The Audition Handicap -- Continued

Please read "Should You Bring Props to an Audition?" from the Backstage article of May 9 and 10, 2019 linked below.

I think, per the drawing, that if the CD assigned that particular scene for the audition, the bigger the dead fish the actor brings, the better, and if the fish is still alive, better still.

The CD must know, as well as the director, the actor's challenge in an audition and assign an appropriate scene that will not require props or at most, a hand prop.  Further, a demo reel or any scene that has a dramatic build should suffice for the CD to be able to assess the actor's ability, at the very least, to determine the need for a callback.


https://www.backstage.com/magazine/article/should-you-bring-props-to-an-audition-10-cds-weigh-in-68062/?utm_campaign=backstage-daily&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=72633215&_hsenc=p2ANqtz--N4SUecqbcZqhCFqU6AC46dkDDemgydNHdMMamteZtRkZ6Oc-xlY85DPd6m_ViJKF2Ni1yV2aoyGVBuM7ERWCMCXp21w&_hsmi=72633215

The Handicap of the Taped Audition

When did the disembodied talking heads that pervade TV acting performances become a description of human behavior?  It's so pervasive that it has crept into film performances as well.  Is this inaccurate interpretation of human behavior what has influenced the handicap of the taped audition?

Taped audition "rules" are ridiculous and casting directors should know better.  Instead of asking actors to present an unfinished rehearsal from three-page sides, casting directors would find out more about actors if they asked them to just face the camera and extemporaneously relate something about themselves. 

Actors must be able to use their body in performance.  The best taped audition I've seen that confined itself to some of those arbitrary rules was Rachel McAdams' audition for The Notebook.  Notice that aside from articulately playing her action, she worked from her body and listened/processed the ideas of her partner.

If you're called upon to present a taped audition, follow her example as the criterion that defines ground zero.  

Diversity, Talent, Technique, Opportunity and Samuel L. Jackson-6/16/17 Redux

 STANISLAVSKI'S MAKEUP TABLE AT THE MOSCOW ART THEATRE

Photo by Lola Cohen

Regarding Educational Theatre's statistic below, I now offer free one-on-one audition preparation and scene study to anyone who is not enrolled in a college or university Performing Arts program or a studio because they can't afford the tuition.  All sessions will be conducted and recorded on Skype and then viewed on my YouTube channel.  The only requirement will be a willingness to practice and be egoless enough to let viewers observe their progress as they master the technique that's derived from Constantin Stanislavski and the Group Theatre.

Dramatic Progression / Exposition - All My Sons

On 2/26/18 I wrote about dramatic progression and exposition and the challenge the actor faces when expository dialogue is sometimes narratively written as it was in Silver Linings Playbook.  I've sometimes told actors that the best example I could think of where the writer wrote exposition dramatically is Arthur Miller's 1947 play, All My Sons.

I'm so pleased that now, in 2019, the play will be performed in New York and that when it closes, it will be able to be viewed at the Lincoln Center Library for the Performing Arts.

John Barrymore, Maurice Schwartz, Stella Adler - Tradition

 

There's an anecdote that when John Barrymore was asked where he learned to act, he said all he had to do was go down to Second Avenue and attend the plays at the Yiddish Art Theater.  Maurice Schwartz was the director and leading actor of that theater in the 1930s when Barrymore and Lombard starred in Twentieth Century.  When I saw the film, I recognized the style before I heard the anecdote.  Barrymore strongly reminded me of Schwartz when I performed with Schwartz 20 years later in the English version of the classic Yoshe Kalb.  Schwartz knew nothing (maybe he knew, but he didn't practice it) of Stanislavsky or the Group Theatre.  His direction was very mechanical, down to telling me to count, literally, "1, 2, 3, drop the handkerchief, then say the next line".  I remember telling Uta that her teaching was by then so ingrained, that I was able to perform as she taught me and still give Schwartz the result he needed.  Schwartz had an incredibly good dramatic instinct.  Although his approach was very different from mine, our communication in performance was harmonious.  

Stella Adler joined Schwartz's company at the Yiddish Art Theater when she left her father's (Jacob Adler) acting company.

