH and kept yourself AWARE, you have reached an understanding of how to use the actor's LAWS OF TIMING and the LAW OF SUBSTITUTION. These laws are mathematically true. They are scientifically true. They are logically true. They are artistically true. You have created and transmitted emotion by your craftsman's use of tools which you forged mechanically. You are beginning to master the science underlying the art of acting. 97
Turn your aware-beam on the close-up. Your close-up. We're all familiar with the poker face and the overactive face. A poker face is all right for playing poker and an overactive face is fine for the life-of-the-party. But neither is much help to the actor. A poker face transmits nothing at all, and an overactive face soon becomes a meaningless blur. Training the facial muscles is a "must" It can be done more easily than some truly heroic muscular feats. The late Commander Frank Wead, who was one of Hollywood's outstanding writers, lost the use and control of his legs and feet due to an injury. By determined concentration he mentally located the muscles in one of his big toes. That was his starting point in learning how to use his toe again. From that beginning he gradually taught himself to use the other muscles of his feet and legs. There are many facial muscles you can train physically after you have located them mentally. Some of your facial exercises will also help you overcome the fear of absurdity. Carol Channing doesn't feel a bit absurd when visitors on the set catch her "making faces." She's getting ready to "go on" stage with facial muscles well trained, alert and responsive to her mental commands. She's confident that her face will be expressive. There are twenty-one sets of muscles in the face that can be trained for controlled flexibility, tone and expressiveness. Try touching the tip of your nose with your upper lip. Don't cheat yourself by trying to push the upper lip with your jaw, lower lip or tongue. Sit in front of a mirror and study the muscles which control the movement of your upper lip as you work it up and down. Try this exercise using the "elevator" muscles at the point of the cheek bones to lift the upper lip.
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EXERCISE 1. Use the elevator muscles on the right side to raise and lower right side of the lips; show the teeth. 2. Repeat for the left side. 3. Alternate these actions. Now push both lips out as far as you can in a whistling position, at the same time locate the muscles that control the movement You'll find them completely surrounding the lips. Command these various muscles to perform for you—and they will Next, try to turn your lip inside out. It's surprising how many "stiff upper lips" there are. Yet for natural expression, and to get equality and firmness of diction, you need to overcome that stiffness and acquire flexibility and control of the upper lip. Without flexibility the mouth cannot be relaxed and natural for speech. Without control it will move too much—and in the wrong way. Imagine mouthings that are noticeable in normal size. Now imagine these mouthings magnified in CinemaScope, Vista Vision, Todd-AO, Cinerama, Cinemiracle and all the rest of the gigantic, colossal and super-colossal systems of film projection. A flexible upper lip will keep your face youthful. One of the first signs of old age is "losing the upper lip." Maurice Chevalier's upper lip has retained its controlled flexibility. His smile has retained a magical youth. With a flexible upper lip you can develop a relaxed smile. In motion pictures and television, the whites of the teeth, like 101
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the whites of the eyes, are of utmost importance. These whites reflect light which the camera picks up. Study close-ups of top ranking motion-picture and television players. Count off in your mind exactly how long they hold their eyes perfectly still, without blinking or moving. Then consciously measure your eye flexibility and control against theirs. Under the stimulation of excitement or dramatic tension, or from force of habit, eyebrows have a tendency to go wild. With a two-hundredfold enlargement of a face in mind, imagine whipping eyebrows. You, as the audience, would be so fascinated by the weird movements of the eyebrows that you’d scarcely be able to keep your mind on the dialogue. Compare your own eyebrow acrobatics with any close-up of Marlon Brando, Shirley Booth, Ingrid Bergman, Marlene Dietrich or Ralph Bellamy. There is never excess movement of eye or brow to distract attention from these stars’ expressions of emotion. The “choker shot”, pioneered by William Cameron Menzies, magnifies even more than the ordinary close-up. Sometimes, it fills the screen with only a part of the face. Often that part is limited to the eyes and eyebrows. You probably remember some choker shots in which a star’s compelling gaze was more eloquent than works. The greatest economy of movement always creates the greatest impact. Untrained eyebrows go wild. Trained eyebrows become tools of expression which can be used under subconscious control. Here is an exercise to develop flexibility and control of eyebrows. Repeat ten times. 102
Slowly arch your eyebrows--as high as you can—slowly return to normal—then slowly pull the eyebrows down and together as close as you can in a frown—then return to normal.
Practice all exercises slowly and under conscious physical control. We all know people whose faces seem to have no vitality. Their expressions are bloodless and flat. Organically, these people may be healthy and yet give the impression of being anemic. They are almost without expression because there is no tone or alertness to the muscles of their faces. After locating certain muscles with your mind, you can develop the muscle tones for a vital, live, animated face. You can be as wide-eyed as Judy Holliday or as menacing as Anthony Quinn by controlling the small muscles just underneath the eyes. The powerful Humphrey Bogart was a peerless master of this delicate technique. Look in a mirror and locate these small muscles—the lower eyelids. Focus your aware-beam on them until you can move them; at first your movements will be very broad. After exercising these lower eyelid muscles, you will develop amazing control. You’ll be able to make movements delicately and the motion itself will hardly be noticeable—but its effect will. From almost invisible muscular movement comes that exciting, subtle play around the eyes. It’s a bit of technique much admired in actors Dirk Bogarde, Ethel Barrymore, Van Heflin, Dorothy McGuire and other stars. 103
The smaller the muscular motion of the lower eyelid, the more subtle is your effect The uncontrolled broad movement is a tool of the ham. Once in a while, it's fun just to be a great big ham— but the actor who knows how to slice it is the one who gets the best results, the greatest rewards and the deepest satisfaction. The eyes have often been called the mirror of the soul because they reflect inner feelings. For an actor, the eyes are also "windows" through which an audience can read the thoughts of a character created by a performer. In motion pictures and television, where camera close-ups sometimes come within a few inches of the face, the importance of the eyes cannot be overemphasized. A fine film director develops a sense of what an audience wants to see in any given situation. With the aid of the camera, he picks up the spectators, bringing them face to face with the actor. Then the camera focuses on the actor's eyes and lets audiences see what the director wants them to see. The actor should do everything he can to improve the use of the eyes and to increase their flexibility and control until they become a manageable tool of his trade. Ida Lupino's eyes are so revealing in their range of expression that they are a dictionary of silent synonyms for actual words. Learning to relax the eyes can be an important tool also. Do you recall the old school physiology-book picture of an eye with the muscles and nerves visible behind it? Remember how the muscles and nerves come together in a sort of knot just behind the eyeball? The point of relaxation is at the very place where those muscles and nerves bunch together. Close your eyes and imagine that you are relaxing the knot
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CLOSE-UP Locate the point of relaxation with your mind and your eyes will soon become relaxed. Keep this on tap in your memory file—especially for motion pictures and television. With your well-developed power of concentration, you can close your eyes lightly for a moment or two just before going in front of the camera to play a scene. When you reopen them they'll be relaxed and fresh, even after a hard day under bright studio lights. When the untrained actor starts acting, he's inclined to use his eyes artificially. He blinks too much. A careful study of the length of time good performers go without blinking, and how annoying too much blinking can be, is an effective way to become aware of your own blinking habits. Here is an exercise which will also help you eliminate this weakness. EXERCISE Concentrate on the elevator muscles at the point of the cheekbone. Contract and release these muscles. Try for independent muscular control. Don't close your eyes or even squint as you contract the muscles. Always keep in mind that these mechanical exercises serve specific purposes. Our next exercise (Smile up—smile down) was used by Bill Williams early in his career. Upon entering an elevator, Bill had a broad smile; as the elevator descended, he gradually realized that he had been hood105
HOW TO ACT
winked, his smile went down in the exact scale pattern of the exercise. This simple exercise received rousing applause at the Hollywood premiere of the film—and Bill learned an object lesson in the importance of dependable technical resources, or tools. This exercise will give you the same results. The exercise serves three purposes: 1. It develops muscle tone and flexibility. 2. It is an emotional "scale." 3. It helps develop the line of concentration. EXERCISE Sit comfortably and mechanically force the broadest "vaudeville" smile you possibly can, stretching every muscle in your face. Show your teeth to the utmost. Hold this smile for an instant, then—slowly—so slowly you can hardly feel the movement—go out of the smile. Slowly let the smile—and the energy that controls it—go down until you almost break into a sob. Just before you break into a sob, let the energy return gradually and slowly. Go back up to the high, forced, mechanical smile. It should take approximately a minute to go down, and the same amount of time to return to the original smiling position. Two minutes for the complete exercise. In the beginning, the muscles of your face will jump and quiver during these facial calisthenics. Soon, you'll be able to 106
CLOSE-UP
blend, smoothly, the muscles used in going from the top to bottom to top. Add another control factor—imagination—and make it a fourpurpose exercise. Imagine a story. The story has a happy beginning, gradually descending through conflicting processes of doubts and hopes, until it sinks into a hopeless tragedy. Just before you break into a sob, you realize the whole thing is a mistake. Your hope, gradually, rises until you reach your original point of happiness. When you have done this two-minute exercise a few times, you will find that the physical action scale and the emotional scale synchronize and support each other—if they are controlled under strongly disciplined concentration. Notice when you are at the bottom of the emotional scale, your breathing is heavy and labored. Your heartbeats are slow and loud. As you come back up the scale, you can feel your breathing and heartbeats speed up. The effect is highly dramatic, as you have seen in the performances of the great Anna Magnani of Italy, Deborah Kerr, Paul Muni, Marlon Brando, Jorge Mistral of Spain, Paul Newman and virtually every exciting star. Who can ever forget the glorious, emotional color palette of Greta Garbo!
