August 2008 Archives

(The Cat & The Moon closes tonight).

Jim True Frost on the value of theater work:

The deep process and craft that you employ in the rehearsals and in the nightly repetition of a theatre job provide a way into acting that camera work never can have (Jim True Frost, Interview, ActorsLife.com).

. . . the deep process and craft, the value of a nightly theater job -- there's nothing like it for growing and learning.

I've been blessed with a fairly long run of the Cat and Moon -- about 6 weeks, and I can't remember working harder on a play after it's opened.

Breathing

Deborah Carlson's Word Of Mouth Studios hammers home, almost each week, the directive to speak no faster than you can breathe. Patsy Rodenburg calls this letting the breath drop.

I find this difficult to do partly because I'm not used to doing it, partly because I'm worried I'll drag a scene down pace wise, and partly because characters are often in an excited or heightened state, i.e., they're thinking and speaking rapidly.

However, if I go faster than I can breathe & think, I speak before my body and mind are naturally ready to speak -- what Ms. Rodenburg calls this getting ahead of the text.

We have time to grow old.
~ Vladimir, Waiting For Godot

Today is my birthday.

I was worried about how I would feel -- often I don't acknowledge my birthday (because I don't want to be reminded that time is a thing and the growing older as we go through it), but this is a significant birthday.

Long long ago, I wanted to be an actor. It was all I ever wanted to be, and I'm more convinced of that now than ever before.

So, why did I wait so long?

Written for stage designers, this beautiful little book, The Dramatic Imagination: Reflections and Speculations on the Art of the Theatre, is one of the first theater books I read. It is one of the great speculations and reflections on the Theater.

While “The Dramatic Imagination” won’t teach you how to design for the Theatre, it will teach you (or remind you) WHY you design for the Theatre -- you design to keep it alive. And while the copyright is c. 1940, the goal of the book for the Theatre Design and Performance Arts today is as it originally was – to create a theater for OUR time. The goal of this book will always be relevant – it will always be a guide.

Each Friday (more or less -- mostly less), I like to post what I call either "Fired! Up Fridays" or "Great ARt!sts Friday." Today it's -- "Great ARt!sts Friday!"

Today, Courtney Love and I became myspace friends -- yes, she does have 53,000 other friends, and counting, but I know our's is special.

Lately I have been asked by many actor friends and acquaintances if they should pay to meet CD's, Agents and Managers.

My answer is simple- YES, ABSOLUTLEY. Actors should attend what are called MEET & GREETS. This is where you pay to meet a CD, Agent or Manager of your choice to show them your work and personality.

(More than in any other play, what follows is the basic technique I've been trying to use during Cat & The Moon rehearsals).

Shakespeare, through Claudius, gives us a great description of bad acting:

My words fly up, my thoughts remain below:
Words without thoughts never to heaven go.
~ Claudius, Hamlet, 3.3

Connecting Thought To Breath

Pasty Rodenburg makes essentially two points about a character's thoughts in her book: The Actor Speaks:

[1)] I think many members of an audience sit and listen without understanding a speech or even a whole play because the actor or actors have not understood the thought, the length of the thought, or one though's connection to another . . . [and 2)] . . . the [actor's] breath is linked to the length and quality of the [character's] thought and feeling . . .

(A full discussion of the relationship between thought and breath and voice is too broad to unpackaged here -- if you want to know more, start with one of these two resources: The Actor Speaks and/or A Voice of Your Own or try to find a good teacher than understands Rodenburg's approach. If you live in New York City, one of the best teachers that understands Rodenburg's approach is Deborah Carlson. She's also a terr!f!c coach with students currently on Broadway and in Broadway touring companies).

It's easier to hear what she's taking about rather than describe it, but I'll do my best:

A while ago -- a long while ago, I think -- I submitted this blog to the Performing Arts Category in Blogged.com. Blogged.com offers ratings and reviews of the blogs in its directory based upon the quality of writing and how often a site is updated. Blogs are initially reviewed by the Blogged.com “team”, but if enough visitors rank and review the blog, then that takes precedence.

Well -- yesterday, out of the blue, I got this in my in-box from Ms. Liu & the Marketing Department of www.blogged.com:

One of the largest and most physically and vocally demanding roles I've had to date, Tom O'Neal's The Cat And The Moon went into previews last week and opened this Thursday, 07 . 31 .2008.