Updated 6th December, 2022.

Reading the canon of Shakespeare in a detailed and conscientious way is a lifetime’s work—it is not something which should be rushed. However, we must start somewhere, and in this article I hope I can offer you some perspective on the paths you might like to take whilst venturing through the works of William Shakespeare.

As actors, we know and have been told, time and time again, the importance of reading Shakespeare; it is deep training for us. Reading and performing Shakespeare will push us and challenge us and develop all the facets of our craft as actors. However, with 39 plays and dozens of poems and sonnets in his canon, deciding where to start with reading Shakespeare (and, subsequently, how it is best to continue reading Shakespeare) can be a daunting task. 

Skip to:

• Where Do I Start with Shakespeare?
• How Do I Read Shakespeare?
• Which Shakespearean Play Should I Read First?
• The Different Types of Shakespearean Plays.
• Shakespeare’s Tragedies
• Shakespeare’s Comedies
• Shakespeare’s Histories
• Over to you!

Where Do I Start with Shakespeare?

Most of the actors I know, particularly those who have performed Shakespeare’s plays, have a clear and fond memory of their first encounter with the writer. Whether it was a school play they saw or acted in, Shakespeare in the park, or an intensely melodramatic black and white film, everyone has had to start somewhere with Shakespeare. Even the likes of Sir Ian McKellen and Dame Judi Dench (who I would consider to be the best of the best when it comes to Shakespearean performance) experienced the Bard for the first time at one point in their lives. What followed next was passion, dedication and curiosity towards Shakespeare, which has resulted in some of the most remarkable performances the world has ever seen. 

This is an encouraging fact for us: even the best Shakespearean actors in the world had to start somewhere. From their starting place they found their way through the works of Shakespeare, engaging deeply with some of his works, skimming over the top of others, and perhaps even bypassing some of the works completely! All there is for us to do is to take our first step. 

How Do I Read Shakespeare?

Just a quick note on this topic, as we already have several articles on the subject of How to read Shakespeare. Take a look at how to read Shakespeare: 6 techniques and our article on decoding Shakespeare: understanding and performing his words.

One thing I would add to this is that combining reading a play with watching a play can be incredibly useful in deciphering the more challenging aspects of the work. Either reading and watching a filmed version of a play scene by scene, or reading an entire play in the lead up to a trip to the theatre can really solidify the plot and characters in your mind. 

The best way to read Shakespeare is to read it aloud with a group of fellow actors. If you can organize a reading group to meet semi-regularly and read Shakespeare aloud together, you will drastically increase your chances of sustaining your commitment to reading Shakespeare and the amount of each play you understand and retain. 

Use this process to ensure you actually comprehend the texts you are reading. I’d really caution against the challenge of reading the complete works of Shakespeare for the sake of it. A colleague of mine at drama school set themselves the task of reading one of the Bard’s plays every week to get through the complete works in a year; after one-and-a-half plays, they were burnt out and dropped the task entirely. Take the time you need to read and experience each play fully. More benefit can come to your craft as an actor by reading one of Shakespeare’s plays deeply and thoughtfully than rushing your way through five because you feel you ‘should’ read them all. 

Which Shakespearean Play Should I Read First?

There are 39 plays we know Shakespeare either wrote or was part of a collaboration of writers. Where the heck do we start? Do we read chronologically and begin in 1589 with The Two Gentlemen of Verona? Or do we head to ancient Rome because we like the film Gladiator and attempt to tackle Titus Andronicus? I’ve heard a lot about Hamlet and King Lear, perhaps I should begin there? The Tempest was the last play Shakespeare wrote alone, maybe that will be the most ‘modern’ and easy for me to access?

To get some clarity around the canon of Shakespeare’s works, here’s a list of his plays in their categories to get a sense of what we’re working through: Shakespeare Plays.  

Of course, as with any question like this, there is no ‘right’ answer. You can and should read whichever one of Shakespeare’s plays you want first. However, it is undeniable that some of Shakespeare’s plays are more easily accessible than others. Plot lines differ in their complexity. Characters develop in their sophistication and complexity as Shakespeare’s career progresses. The text itself changes too. We sometimes forget that there was a time before Shakespeare was ‘Shakespeare’ – the prolific artist we know him as today. His skill as a writer developed over his career, with his use of language and sentence style growing and changing over the course of his lifetime. 