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Remember the following words from Chapter 10: Your subconscious is a vast, natural reservoir of creativeness inspiration and emotional power. Imagination releases the creativeness, inspiration and emotional power of that reservoir. To prepare your imagination in the mechanics of tapping your emotional reservoir, you are going to get a series of emotional flexibility and control exercises. If you were standing at the bottom of an empty swimming pool and I started to fill the pool with water, you would first feel the water with your feet, then your ankles, your calves, your knees, thighs, stomach, chest, neck, mouth, nose—until the water finally reached your eyes. Use this imagination formula for the following series of exercises. While doing the exercises, let your body respond naturally to your imagination. Don't try to force yourself into a particular physical mold. Let any mold and movement be the result of your thoughts. No superimposed attitudes and gestures. You are not being told "what to do." You are being told "to do" what you might imagine under these selected circumstances. EMOTIONAL FLEXIBILITY EXERCISE FIRST EXERCISE—Anger Concentrate fully and imagine you are angry . . . . You have never been so angry in your life . . . . Let this feeling of anger travel slowly up your body. Feel it first with your feet . . . . When you are angry your feet will grip the floor . . . . Then feel the anger travel up through your ankles . . . . Your calves .... legs . . . . Your knees will flex as you get set to give or take a blow . . . . Anger travels on up your thighs . . . . your stomach . . . . your chest . . . . pouring out through your arms to your hands, which will probably become fists or claws . . . . On goes the anger, up through your neck to your lips, which will very 110
THE TRUTH SHALL MAKE YOU FREE
likely become thin and hard ___ Then to your nose ____ Finally it reaches your eyes, where your audience looks straight into your imagined feelings. Slowly come out of the exercise. SECOND EXERCISE ----Sadness
You are sad . . . . You have never been so sad in your life . . . . Your feet are heavy and tired ____Your arches are sore ____ Your ankles are swollen . . . . Your knees are so weak they will hardly support the weight of your body . . . . Your stomach is sick and there is that black, heavy feeling in the pit of it . . . . Your heart aches . . . . Your breathing is labored . . . . Your hands are so heavy your arms can hardly carry their weight .... Your throat is dry and sore ___ Your mouth is dry ____Your l i p s a r e pa r c h e d . . . . T h e b r e a t h a l m o s t w h i s t l e s t h r o ug h your dry, parched throat . . . . Your nostrils are dry . . . . Your e y es are tired a n d b lo o ds hot . . . . L e t t h e s t r e n g t h d r a i n o ut o f y o u i nt o t he ea r t h, u nt i l y o u c a n h a r dly t a ke a s te p . When you have gone as far as you can without breaking i n t o a s o b, s l o w l y c o m e o u t o f t h e e x e r c i s e . THIRD EXERCISE—Pride You are proud . . . . You have never been so tall and proud in your life . . . . Your feet are firm on earth . . . . Your legs are straight and lithe . . . . Your hips are taut and slender . . . . Your chest is high and bouyant . . . . Your face is bright and shining . . . . Your eyes are clear and clean . . . . The wind blows through your hair as you stand there in your great pride. Come out of the exercise gradually.
Ill
HOW TO ACT FOURTH EXERCISE —Fear
You are frightened . . . . More frightened than you have ever been before in all your life . . . . You may be killed in a few moments . . . . Your feet want to run, but they can't because they're so heavy . . . . Your flesh creeps . . . . Your knees almost buckle . . . . Your entire being tries to hide within itself . . . . Your words stick in your throat . . . . You may die now at any moment. When you have taken this exercise as far as you can, slowly come out of it. F IFTH EXERCISE —Happiness You are happy . . . . Your feet are eager, alert . . . . Your legs almost dance with joy . . . . Your chest is light and bouyant . . . . You can almost float away . . . . Your smile is happy . . . . Your face shines . . . . Your eyes sparkle. Carry the exercise as far as you can; then slowly come out of it. After every exercise, take a few steps around the room to clear your head. You may not notice the difference in your muscular responses when you first do these exercises, but in a short time you'll become aware that your muscular reactions are as varied as the emotions that stimulate them. You'll find that when you are angry your feet grip the ground in a manner entirely different from the way they grip the ground when you're imagining the emotion of sorrow. You will discover that you cannot penetrate very deeply into
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THE TRUTH SHALL MAKE YOU FREE
any of the emotions when you first start practicing them. Gradually, as you continue to practice the exercises, you'll be able to go further into the emotions. You will confirm how far you can delve into different emotions and still retain dependable control of yourself and your technique. After practicing the emotion exercises for several days, you will grow aware of each emotion producing a definite delineation. You'll see each one standing clean, clear, completely definable, despite any similarity of muscular action in the exercises. In time, your sensitivity and control will increase and you will see each delineation becoming clearer and clearer; more and more cleanly defined. While performing these emotion scales, take careful note. Be acutely aware of how they affect your heartbeat and the rhythm of your breathing. You are forging a key that will open one of the most important doors to the art of acting. Return to each of the emotional flexibility and control exercises; this time, when you reach the top of each emotion—right at the peak—speak a line of dialogue. Whatever the emotion you're working on, it's best to use a very short line with it. For example, in the emotion of anger, use the line, "I'll kill you!" Or, for the emotion of pride, use the line, 'That's my dad!" A word of warning: Don't think of how you are going to say the line, or of how it should sound. Let your interpretation of the speech be entirely the result of your controlled emotion. It will be difficult at first Eventually, you will be able to speak the line spontaneously, allowing the emotion itself to give the words their interpretation. You will develop daring. You won't care how the line sounds, 113
HOW TO ACT
so long as it has the controlled emotion under it. You are ready now for your next exercise. This is the transference from one emotion to another. It is called emotional transition. EXERCISE
{EMOTIONAL TRANSITION) Using your emotion of anger, build it up as high as you can go. When you reach the top, instead of coming out of the anger emotion as you did previously, transfer it to the high peak of your emotion of sorrow. Slowly come out of the exercise. Keep trying. You will soon perform the emotional transition with the ease born of skill. Practice making various series of transitions, using all the emotions and situations in the preceding exercises, plus others you make up for yourself. Invent many variations of these exercises. They will give great range and flexibility to your emotional scale. They will provide you with a dependable and substantial set of emotion tools which you can count on whenever you need them. These exercises will, in short, give you CONTROLLED EMOTIONAL FLEXIBILITY.
