All effective acting techniques meet at the union between the psychological and the physical.
Why? Because our human experience is formed through the existence of thought and feeling. That’s our reality: we think things, feel things, want things, so we do things. So while it may sound intellectual, in reality – it’s what we do every day.
So acting is about being human – except under imaginary circumstances and with a script.
Ground Zero in Acting Techniques
And because we think and feel and want– we act. We take action. And there lies the most effective component of good acting: In short – acting is action.
The Flat Issue
Acting becomes unremarkable when actors push for emotions without connecting to drive or need; the objective, intention, there are several terms which mean the same thing – what you want. A lot of actors feel they have a grasp on what it means to pursue an objective. But in reality, it’s not happening. The objective is named, maybe written on the script, but the action, the need – just isn’t there. So the work is flat. It’s not alive.
Audition Room
Same is true for audition preparation. An actor may believe they enter the audition room with a fresh take on a character and yet give the same exact reading the last twenty actors gave. The work is generic. Generic is the enemy of the actor.
The Work that Works
I coach actors to get viscerally connected to the pulse and action of the scene. It’s obvious when actors actors work like that. Because we can’t take our eyes on them.
Hollywood is a Verb, 1979 / © Ed Ruscha