If I am to be horribly reductive and simplistic, I’d say that there are three plays which you should consider as your starting point for reading Shakespeare. They are:

• Romeo and Juliet 
• A Midsummer Night’s Dream
• Macbeth 

Listing these three plays as a starting point for beginners does not in any way suggest that they are less sophisticated than Shakespeare’s other works. Quite the contrary: these are three of Shakespeare’s most performed and beloved plays. They are far from simplistic—each challenge art and form in their execution, they were all written within the most prosperous ten years of Shakespeare’s career and they are all revolutionary in their own way to the world of drama and comedy.

These plays are a good starting point for a new Shakespearean reader because of their clarity. The plots and characters of these plays, all wonderfully written and exciting to experience, are extremely clear. There is much less ambiguity or historical placement in these plays. We would experience them as a modern audience today in a very similar way to the Elizabethan and Jacobean audiences whom these plays were written for. This is not always the case with Shakespeare’s works.

Choose one of these three to start with. Don’t worry, this isn’t a “be all or end all” decision (to drop a little Macbeth reference for you), as you’ll be reading all three of these plays at some point. 

The Different Types of Shakespearean Plays

We’ve taken the first step into Shakespeare’s canon. Well done! Reading a Shakespearean play is no small task. Most of us actors forget that reading Shakespeare actually isn’t done all that often by people outside of the arts. Reading even a single one of his plays outside of the classroom and as an adult is an impressive thing to accomplish. But, we can’t stop there.

The more Shakespeare we read, the more we are able to experience Shakespeare’s works—we come to understand how he writes, which themes he chooses to explore and how he builds his characters. As I progress through my career as an actor and as a reader of Shakespeare, I find I am building upon my understanding of the first plays I read (starting with A Midsummer Night’s Dream, if you care to know) by delving deeper into his canon and reading some of his more obscure works, like a Cymbeline and Coriolanus. 

Shakespeare’s plays are typically grouped into three or four categories. The primary three categories are: Histories, Comedies and Tragedies. The outliers from this list—plays which don’t entirely fit the classical mould of these genres, plus a few other of Shakespeare’s more obscure plays and collaborations—fit into the category of his ‘Problem Plays’ and/or his ‘Late Romances’. These plays are ‘problematic’ for their difficulty to categorise—not necessarily their subject matter. You can read more about Shakespeare’s Problem Plays here.

Breaking the canon down into these groups can be really useful when attempting to navigate the entirety of Shakespeare’s canon. Reading Romeo and Juliet, a tragedy, might leave us feeling a bit blue and yearning for a comedy. Diving into a history play can tickle multiple facets of our interests: we are reading Shakespeare and learning a thing or two about interesting historical figures.

At the start of your journey, I would advise you to delay reading from the Problem Plays category. Familiarise yourself with some of his greatest hits first to give yourself time to understand the way he writes and his language. Diving too quickly into a problem play like Measure for Measure, which is very experimental and ambiguous in style and tone, might leave you bewildered and disheartened.

We want to follow the path of our own enthusiasm in this quest, not follow the path of obligation which other actors or scholars have laid out before us. Read what you feel you would like to read next, rather than what someone tells you you should read next, (he writes, fully realising the irony of this statement whilst creating an article entitled “in what order should I read Shakespeare”.)

Rather than trying to break down the entire canon into an order you should read, let’s create a plan of attack for each of these genres, for you to jump between as you wish.

Tragedies

Now, I’m about to make a bold and potentially controversial statement. I believe the real richness of Shakespeare’s canon exists in his tragedies more so than his comedies. I hear the cries of one thousand British scholars who disagree with me vehemently—sorry folks. But I do believe that if we were on our desert island with only one genre of Shakespeare’s canon to choose from, his tragedies would be the most fulfilling and enriching for us. Lists of the works of Shakespeare vary from scholar to scholar, but a fairly comprehensive list of his tragedies is as follows:

1. Troilus and Cressida
2. Coriolanus
3. Titus Andronicus
4. Romeo and Juliet
5. Timon of Athens
6. Julius Caesar
7. Macbeth
8. Hamlet
9. King Lear
10. Othello
11. Antony and Cleopatra
12. Cymbeline

From this list, I’ve pulled out a few choice selections to get you started:

#1 Romeo and Juliet 

If you haven’t tackled this one already, Romeo and Juliet is the best place to start with Shakespearean tragedy. It has it all: romance, comedy, sword fighting, terrible puns and tragic endings. In this play, Shakespeare shows his expertise as a writer, beginning the play with all the hallmarks of a comedy before turning the events of the play on their head and stunning the audience with its tragic middle and end.