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Over the past few weeks you've flexed your mental muscles and had a good physical workout You've explored the resources of the mind for tools of acting. You are able to make your body serve you expressively. You can apply the mechanics of timing through proper use of mind and body. You've accomplished a lot But as yet we've done nothing about your voice. And acting is composed of three basic elements—the voice, the body and the mind. It's time to take up voice and diction. Every normal person is born with an instrument that can be used to produce a good voice. But only a few learn to use that instrument right. Wrong use builds up a system of tensions that keep the voice instrument from functioning properly to the best advantage. Voice is sound produced by air passing through the larynx and made audible by vibrations of the vocal cords. You may have heard that your voice is produced in the mask of your face, in some spot in the sinus region or in the throat. None of that is true. The only place you can produce a vocal sound or make a vocal noise is in your Adam's apple. That projection, called the Adam's apple, is formed by thyroid cartilage, and is part of the larynx. Inside the Adam's apple are two small bands of membrane, the vocal cords. They come together with a slightly downward motion and vibrate by means of compressed air to produce the sound called voice. When you've had a sore throat, have you ever had a sore Adam's apple? Of course not. If you've ever suffered from laryngitis, you will remember that your throat was not noticeably sore. You just couldn't talk. The sound produced by the vibrations of the vocal cords down in the Adam's apple is not very big. But that sound is enlarged and enriched by overtones produced by a series of "echoes" in the various nasal, oral and chest chambers. There is no actual sound originating in the sinus cavities, the 116
A BODY WITH A VOICE
nasal cavities, the mouth or the chest There are only sympathetic air and sound vibrations, which are set into motion by the vibrations of the vocal cords. The combination of sympathetic air and sound virbrations disturbs the air like ripples in a pool when a pebble has been tossed into the water. The disturbed air, which we call sound waves, passes out into the atmosphere. It is picked up by the "receiving set" in our ears, or other ears, living or mechanical, and is reconverted into sound as we hear it If you put too much uncontrolled power behind your voice, the "ripples" will be distorted, destroying the rhythmic sound patterns, just as heaving a big rock into a pool would cause distorted ripples that pile up and overlap each other. Control of possible distortion is becoming more and more important as microphones, tape and speakers are improved electronically. Through exercises you can develop the affinity of your echo chambers (nasal, oral and chest) for the sympathetic air and sound vibrations set into motion by the vibrating vocal cords. The mouth and throat, besides acting as resonating chambers, have sympathetic air and sound vibrations of their own. They also act like the bell of a trumpet or megaphone to project these combined vibrations into space. A variety of noises can be made by the vibrations of the vocal cords. These noises, blended together and chopped up by mechanical movements of the lips and tongue, become speech. The simple vocal sounds made by the vocal cords are known as vowels. The mechanical actions made by the lips and tongue are called consonants. Il7
HOW TO ACT
Some consonants are silent; others have vibrations. These are called voiceless and voiced—sonants and surds. In English, when a voiceless consonant ends a syllable, it should be followed by a slight puff of air. Voiced consonants should have the same vibrations, whether used at the beginning or the end of a syllable. A tight throat stifles the vowel sounds and causes the consonants to be tense and strained, or to be left out altogether. It also distorts the rhythmic sound pattern. Sit in front of a mirror. Lift your tongue and look at the under side of it. You can see that it's one mass of muscle. Tighten the muscles as tight as you can and you'll find that your throat will become tight and rigid, too. Feel your throat with your fingers —notice how tense it is. Next, relax the muscles under the tongue. Focus your con~ scious-beam on your tongue and keep it relaxed. Letting the tongue remain relaxed, try to tighten any part of your throat. Impossible. It can't be done. You have reduced—to the simple training of the tongue —the entire rigmarole of keeping a relaxed throat. The tongue has two sets of muscles, extrinsic and intrinsic. The set of muscles that you use both to tighten and relax your throat are the extrinsic muscles. They are used primarily for swallowing. Usually through tensions and inhibitions, which bring about bad habits, a great many people use their set of extrinsic muscles for speaking as well as for swallowing. The results: tight throats, sluggish consonants and bad speech in general. The intrinsic muscles are those which lengthen and shorten the 118
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tongue; flatten and thicken it. They are the muscles you use when you cleanly and clearly make the mechanical actions called consonants. With a little concentration and well-directed application of effort, it's easy to train the extrinsic and intrinsic muscles to perform independently. The next thing to find out is how to make the vocal cords vibrate. Somewhere in your anatomy you must produce the power to bring about the vibration. Your production center is the diaphragm. Your breath brings about the vibrations. Your mental command to produce a sound you can hear causes the vocal cords to click down together, closing the open passage in the larynx. The vocal cords act like two taut rubber bands placed side by side so their edges are in juxtaposition. The breath current then vibrates these two edges. You created a similar effect as a youngster, when you put two blades of grass into your mouth and then blew, causing the blades to vibrate simultaneously. You have learned that the Little sound produced by the breath current vibrating the vocal cords is enlarged by means of sympathetic air and sound vibrations set up in the echo chambers of the head and chest. These head and chest echo chambers are cavities of different sizes. Echoes from the varisized chambers differ in tone, according to the length of the vibrations, just as the tone of a piano note depends, in part, on the length of its string. The longer the string, the slower the vibrations and the fuller and deeper the tone. The shorter strings bring about shorter, faster vibrations, producing a sharper, lighter tone. 119
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Refer to the exercise poem in Chapter 8. Keep the chest high; with no movement of the chest, and the tongue relaxed, leaving the throat open—whisper each line twice, then, take it aloud twice— WITHOUT CHANGING THE THROAT FROM THE WHISPERING POSITION.
Be careful not to change anything you have learned—keep the tongue relaxed. At this point don't worry about diction. If your throat becomes tired, it's because you have tightened the extrinsic muscles of the tongue. Let those muscles remain relaxed and be sure that your chest does not move. After doing this awhile, the quality of your speaking voice changes a great deal. The low frequencies begin to come into it The voice becomes much richer and of a more solid texture. Quality—like the "quality of mercy"—is no longer "strain'd."
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Scientific improvement in the acoustics of legitimate theaters, and the development of electronic sound systems in film and television, have made it possible for audiences to hear the performer more clearly than ever before. In motion pictures and television, the actor's speech can now be directed intimately to each one in an audience. Each individual in the audience likes to understand what he's hearing; and make up his own mind as to the truth and realism of it The actor's problem is greater because he no longer performs for an audience as a group. He performs for a group of individual thinkers. Each of these individuals bases his critical judgment, either consciously or subconsciously, (audible or not) on remembered experiences of his own or someone else. Words—their use, meaning, sound and cleanness of delivery —are tools of the actor. The actor's responsibility is to execute these words cleanly and clearly: to do this with such ease and dexterity that they sound pleasing and natural—and above all, so that they produce excitement. Words—like everything else—are made up of something: they have two parts, sound and action. They also have a beginning and an end. Each sound and action, each beginning and end are of equal importance to every word. The separate parts of each word must be executed with balanced vitality. In the theater this is necessary to propel the vibrations of sound to each individual ear in the audience. In motion pictures and television this balanced vitality is necessary to energize the sound system. Balanced vitality is not to be confused with accent and stress. With a few exceptions, the "parts" of words can—for all practical purposes— be reduced to ten sounds and five actions.
