NOTES ON ACTING BASED ON MY KNOWLEDGE & EXPERIENCE- as actress and director .

An audience wants to see characters in situations. Therefore an actor should ask, in what situation or circumstance does the character find themselves?  Then you, the actor play the situation, not the emotion. When you play the situation the required emotion and results will come. The actor has to put themselves into those imaginary circumstances and situation(s) the character finds them self in.

Anything the script tells you about your character is or about what the character has done before the story starts is part of the characters given circumstances. They are logical in developing and creating a character. Given circumstances are not subject to debate that is why they are given- they are the facts of the script that are not negotiable..

Learning lines by rote is helpful so that the words don’t sound rehearsed. This is because people in life simply talk without too much thought about what they are saying, they simply talk. Therefore it is important to the the actor to sound like a person when they are speaking and not like an actor with rehearsed dialogue. Speak, don’t speech. Colour the words with the inner life of you, the actor and also as the character you have in mind. Be specific about what you say. Why do you say what you say as the character? This is inner thinking or subtext. Or what am I the actor and the character thinking about ? And to really be aware of those thoughts during a scene that you could possibly weave into the moment you are playing and existing in.

Go beyond the lines. It’s ‘what you mean’ as an actor by what you say, not what you are saying with mere lines. This is the ‘subtext’ - the inner monologue. Furthermore, characters say things, as people do in life, which they don’t always mean. Someone could have a broken heart and say “ I’m doing alright” when asked how they are. It does not mean they are fine. It could mean a whole host of things. It could mean that they are terrible, sad, mad.. its how the actor delivers this, what they are feeling and thinking when they say lines that counts and most importantly the behaviour.

Have a point of view towards everyone in the script you are given. It is very important to find all the relationships you have in the script and then to have a specific feeling - a point of view your character has to everyone in that script. So that the moment; the second you see them, you have a feeling towards them. For example, do I like him/her? What do I think of them? That should be apparent in your acting.

Every script is a situation- its make believe. It’s the actor’s job to take something imaginary to be true. To be affected by it. Then personalise your lines/ the script/ and the people in the story. Make them real and meaningful to you. Personalise objects you may have to use or work with, like a cigarette or a book you are reading, a drink for instance. Make those objects part of the inner life and circumstances.

Always have a strong emotional preparation or something brewing inside before the scene starts, so that you always have your psychological tank full. Because like people in life we all come from a place, we don’t just start a scene. Life is continuous so characters come from a place too. Make the preparation logical to the scene. A scene cannot start cold. Just like in life, before we enter a room or a meeting with someone, we are coming from somewhere and feel a certain way- this is called a preparation.

Having secrets also contributes to good acting- either about the character or their point of view towards other characters or actors in the script. It’s the same in life. We withhold information or don’t always speak the truth, its the same with good acting. Have secrets & find a way of putting them into the scene. Watch people in real life, watch their behaviour. They are all hiding things, they may have a sickness they are not sharing with the world, or they may be having an affair, it’s the same with characters. This can create many layers and depth for the actor.

For film acting, your face becomes the stage. Your face is the proscenium arch. You have to show so much in your face and especially the eyes . Acting is about what you mean by what you say. “I love you” could be said screaming at someone depending on the situation the character finds themselves in. We should be able to see this in your eyes on camera.

Make acting specific and believable. You can do this through the senses we use everyday in life. The sense of smell; taste; touch; hearing; seeing. These sense memory technique helps you to re-live and re- call real and imaginary situations. It helps the actor to believe and feel everything sensorially . Every SCRIPT is make- believe, therefore you take something imaginary to be true. You allow yourself to get effected by it. That something is also talent. That something is what makes you’re acting real and believable. Because you have to believe everything you hear, smell, taste, touch and see. So that your sense of truth and imagination are developed and ignited. Igniting the senses also makes you precise & specific as an actor. It’s the specificity of a sense that affects you.

“All human responses are the result of sensory experience…When one reacts with an imaginary object, the response is exactly the same as if the object were not imaginary” Lee Strasberg.

Technically, sense memory technique helps you with quick transitions to get you specific results when you act for screen or stage. You could be working on seduction for instance and a shock emotion that you know is coming up in the scene . Think Desdemona in Othello here.

Thoughts & Thinking: Use the reality that exists. Have another level of awareness. A real feeling of some kind running inside you “that could possibly fit the scene” as my teacher Jack would say. “I feel angry”, “I feel sad” , if you are aware of it and it could work for the scene, then you can use it. That’s all valid work. Robert De Niro once said, the best acting for him is when he is aware of other thoughts he is having in addition to character thoughts.

Feelings can be built up and trained in the actor to arrive at the part and represent it many times on stage or on screen. The actor must live through it in addition to the technical training of body , speech and voice. This is all a process of living on stage or on set as your character, free from tension.