#2 Macbeth

Again, another one of our plays from the beginner’s list, ‘The Scottish Play’ is a fantastic early read. It features fantastic characters (including one of Shakespeare’s best villains)  and soliloquies, and explores themes of witchcraft, guilt and ambition. There’s a few ghosts in there too … not to be missed!

#3 Hamlet 

Arguably the greatest of Shakespeare’s plays when it comes to critical acclaim and analysis, Hamlet is a remarkable work of art to behold. I’d advise you to ensure you’ve read at least a few other plays in Shakespeare’s canon before confronting the Dane, as Hamlet is in many ways a more complex and sophisticated piece of writing than most of Shakespeare’s early works.

#4 Othello 

Othello and Iago, protagonist and antagonist in this Venetian play, are two of Shakespeare’s greatest characters. Indeed, Iago took out our top spot in a list of best Shakespeare characters! The scenes featuring these two alone on stage are some of the best scenes for actors to prepare and perform in the entire Shakespeare canon. And the play around them? Full of jealousy, vengeance, the perils of prejudice and the worth of reputation.

#5 Julius Caesar 

Take a step into Ancient Rome in the time of Julius Caesar—an empire in constant turmoil as democracy finds its feet. The fear of tyrannical rule is rife in this society, and from this fear a conspiracy to assassinate an emperor is hatched. In this play, Shakespeare asks a question of his audience: “What happens in the vacuum of an assassinated leader?” A great play full of great characters, this is one to read a little further into your journey as a reader of Shakespeare, as the plot and the context of Shakespeare’s Rome can be a little more difficult to access without reading up on the given circumstances of the story first.

From this point, go whichever way you like with the Tragedies. If you’d like to stay in Rome, head on over to Shakespeare’s first revenge tragedy Titus Andronicus (and compare its Tarantino-esque gruesomeness with the sophistication of Hamlet!) Then move on to the colossal stories of Antony and Cleopatra or Coriolanus. Or you might like to tackle King Lear—an exceptionally beautiful, mystical story featuring some of Shakespeare’s most complex circumstances and characters. 

Comedies

Take a break from all the tragedy and have a laugh! Now: ‘comedy’, as it pertains to Shakespeare, does not necessarily mean ‘funny’—at least not in the way the word comedy correlates with humour for us today. Shakespearean comedies are stories of forbidden love and marriage, foppish characters and wonderful wit. These stories often feature magic or extraordinary circumstances of shipwrecks, last minute happy endings and unions between sworn enemies. 

1. The Tempest
2. The Two Gentlemen of Verona
3. The Merry Wives of Windsor
4. Measure for Measure
5. The Comedy of Errors
6. Much Ado About Nothing
7. Love’s Labour’s Lost
8. A Midsummer Night’s Dream
9. The Merchant of Venice 
10. As You Like It
11. The Taming of the Shrew
12. All’s Well That Ends Well
13. Twelfth Night
14. The Winter’s Tale
15. Pericles, Prince of Tyre
16. The Two Noble Kinsmen 

Where do we start with this list?

#1 A Midsummer Night’s Dream 

For many, we start right back in high school English! A feature of our beginner’s list, AMSND (forgive my abbreviation, it’s a long title to type) is Shakespeare’s most popular and frequently performed play. I don’t think there has ever been a time since its creation that a production of AMSND hasn’t been on in a theatre or garden during the summer months somewhere in the world. With three interweaving plot lines full of magic, farce and even workplace comedy (we’d not have The Office without The Mechanicals), AMSND is Shakespeare at his finest, whilst still being accessible and understandable.

#2 Twelfth Night 

Twelfth Night is fairly unique in Shakespeare’s canon in that it is a play which is driven by relationships rather than events. Shakespeare focuses on the characters of this play, rather than a rigid plot or thematics. This was the second play of Shakespeare’s I was ever involved with, and it holds a very dear place in my heart. It’s a great play to read and experience early on in your investigation of The Bard’s works. 

#3 The Merchant of Venice 

To reiterate, ‘comedy’ in Shakespearean and early dramatic terms does not mean the same thing it means to us as a modern audience. Comedy was concerned with certain plot rules or structures: like star-cross’d lovers, oppressive villains and happy endings. The Merchant of Venice is not a play we would call a comedy by today’s standards. Particularly given the events of the twentieth century, The Merchant of Venice now cannot and should not be looked at without serious consideration of the themes of antisemitism and prejudice present within the play. That being said, this play contains one of the most extraordinary and complex characters in Shylock, and the ‘courtroom scene’ towards the end of the play still stands as one of the greatest sequences in drama.