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HOW TO TALK ENGLISH
Ten Sounds with Diacritical Marks Key Word a...................................as in ................................... father
o............................... as in ................................ so oo ................................... a s e...................................... a s i....................................... a s e ...................................... a s a ...................................... a s oo .................................... a s u ...................................... a s a...................................... a s
i n ....................................... i n ....................................... i n ........................................ i n ........................................ i n ........................................ i n ........................................ i n ....................................... i n .......................................
soon see hit deck ha d hook luck law
The actions are:
ACTION
EXPLANATION
Lips together, then opened
b Three slightly different thoughts P and pressures m
Tongue strikes against gum line of upper front teeth—then relaxes
Four slightly different thoughts and pressures
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LETTER PRODUCED
1 d t n
ACTION
EXPLANATION
Back tongue
Two slightly
meets soft palate, then relaxes
different thoughts and pressures
Lower lip
Two slightly
against upper front teeth
different thoughts and pressures
Blade of tongue and hard ridge
A buzz and a hiss
LETTER PRODUCED g k
v f
z S
back of
upper teeth Final r's are pronounced like the er in the word ermine. The ing sound must be executed with the nostrils open, not closed. Wh is pronounced hoo. Two of the actions can be combined, producing what is known as double-consonant combinations. The most common double-consonant combinations in the English language are: bl, br, cl, cr, dr, ft, fr, gl, gr, pi, pr, sh, zh, sm, si, sn, sp, sq, st, sw, cb, sc, tr—plus two executions of the consonant combination, th: this and thick. There are a few consonantal diphthongs: they are the soft g, j and x. One conso-vowel: the beginning r, and one conso-vowel combination: qu. 124
HOW TO TALK EN GUSH
In English there are very few triple consonant combinations. Some of the most common are: chr, spr, sch, scl, scr, spl, and shr. W is always pronounced do. Y is always pronounced e. In ordinary American speech: "The" before a consonant is always pronounced thu (except for emphasis). "The" before a vowel is always pronounced the. "A" before a consonant is always pronounced u (except for emphasis). "A" before a vowel is always pronounced a. By combining two of the ten sounds, we can produce the six "sound combinations," or diphthongs, that are most frequently used in American English. The first sound in a diphthong is called a "prime," because it is the stronger of the two. The second sound is called the "vanish." It is the weaker of the two. Here are the diphthongs in American English: PRIME e a o e a
a
VANISH plus e plus e plus oo plus oo plus oo plus oo
DIPHTHONG as equals a equals i as as equals o as u equals equals ou as as equals oi
KEY in
hate
in
night hope cute house boil
in in
in in
All words are made up of single, double or triple actions (consonants) and single sounds (vowels), or combined sounds (diphthongs). If we think of the consonants as being actions, we are more 126
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likely to execute them completely. They should be fully executed whether they come at the beginning, in the middle or at the end of a word. The same rule holds true for a sound, whether it's a single sound or a combination of sounds. They should be fully executed according to the pronunciation given in a reputable dictionary. The actor must sometimes correctly speak incorrect diction. This is simply a matter of substituting sounds or actions that are common to the local speech or dialect as they are needed for the characterization. When the actor turns his attention seriously to sound, he finds he has many new concepts and tools to use. Thousands of man hours and dollars have been spent to reproduce perfectly the voice vibrations made by the human instrument. Comparatively few man hours and dollars have been spent by the actor exploring the possibilities and further developing the human vibrator. The audience has spent many more man hours training its ear—and developing its emotional expectancy than the actor has in fulfilling the audience's expectations. The actor must be understandable the first time through—the audience cannot go back and run over a difficult passage as they can in a book or a newspaper. The eye receives more quickly and retains longer than the ear. The ear is as easily tired by a monotonous sound or speech pattern as by uninteresting dialogue. Diction is not as difficult as it seems; it's just confusing, because in English we have two languages—the written and the spoken. Don't worry about it too much; just pronounce all the sounds and execute all the actions, then you'll be all right After all, as an actor, you have to talk 126
Did you ever have a friend ask: "What was that again?" as you finished telling him something? Then you repeated exactly what you had said—this time stressing certain key words for emphasis, and giving them a special connotation to bring out a particular significance beyond their literal and obvious meaning. Audiences can't ask, "What was that again?" Actors have to use stress and connotation as tools of interpretation. These tools can answer every possible question that the speech prompts in the mind of the listener. Every sentence has several words in it which might give the answer to specific questions. For instance, take the line, "This is Helen Hayes speaking to you." There are at least seven questions you could answer in this simple remark. Read the line, accenting, or stressing, the first word, "this." "This is Helen Hayes speaking to you." You have answered the question "Who?" Read the line again, stressing the second word, "is." "This is Helen Hayes speaking to you." You have not only established, but emphasized the identity of the speaker. Accent the word "Helen" and you know which member of the Hayes family is speaking. If you accent the word "Hayes," you stress which particular Helen is speaking. Not Helen Smith, not Helen Jones, but Helen Hayes. Stress the word "speaking" and that answers the question of what Helen Hayes is doing. Accent the word "to" and it's clear that she's talking directly to you. By accenting the word "you," there is no doubt to whom Helen Hayes is talking. The variety of meanings you can acquire by the ability to stress 128
WHO, WHAT, WHEN AND WHERE?
and give special connotation to any word in a line gives the line authority, vitality and color. In the first line of the "quality of mercy" speech, Portia says: "The quality of mercy is not strain'd." Helen Hayes would be able to answer all these parenthetical questions in that single phrase: (The what?) ... The quality ... (of what?) ... of mercy .. . (is not what?) ... is not strain'd. By answering those three questions in that one phrase, its reading gains much more color, or vividness, than it would have if the actor thought of it as answering only one question. Practice the "quality of mercy" speech, answering each of the following parenthetical questions. EXERCISE (The what?) The quality (of what?) of mercy (is not what?) is not strain'd, (it what?) It droppeth (as what?) as the gentle rain (from where?) from heaven (to where?) Upon the place beneath: (it is what?) It is twice blest—It blesseth (whom?) him that gives, and him that takes, (how great is it? ) Tis mightiest in the mightiest, (how does it affect kings?) it becomes The throned monarch (how?) better than his crown, (why?) His sceptre shows the force (of what?) of temporal power, (what's that?) The attribute to awe and majesty, Wherein doth sit (the what?) the dread (and what?) and fear of kings. But mercy is (is what?) above this sceptred sway, (why?) It is enthroned in the hearts of kings, It is an attribute (to whom?) to God himself; And earthly power doth then show
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likest God's (when does mercy become thus?) When mercy seasons justice. Here axe the five Ws and an H that will help you with stress and connotation. Who What Why
When Where How
Using the "quality of mercy" speech—controlled by the five W's and an H—as a pattern, read aloud as much as you can. Especially read dialogue. This will give you a solid interpretative background, and prepare you to take the fast direction that is necessary today. If you conscientiously practice answering these "who, what, why, when, where, how" questions, you will develop word flexibility and be able to get more out of the scenes in a later chapter.