Twentieth Century is a comedy, Tevye is a drama, and Stella's teaching style reflected her passion for the "art of acting."  In this clip she was responding to a scene from The Dresser performed in class by Milton Justice and Bill Lithgow.  Milton told me, "It was Stella's last class and we decided to do a scene with a theatre theme, thinking Stella would talk about a life in the theatre. She certainly did!"

Aside from gesture, note the style that a particular tradition of performance influences.   

Tim Sweeney: A Student's Memory of Uta Hagen

Tim Sweeney, an HB Studio alumnus, recently told his friends that he had "dusted off his acting chops after what seems like centuries...", and had already gone before the cameras on HBO's Crashing, and Netflix's Orange is the New Black, 7th season, the final episode. "It's never too late to do what you love doing," he said.

On a wonderfully freezing (red nose cold) winter night about six years ago we'd gone to the White Horse Tavern where Tim told me an anecdote about Uta that very few HB alumni or even her students would've had the privilege to experience.  I'd meant to share it here long ago, considering the deep positive influence she had on so many of us, whether or not we pursued the work, so that exactly what she'd said or demonstrated in our presence remains imprinted in us and can be summoned, brought sharply into focus, at a moment's notice.

Here's an excerpt, edited by me, of the message Tim sent me when I asked him to please write what he told me he'd experienced of Uta's work:

"Back in the early 80s, I believe it was 1984, I had the opportunity to work on The Silver Fox by Donna DeMateo, produced at the HB Playwrights Foundation starring Uta Hagen and Kelly Wolf.  I was in charge of running the sound effect equipment.  In my lifetime being both a working actor or a backstage tech, I have never seen so much organic behind the scenes preparation with which Uta Hagen encircled herself.

Ms. Hagen was very particular about place.  What is my relationship to where I am?  Is it an unknown place?  Is it my home?  Is it someone else's home?  What does the rest of the place that is offstage look like in relation to what is onstage?  If it's a living room, where is the kitchen, the bathroom, the bedroom?  Is it raining outside or is it sunny?  What time of day is it?  Is it hot, cold; snowing?

Watching her offstage preparations was like watching a performance in itself.  The Silver Fox took place in a living room, and I witnessed her making several entrances from various areas of the set during the play, and she would literally walk in place before she entered the set.  She knew how many steps it took to get from the offstage bedroom to the onstage living room.  Just looking at her, you could see what she saw."

Break a leg, Tim!

Visual Syntax: The Role of the Director

The HBO series, My Brilliant Friend was an admirable production for many reasons; the script adaptation, the casting, the acting, the direction, the music, the work of art that results when the contributions of all the collaborators creates a compelling production from beginning to end.

I have many thoughts to share about My Brilliant Friend, and I might write more than one post about it, but would like to begin with the work of the director, Saverio Costanzo.  The actors I coach whose performances are affected by the abilities of their directors will recognize my observations about scenes that were either shot well or poorly; that there are directors who do or don't understand visual syntax and how important it is, not only for the best use of the actor's performance, but also for the dramatic telling of the story.  As much as I caution actors against performing a scene narratively, I think actors should be aware that the director's use of visual syntax is the narrative aspect of the drama.

In that regard, please view the first scene above from episode 7.  Note the director's narrative:  Elena leaves the shop.  As she walks toward the town square, she sees, in the distance, a portion of Donato's figure (the man who sexually molested her) behind a building as he watches her.  She stares at him, frozen, when, suddenly, the full face and figure of her teacher, Oliviero takes up the frame and obliterates Donato, and as she and the teacher stroll through town, the teacher focuses her on her life and its future.  There were many individual scenes in this series that could be singled out for excellent visual syntax.  I chose this one now because I thought it was breathtaking.

The scene below it from episode 8, Lila's wedding invitation to Oliviero, is progression from the previous scene.  It speaks for itself, but, speaking of resonance, all you followers of Stella Adler -- remember her remark regarding all the very talented young women in her classes, who, for some unfathomable reason married, had children, and moved to Scarsdale?!  Remember how she pronounced Scarsdale?

The third clip, from episode 8, the end of the wedding scene, is total visual syntax without dialogue; the heartbreak of betrayal told with increasing magnitude with each succeeding frame.