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"Double-track" is a phrase we borrow from motion-picture terminology. In making a motion-picture film, the speech can be recorded on one track, the background music and sound effects, in juxtaposition, on another. They are run simultaneously and blended into a single unified track This is mechanical double-track. The actor uses mental double-track. Double-track is the reactor of acting. It controls the spoken dialogue. It constructs a solid, continuous line of concentration— developed from the actor's creative imagination—as a substructure to support the words he speaks. Double-track contains the audible sound track of dialogue and the silent track of thought. Both motivate reaction. Double-track helps develop a fully rounded, natural characterization. Some actors double-track instinctively. They do it to a greater or lesser degree—with technical awareness, or in hit-and-miss manner. Great performers double-track all the time—in every rehearsal —in every performance. Reacting is as important to a scene as acting. Sometimes it is more important. The reaction of a person on the receiving end of a speech is as significant to a play (and its audience) as the speech itself. Every actor must find out what goes into the art of reacting— then he must perfect the technique of reacting. The tool for this is—double-track. It is set in motion by the other actor's delivery— it is locked in place by listening. Double-track is an important function in the training of an actor's mind. It recognizes the existence of two trains of thought going on at the same time (in real life) in juxtaposition to each other. It then incorporates this realistic process into the technique of acting. Allow me to repeat: Double-track constructs a solid, continuous line of concentration, developed from the actor's creative imagination, as a substructure to support the words he speaks. 132
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A line of concentration is the power line that transmits empathy between the actor and an audience. Without this there is no empathy. Without empathy, there is no "truth." "Truth" is the result of the substructure upon which the dialogue rides. The substructure is the result of double-track. When a director calls for "more reaction," many actors, especially newcomers, respond by mugging. This isn't what the director wants. There has to be a reason for your reaction. If the thought is there, it will show through, in reaction. There is a natural responsive rhythm between action and reaction. Perfect timing takes place by following that rhythm. When you double-track in a role, you're doing a natural thing. You are completing a rhythmic pattern and giving your senses the benefit of faultless timing. In both—the conscious objective of a role and the subconscious objective of its double-track—you obey the laws of timing. You have become aware of two of the actor's great common denominators: TIMING and SUBSTITUTION. Think of them as forming the sides of a triangle—SUBSTITUTION on one side— TIMING on the other. At the apex of the triangle is DOUBLE-TRACK. It is the peak achievement that results from the substitution-timing support Everything that is in substitution is in double-track. Everything that is in timing is in double-track. It is the ULTIMATE COMMON DENOMINATOR that contains all other common denominators. It elevates the craft to the art of acting. At this peak, all parts are reduced to their lowest common denominator of real life—where they came from in the first place 133
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—and reassembled to create a whole person of consciously assumed reality. The following scenes will show you how to double-track, when working with another actor. Listen to his lines for double-track clues. In performance, double-track is a combination of the audible sound track and a silent track of connected mind pictures. In training, it is more effective, at first, to double-track aloud— memorizing the exact words that come from your imagination. Then, silently think these words exactly as you memorized them. Later, this silent double-track will be translated from thought into instantaneous mind pictures. When you translate this thought line into a series of connected mind pictures, your acting will begin to have the exciting, vital quality every actor strives for. Your double-track image for the following scenes will be different from mine. Your interpretation of the characters' inner thoughts will not be the same as mine. The important thing is to keep the interpretation honest and within the framework of the characters, as you understand them. The silent double-track must be invented—thought and rethought—just as conscientiously as the audible part of the scene is learned. Only then will it become an automatic habit-pattern that will be dependable under the tensions of actual performance —and help you keep up with the speed of modern show business. In the following scenes, the parenthetical italicized lines are some of the possible double-track thoughts and reactions. When thought becomes a mind picture, it takes only a fraction of a second to flash its message. So it is possible for the character Ruth in 134
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the first scene to speculate about the man at the registration desk and size him up in the brief moment it takes her to say the single word "Yeah." EXERCISE-SCENE NO. I The lobby of a shabby, third-rate hotel. TOM, a personable young man, enters. He looks around for a moment, then walks over to the registration desk and taps the bell. In a few seconds RUTH, a flashy young girl, enters from a door behind the desk, taking up her post at the desk. RUTH (Who's this guy? He's not the kind who stays in a hotel like this.) Yeah? (Not bad lookin'. Probably up to somethin'.) What do you want? TOM
(Hm-m, quite a dish for a fleabag like this. I wonder if she's Ruth.) Fix me up with a room? RUTH
(Looks like he's got some dough.) What do you want, double or single? TOM
(Well, they told me to get acquainted with her, regardless of what it costs.) 135
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Maybe you'd better fix me up with a double—just in case. (Boy, that's a corny line. I must be slipping.) RUTH
(Fresh guy, but kinda cute.) Do you want a bath or not? TOM
(Here I go again!) Well, I've had one, but I could probably stand another. (That one really stinks, too. It must be the atmosphere around here.) RUTH
(Same price, kid, even if you are cute.) Number six. That will be two dollars. TOM
(What a dive! Anything for the job, though.) Two dollars? Here it is. Cheap at half the price, huh? RUTH
(Cheap, huh? Who does he think he is!) That's a good room. TOM
(I've got to get this in writing for the record.) Do you want me to sign anything? 136
DOUBLE-TRACK YOUR DOUBLE TALK RUTH
(Gee, he's got me running around in circles.) Oh, yeah. You've got to register. TOM
(Here's a chance to find out if this is Ruth. Maybe I can trick her into telling me her name.) (as he writes he spells out the letters) T-o-m R-o-g-e-r-s. What's yours? RUTH
(taken by surprise, but not for long) Ruth Jac— (For the luva—Man! He's a fast one.) Doesn't make any difference what mine is. TOM
(Better watch my step.) You're right (Flattery can't hurt. Anyhow it's the truth.) With a shape like yours, it doesn't make any difference what your name is. RUTH
(He's sharp. Notices everything.) You know all the answers, don't you? TOM
(She's not sore. Think she really likes this cornball line.) Sure. I worked my way through college—selling a book— What Every Young Girl Should Know. 137
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(/ can keep up with you, fella.) Yeah, I know—I wrote it. (Let's get back to business. I don't want him to think I'm too anxious.) Do you want to go to your room now? TOM
( Ugh, I can hardly face the thought.) Well, I want to, but I've got some business in town. (Little more of the old pitch now.) You have things all comfy for me when I come back, will you? RUTH
(picking up his bag) (This guy's pretty sure of himself.) I'll do that I'll raise the window and turn on the hot water for you. TOM
(She'll be a pushover—/ hope.) So long—Dreamboat.
EXERCISE-SCENE NO. 2 A lawyer's office. J OHNSON , a simple, honest, laboring man, is attempting to explain to an attorney how he was tricked into giving a criminal an alibi, making it possible for the real killer to go free and an innocent man to be convicted. 138
DOUBLE-TRACK YOUR DOUBLE TALK JOHNSON
(Oh, Lord, how did I ever get into this! Will he believe me? He's got to believe me!) I was a transient— (Better give it to him straight.) and I had been drinking. (So help me, it's the truth.) I hadn't heard anything about the little girl. (What a fool I was.) I thought they were trying to find out about the fight (I'm afraid the law's not going to like this.) So I didn't tell the sheriff anything except what time it was when I was drinking with Red. (// / just hadn't let him trick me. If I'd just never met him.) After I found out about (The kid's dead, Dead!) the little girl being killed, (// I'd just been smarter!) I knew Red had tricked me into alibiing for him. (Just as well get it over with.) Well, I was drinkin' with him one day, (Yeh, it sure adds up—now.) and he seemed anxious for me to remember what time it was. (// he'll just believe me. It's the truth.) Seemed a little nervous, (I shouldn't a' got so loaded.) but he'd been drinkin' quite a lot of wine, and (// I'd been sober, I'd have caught on.) well—I didn't think much about it, at the time. 139
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{How could I know it was a thing like that?) I was kidding him about some scratches on his face. {Yes, he told me—and I believed it!) He told me {The liar! The dirty, killing liar!) he walked into a plum tree. EXERCISE-SCENE NO. 3 The lavish drawing room of MRS. MAUDE ROYDEN, a wealthy society woman who has just returned from a club meeting. She enters the room and sees her daughter, JOYCE, who is thumbing through a magazine. MAUDE
{Mm-m—so there's my new Harper's Bazaar. I'll tell her now.) Oh, Joyce, I'm so glad you're home. {She'll love this. Simply love it!) We've discovered the most wonderful thing for the Junior League to do this year—while the fleet's in town. JOYCE
(/ can just imagine!) Have you —joined the Junior League, Mother? MAUDE
{What a flippant sense of humor young people have today.) No, dear, but I'll tell you what to do and you can do it. 140
DOUBLE-TRACK YOUR DOUBLE TALK JOYCE
( You always tell me what to do.) But, Mother, I'm not the entire Junior League. It might be that— MAUDE
{She should have more selj^confidence. After all, she's my daughter.) Nonsense, my dear. If you want the League to have a party for all those nice sailor boys, they'll just have it. That's all there is to it JOYCE
(How grim!) Oh, do I want to have a party for the—er—Navy? MAUDE
(That's better. She just needs handling.) Of course you do—don't you? JOYCE (Grim? This is positively revolting.) Well, up to the present moment I hadn't given it a great deal of thought—in fact, it comes as a complete surprise to me. (Mother's always so BUSY. Probably comes of having nothing to do.) I suppose you and the other members of your little sewing circle have been sitting around a tea table at the Fairmont all afternoon, planning ways and means of keeping your respective daughters out of trouble. (THEY should talk!) 141
HOW TO ACT You want to watch out that some of you older gals don't get into trouble yourselves, Mother dear. MAUDE
(Really! I wonder if she could have heard—of course not.) Joyce, sometimes I don't quite understand you. That's what comes of letting you lead your own life, as you call it. None of you— not one of your set—has any respect for her mother. JOYCE
(That's right—up on your soapbox.) Oh, Mother, now let's not start that again. (Might as well get this over.) Now tell me what is this great plan of yours to entertain the Navy? MAUDE
(There now, she's being more reasonable.) We believe it would be nice if the League gave a ball. JOYCE
(How dull) But someone is going to give a ball. There's always a ball. All the officers arrive in droves—and all the League members arrive in droves. Then they're shuffled together to the rhythm of a smooth band—and what happens? (Everybody knows what happens!) They all leave in pairs. They come in droves—and leave in couples. Hundreds of couples pouring out the front door, the side 142
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door, the back door—even out the windows of the Fairmont Hotel! And then what happens? (The pay-off.) Three debutantes are married off to three unsuspecting Naval officers, and the social season is considered a success! MAUDE
(What an attitude to take!) I don't know where you get your ideas—you always ridicule the social system your family has helped to build. In my day a young girl— JOYCE (Not that again/) Now, now, Mother—Don't start about when you were a young girL (Rather have her go on about the ball.) Just tell me all about this officers' ball you cooked up this afternoon. MAUDE
(Oh, she doesn't understand that this will be a different sort of ball.) It isn't for the officers, Joyce. It's for all those nice sailor boys and their nice little girl friends. You can have it at the Civic Auditorium. JOYCE
(laughs) (Bell bottom trousers, here we come!) You mean—for the gobs?
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HOW TO ACT MAUDE
(Really, such language!) Gobs? I don't know what you mean by that word. I mean all those lovely boys with the little round white hats. They're all so far away from home—and so, of course, they're homesick. Oh, Joyce, it will be a wonderful thing for you girls to do something for them. (That's it—appeal to her better self.) JOYCE
(/ can see it now!) Oh, Mother, Mother! You're so delightfully naive. Those boys wouldn't take a deb to a dance at the Civic Auditorium. (She can't mean this.) How you've changed in the last few hours—wanting me to go out with a gob. MAUDE
(Mercy, what an idea.) Oh, no, darling. You girls won't go with them. They will bring their own girls. You will invite the officers of course. JOYCE
(Poor Mother. She just doesn't know.) I can see your social education has been sadly neglected, Mother. Have you ever watched a sailor make a date with a girl? (And it always looks rather intriguing, too.) She's standing there on the corner of Powell and Market—all done up in a bright red dress, with a pair of green shoes, a suede sports
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jacket and plenty of purple lipstick. Up comes a gob—there's a little jockeying back and forth—and the date's on. That's the way they do it at Powell and Market MAUDE
( She's just trying to irritate me.) Don't be absurd, dear. I'm serious about this. JOYCE
{Serious? Are you?) Well, you might just as well count me out of it—because I'm not going to have anything to do with it. Besides, I know the League won't do it MAUDE
(She can't cross me like this all the time.) Of course you'll do it. Now I don't want to hear any more about it You don't have to go with one of those boys. {Let's see—who would be nice?) You can invite one of the nice officers you met last year. Or Tony Craig. JOYCE {She's bullying me.) I'm not going to do it, Mother. You might as well quit trying to talk me into it MAUDE
(This time I'm going to put my foot down.) Of course you'll do it— 145
HOW TO ACT JOYCE
(Determined/ Hm-m—maybe this could be fun.) All right—if I do it, you'll have to take the consequences. MAUDE
(Now what does she mean by that?) What kind of consequences? JOYCE
(You can't stop me now. You asked for it! ) If I have to go through with this—I'm going to do it my way! (I certainly am!) I'll go to the dance—and what's more, I'll take me a man— (Oh, this is too delicious!) and do you know where I'm going to get him? I'm going down to Powell and Market and pick me up a gob! EXERCISE-SCENE NO. 4 Seated at her telephone in her modest office is KAY CALHOUN, a young woman private investigator, who has been retained by a church group to establish the innocence of a man unjustly accused of a killing, KAY is going through a list of important lawyers, trying to get one who will handle the case of the convicted man at a re-trial. The scene opens with KAY in the middle of a conversation with an attorney. KAY
(He just doesn't want to bother with the case. He's made up his mind.) 146
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If you'll only read the transcript of the triaL (pause) (He's being stubborn now. He doesn't wart to reason. How can he be so unfair?) I can't understand how you can say that before you've looked into the case. (// he'd just see me, I know I could convince him that Monkey's innocent. I have the facts. All he'd have to do is listen.)
Well, will you let me come over and talk to you about it? (pause) (Stubborn. Pig-headed. Lawyers—Justice! He wouldn't recognize Justice if he walked right into her scales.) That's your final
answer? (Mark him off. Mark him off.)
Well, thank you very much. ( What now? Who's left?) (KAY hangs up the receiver, looks at her list. All the names are crossed off except one. She now crosses off that last name as she speaks into the telephone again.) (Our last hope.) Atwater 2743, please. (pause) (Guess lawyers are like everyone else. They believe what they want to believe.) This is Kay Calhoun. Could I talk with Mr. Drumm? (pause) (Maybe I can drum Mackey's innocence into his head.) Hello, Mr. Drumm, I've been retained by a church organization to investigate the Earl Mackey case. 147
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(Of course you know about it—it's been in all the papers.) What's that? (pause) (/ should give up? Don't you tell me what to do, Mister. Let me tell you a thing or two.) But, Mr. Drumm, I've already started the investigation and I've certainly found enough evidence to make me doubt that he's guilty— (pause) {Man innocent until he's proved guilty! Humph! Guilty until he's proved innocent! But how can we prove anything if no one will take the case?) But it seems to me that if there is any doubt at all, every effort should be made to get a new trial— (pause) (Oh, don't be so unctuous!) What? (/ wish my mother hadn't taught me to be a lady!) Well—thank you— (For nothing!) Thank you very much. Good-by. (And that's that. End of the list. But that's not that—and it's not the end of the line. I'll find someone—I'll find a lawyer yet!) EXERCISE-SCENE NO. 5 A small room in a country building housing courtrooms, jail and morgue, RUTH'S mother and father have been killed in an explosion, RUTH, accompanied by her boy friend, JACK, is in the 148
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building, but has just been summoned to identify the bodies of her parents, JACK is left alone in the room. After a considerable length of time a DETECTIVE enters. DETECTIVE
(So this is the kid, bub. Sort of innocent-looking. His kind'll fool you. He looks nervous already.) Sit down, Jack. You've got lots of time. JACK
(Poor Ruth. I wish I could help her. Oh, here's the dectective. Wonder if Ruth is still back there.) Where's Ruth? DETECTIVE
(I'll play it smooth, first.) She's tied up just now, Jack. JACK
(She needs me with her. Poor kid.) I want to go to her. DETECTIVE
(You can go to her—after you've told me what I want to know.) After a while. Maybe she wants to be alone. JACK (Alone! At a time like this! She needs me.) I don't think she wants to be alone.
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(So he wants to be with her, huh? Afraid she might talk. They'll talk—both of 'em.) I think maybe she does. (Well, I'll start with a few leading questions and get to the point.) In the Navy, weren't you, Jack? JACK
(Navy? What's that got to do with it?) Yes. DETECTIVE
(I'll get him up to the point.) How long you in, Jack? JACK
( What difference does it make to him?) Little over three years. DETECTIVE
(Hm—three years. Had time to have plenty of training with depth bombs.) Ever have anything to do with depth bombs? JACK
(Depth bombs? Me? I was a wireless operator. What's going on here?) No. I was a wireless operator. 150
DOUBLE-TRACK YOUR DOUBLE TALK DETECTIVE
( Wireless operator. He'd know bow to rig up a time bomb. I'll lead him on a little more.) Know how to fix a radio, I suppose? JACK
{This guy's trying to find out something. What's he driving at?) Why—sure. DETECTIVE
{I'll bet you do!) Fixed any lately? JACK
{Fixed any lately? This guy's nuts. What's really on his mind? What would I be doing fixing radios?) Why—no. DETECTIVE
{He'll try to alibi out of this.) Thought maybe you had. Found some wire in the glove compartment of your car. JACK
( What's he doing in the glove compartment of my car?) Wire? DETECTIVE
{Want to play dumb, huh? Might as well start putting the pressure on.) Where did you get that wire, Jack? 151
HOW TO ACT JACK
(There's not any wire in my car. What's he asking me all these questions j or?) I don't know what you're talking about. DETECTIVE
(He knows what I'm talking about.) Oh, yes you do, Jack. That was part of the wire you used on the dynamite. JACK
(Dynamite! Does he think I had something to do with—oh my God!) Wliat're you talking about? DETECTIVE
(Now I've got him! He's excited. O.K.—I'll let him squirm.) The dynamite you took out to the yacht JACK
(He's—God! I can't believe—) Dynamite to the yacht? DETECTIVE
(He's squirming.) The dynamite you took out to the yacht and wired up to the alarm clock. 152
DOUBLE-TRACK YOUR DOUBLE TALK JACK
(This guy's trying to make trouble for me—I've got to get out —get away—I haven't done anything.) Wired to an alarm clock! DETECTIVE
(Now—he's breaking. He was in on it, all right.) Where did you get the dynamite, Jack? JACK (This man thinks I had something to do with the murder. How could he think such a thing—I never had anything to do with dynamite in my life. I don't like this.) I never saw any dynamite. DETECTIVE
(Yeah, I know—but where did you get it? Probably stole it somewhere—say! ) Did you steal it from the Navy Supply Depot? JACK
(He's crazy—I'm being framed!—I'm scared—) No—I— DETECTIVE
(Fumbling for an answer now. He stole it from the Navy, sure as Hell.) You bought it?
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(I'm scared—/ don't know what to do—) No—I— DETECTIVE
(You sure had a motive, boy!) Ruth's a wealthy girl, now. (You knew about the money, kid.) You know that, don't you, Jack? JACK
(Money!—What's that got to do with me?) How would I know? DETECTIVE
(They both had a motive. Looks like they were both in on it. He didn't have the money to swing it—but Ruth did.) Did Ruth buy the dynamite? JACK
( You lousy—you son-of-a—/ He's accusing—) What's she got to do with this? DETECTIVE
( Yep! She gave him the money and he bought it.) Or—did you buy it yourself? JACK
( What's he talking about—?) Did I buy what myself. I don't know what you're talking about (Thisis bad.) I want to get out of here. 154
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(It'll be a long time before you get out of here, boy. You might as well open up.) Well—you might be here quite a while yet (All right, Smart Guy. I've had enough of this. Let's let him have it!) Come on, kid. Why did you murder them? (Let's see how you take that.) JACK
(Me—Murder—? Oh, God,! Why I never even—where's Ruth. What are they doing to Ruth? We're being accused of—) Murder! At first you will probably think and react as you believe you are supposed to. That won't ring true, and the audience will know it You must double-track in the character's image. Of course, what the character means to you—what you are able to make out of it—will always reflect a little of your personal self. A certain amount of the actor's ego is necessary to every characterization; it gives impact 155
An actor must keep his mind and body vital and alert He has no time for boredom. A bored person is a tired one, and a tired person is dull and unexciting. An actor must be an exciting personality. All normal people have within them an almost unlimited supply of energy, dammed up and choked off by mental and emotional barriers—most of which they are not even aware of. Whether you realize it or not, the energy is there—more of it than you know what to do with. Dynamic, creative men and women in all walks of life have learned to tear out the barriers that hold back their great store of energy. Once you have learned to tap the immense reservoir of energy that lies latent within you—you will be amazed at the vitality, power, creativeness and drive you possess. There are many psychological reasons for the barricades we build up which stifle our energy. But for our purposes, you only need to focus your awareness on two of these barriers: FEAR OF ABSURDITY and BOREDOM.
To be a good actor, you must get rid of the fear of absurdity, just as you would get rid of a bad tooth. The fear of absurdity is largely a fear of ridicule. Although a fear of this kind is usually called an inferiority complex, the honest person is likely to find that his inferiority complex is really a superiority complex. Sooner or later, he realizes that it is his swollen ego which nags him to always be the best, or first, in life's struggle for recognition. This swollen ego cannot stand the fear of being laughed at—if he is not the best or does not come in first. For the person with an inferiority complex, I can suggest one quick way to get rid of it. Best or worst, first or last, say to yourself: "So what!" An actor must be a daring individual. He must take a chance. If you think you're being asked to make a fool of yourself in anything you have been told to do in the preparation or per-
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formance of a role—do it just the same—as long as you keep within the bounds of good taste. Take a chance. Risk ridicule. You'll probably find that, instead of being absurd, you are being a convincing performer—a good entertainer. Far from laughing at you, your audience will laugh with you. They will be filled with admiration—perhaps envy. The actor must be an individualist Perhaps more than the creative artist in any other field. It is this individualism which makes him stand out from the average man and woman. But while you are giving expression to your individualism as an actor, don't forget to be humbly grateful. Thank your lucky stars that the world is populated for the most part by average people, because they are your audience. They have the same unexpressed desires, unattained goals and unrelieved scales of feelings that exist in the characters of plays, films and novels. Through empathy, created between the actor and the audience, they are able to vicariously express their desires, attain their goals and relieve their feelings. When I first gave you the "smiling exercise," the chances are you felt pretty silly doing it But since you have acquired an underStanding of its purpose and experienced its usefulness, I doubt if you feel that way about it any longer. You will find that a friend watching you do the exercises will not think you absurd at all. In fact, he's likely not to be able to take his eyes away. You will have created fascination.
An actor must fascinate his audience. During the process of developing individualism and daring, it is important to use good taste as a control. 159
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I'm not encouraging you to become a "character." Hollywood, New York and other theatrical centers are full of "characters" who have a false opinion of their own importance. They give away their exaggerated, distorted evaluation of themselves by voices that are a little too loud, hair worn a little too long or too short— or too brassy blond—shoulders a little too padded or too narrow —T-shirts a little too torn—or skirts a bit too tight—and wisecracks that are not quite funny. They are indeed characters, but not individualists. They're just poor copyists. Balance, polarity and poise must come into play. John Barrymore, who for a long time had a brilliant career, was an individualist His individualism stemmed from originality unhampered by inhibitions. But in his prime he was a serious student and practitioner of his art One of the greatest actors of his time and completely aware of his talents, he approached his art with a combination of great daring and deep humility. He had no fear of being ridiculed when, as a top-ranking star of the Broadway stage, he went to his coach, Margaret Carrington, to work for many months perfecting the voice most people thought already perfect Never be afraid to take a chance. Tear down your fear of absurdity every time you can and in every way you can. If you're asked to make a speech at a local club, accept the honor and prepare your speech. Good, bad, or indifferent—make the speech. Next time it will be easier and better. There is always one comforting thought to cling to while you're up there speaking. Ninety-nine per cent of the people listening to you can't do so well. If they could, one of them would be in your
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ATOMIC DRIVE TO IMPACT spot on the platform, and you would be sitting down in the audience. When my brother and I found ourselves faced with an ordeal like junior speechmaking, our mother used to tell us: "Your friends will be proud of you and you don't know the other people anyway, so what difference does it make?" We had faith in her theory, and its principle worked successfully for both of us. Consider boredom now—the second, previously mentioned, barrier which holds back your great reservoir of energy. I repeat. Bored people are tired people. Tired people lack vitality. And people without vitality are never very interesting. If an actor is interesting and exciting, he cannot be bored—or boring. I asked you to practice the various exercises for a few minutes at a time. My purpose was to keep you from becoming bored. By giving you new and different trains of thought to follow at properly spaced intervals, I have tried to help you retain enthusiasm in your approach to a very complex subject. Extending this principle into general living, it's important to give yourself a variety of diversions and interests. They rest your mind and stimulate your imagination so you can return to your vocation—the building of an acting career—with constantly renewed enthusiasm. Cultivate any number of outside interests. Find yourself an interesting hobby. You can retain your singleness of purpose in working toward the construction of a solid career as an actor, and still not be confined by a single-track mind. When you get tired of whatever you are doing, ask yourself if
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you're really exhausted or just bored. More often than not, if you do something to divert and excite your interest for a few mintures, you'll find that you're not tired at all. You just needed a fresh approach to your reservoir of energy. Then, having tapped the reservoir, you will return to your original task almost magically revitalized. Most of the stimulating individualists I have come into contact with are people with at least one, and sometimes two or three, hobbies. It's part of my responsibility to make my clients aware of the many exciting activities and ideas going on in the world around them. I encourage and keep several projects in motion all the time. The result is that they have neither cause nor opportunity to get bored—or fatigued. My own outside interests are cultivated with the definite aim of spanning a widely assorted range of activities. When I get tired I sometimes head out for a yacht anchorage. I might go for a sail or just look at boats. If time doesn't permit me to leave the studio, I'm happy to look through a yachting magazine. Before long I'm ready to get back to work. I find it interesting to browse around in antique shops. A big hardware store, with all its new gadgets, stimulates my imagination in many directions. I enjoy visiting the Mexican district and talking Spanish with the congenial people I find there. I like to drop in at a favorite camera store. Visiting art galleries is as diverting for me as spending a couple of hours exploring an unknown part of the city. I may search for a certain recording, which might mean making several stops at various music stores. 162
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Learning to paint in oils, developing film, studying a foreign language, rebuilding a bookcase, trying to play a guitar and binding books are other projects on my list of hobbies. My enthusiasm for all these things has many times inspired others to find hobbies of their own. Almost every day I do something which has little, if anything, to do with my actual work as a teacher of actors. And I find invariably that these unrelated activities, far from interfering with my career, help me do a full day's work at my top level of efficiency. A well-educated man is one who is widely informed. Through a variety of activities, you can become aware of, or have your awarebeam focused on, a number of things which you may have thought very little about before. When you get several projects going, your scope will broaden. You will be more interesting to people. You will find yourself becoming an educated person—you will find yourself developing enthusiasm. Interest creates enthusiasm. Enthusiasm releases energy. Whether you become an actor, a day laborer, or president of "Atomic Energy, Incorporated," your life will be much more exciting if you can train yourself to use that formula as one of your musts in practicing the art of living.
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Hamlet said: "... we end the heartache, and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to ..." It has always been the function of the actor to be the emotional physician, who gives solace, encouragement and freedom of feeling to people who need it—when they need it This has been the challenge of the actor since the beginning of time. He is the torchbearer of a great tradition; a fearless trail blazer into an expanding frontier. The actor must not be afraid to be the catalyst between progress and people. He must approach his calling with authority, humility and fearlessness. As the human race progressed, instinct gave way to inspiration. Inspiration became a creative tool of civilization. To be aware of creation, born of inspiration—and to be able to direct that creation, is a result of intelligence. In this book, you have been made aware of consciously constructing a physical structure to securely support and accurately control the creation of your subconscious. You have learned how to build a dynamo of energy from your subconscious storehouse, and how to direct that energy toward your particular needs. You have learned how to change your liabilities into assets and develop an exciting, arresting personality. You have learned common denominators to interweave your own personality with that of a character; how to transmit this new personality, through empathy, to an audience—with impact You have organized the machinery of the conscious mind so that it works with dependable precision—leaving a clear channel to your subconscious for new thoughts and ideas. These new thoughts and ideas are inspirations. Controlled inspiration is creation. Develop the habit of depending upon your subconscious as a
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source of supply for your inspirations. Eventually, you will have the confidence that your supply is greater than any demands you can make upon it Your own experience will give you this confidence. Have faith in your ability to supply more than is demanded. You will experience the fulfillment of free choice in selecting the inspiration that best suits your needs. When you have learned to select that which is best, you will have acquired good taste. When you have developed good taste, you will experience a sense of exhilaration—when you are exhilarated, you will have no time for boredom. Polarize the word boredom—and you'll find enthusiasm. Develop the habit of enthusiasm by becoming spontaneously curious. Find out all you can about everything you can. Start with the book you have in your hands. What is the color of its binding? What kind of type is used in its printing? How many pages does it have? Is the texture of its paper pleasant to touch? How much does it weigh? What kind of a man is its author? Who is the publisher of the book? What books have they published? How much did you pay for the book? Is it worth it to you? If so, why? If not, why not? Apply this formula to commonplace objects and situations around you. You will develop new enthusiasm for your everyday surroundings. They will take on an added significance with interesting, dramatic qualities. You'll respond to them emotionally as well as intellectually. Suddenly you will recognize in these commonplace objects and situations characteristics and aspects which you were completely unaware of before. 167
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The uncreative man is one-sided. He develops his potentialities along one line. One of the most forceful examples of an outstanding, wellbalanced man was revealed to me some time ago when I was visiting a small town in Wyoming. I had occasion to call on the most prominent doctor in the community. He had known me since childhood. For many years I have lived in a world completely apart from his and worked in a profession entirely foreign to his section of the country. I was amazed to find that Dr. Walter O. Gray knew exactly what I was doing in Hollywood, was acutely aware of the activities of many of my professional associates, and had a substantial understanding of my problems in the career I have followed. Dr. Gray had been more than the leading doctor in his community for many years. He had been mayor of his town and president of one of its biggest banks. He had been outstanding in civic and religious activities. He was well balanced. His balance gave him poise in the fullest sense of the word. He knew every child by name. There was no problem too small for him to consider or help straighten out A high-school boy could go to Dr. Gray with the problem of how to earn enough money to carry on his education. No matter how busy Dr. Gray was, he made the boy's problem his own. A job was found somehow, so the boy had the fulfillment of his American heritage—the right to an education. If you've been wondering what an anecdote about a doctor in an obscure little Wyoming town has to do with acting, let me assure you that it has everything to do with it Dr. Gray was an individualist Had he been an actor instead 168
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of a doctor, he would have been equally successful. An actor should be a fine individual. He should be many-sided. He should be full of enthusiasm for every phase of living. Each phase that comes into his scope of awareness increases his stature as an individualist. Dr. Gray and others like him are among the characters that audiences want to see portrayed on stage, screen, television and radio. Audiences are composed, chiefly, of people who have not fully developed their subconscious desires. They depend on actors to vicariously fill this void. In your desire to be a serious actor, you are applying for membership in the oldest brotherhood of emotional physicianship to mankind. The duty of the serious actor is great Thousands of years before the birth of Christianity, acting served the same purpose that it is serving today. Its fundamental purpose has not changed from the time cave men lined up in a circle and performed their ritualistic chants and pantomimic dances to stir the emotions of their audience. Through these rituals, which were basically acts, the primitive emotions were excited to a point of emotional stimulation that propelled our civilization onward. In times of grief and trouble, it diverted their attention and gave them solace and relief from emotional tensions, while their subconscious minds revitalized them with new inspiration and prepared them to carry on—restimulated. There has been no fundamental change in the relationship between the actor and his audience in giving them physical and spiritual service. All through the ages the actor has given emotional ease, rest 169
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or stimulus to someone in the audience who needed it desperately, at that particular moment. When a performance is sincerely communicated by the actor, it will serve its purpose. War renews and intensifies proof of this. Entertainers go to front lines and hospitals, where they perform and arrest time for a short while. Don't be afraid to take a chance—do the best you can with every performance you are called upon to do. If you, sincerely, do the best you are capable of, then you will live up to the hereditary tradition of acting. Carry your banner high and with pride.
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