#4 Much Ado About Nothing 

Delving deeper into Shakespeare’s comedies, we now come to Much Ado About Nothing—a play known more for its wordplay and its themes than its characters and events. That being said, within this play you’ll find Beatrice and Benedick, who are essential characters to add to your comedic repertoire (as well as a strong, early example of the established “will they, won’t they” rom-com trope.)

#5 The Taming of the Shrew 

Like The Merchant of Venice, The Taming of the Shrew has become more and more heavily scrutinised as time has passed. An incredibly problematic play through today’s eyes, this is a play to read not necessarily for its sophistication as a star alone piece, but as an advanced exercise in reading Shakespeare. This exercise will require you not only to read and understand the text itself, but to develop opinions about the text—what Shakespeare’s original intentions were and why it has the reputation it now has. Does this play have a place in public performance today? Or is it a play best left on the shelf to gather dust? You decide.

Histories

Shakespeare, like all good writers, was an avid reader and scholar. He was a lover of history, and wrote plays about British history for the entertainment of his audiences, but also potentially to defame or glorify a current or previous monarch. As a writer, Shakespeare was a businessman and shameless self-promoter; of course, we should not separate intention—whether for reputation or financial gain—from his works. It can actually be a fascinating lens that helps us further unpack each work.

1. King John
2. Richard II
3. Henry IV, Part 1
4. Henry IV, Part 2
5. Henry V
6. Henry VI, Part 1
7. Henry VI, Part 2
8. Henry VI, Part 3
9. Richard III
10. Henry VIII
11. Edward III

Eleven plays, which ones should we prioritise?

For this genre I believe there is a simpler approach. Both Henry IV and Henry VI are plays broken up into multiple sections, but for the sake of this article let’s call them the one play. To gain a sophisticated understanding of Shakespeare’s canon of history plays, I think you should read his chronicle of The Wars of the Roses. This series of plays spans from Richard the Second, through all three Henry plays, and finishes with Richard the Third:

1. Richard II
2. Henry IV
3. Henry V
4. Henry Vi
5. Richard III

In this chronicle we have famous lines like “For God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground. And tell sad stories of the death of kings;” from Richard II, “Once more unto the breach” and “We few, we happy few, we band of brothers” from Henry V and “Now is the winter of our Discontent” from Richard III. There’s a wealth of wonderful scenes, characters and events in these plays.

These plays, more so than the comedies and tragedies, are quite dense. They may require some additional research in your part to glean the context and setting of the plays and individual scenes. I’d highly advise reading these plays with a guide, with a filmed version or with other actors. Most importantly, take your time: give yourself ample opportunities to digest the material.

Conclusion

I have, of course, missed many of the exceptional plays in these three lists of five plays from Shakespeare’s tragedies, comedies and histories. This is not an indication of the lack of sophistication in the unlisted plays, they are just a little further down the list of what I’d suggest you to prioritise when working your way through his canon. Here are those lists once again:

Tragedy:

1. Romeo and Juliet
2. Macbeth
3. Hamlet
4. Othello
5. Julius Ceasar

Comedy:

1. A Midsummer Night’s Dream
2. Twelfth Night
3. The Merchant of Venice
4. Much Ado About Nothing
5. The Taming of the Shrew

History:

1. Richard II
2. Henry IV
3. Henry V
4. Henry VI
5. Richard III

Remember, this is a marathon, not a sprint. Take your time and prioritise the quality of your reading over the quantity. Jump from genre to genre as you see fit, and follow your curiosity and enthusiasm as you read.

And please, once you’re well entrenched in the world of Shakespeare, go off the beaten track and try something different. Read Cymbeline – the fairytale-like play from early Britain featuring a fantastic female leading role. Read The Tempest, Shakespeare’s last play, and see how he chooses to finish his career as a writer. The more you read, the more you will be able to read. You’ll come to see the patterns and growth of Shakespeare as a writer, increase your skill as a dramatist and, most importantly, love these plays for the brilliant stories they are.

Adieu! 

The post In What Order Should I Read Shakespeare? appeared first on StageMilk.

So how do we actually start acting Shakespeare? Today we’ll be answering that question. Where do we begin with The Bard’s work, how do we find opportunities to act in a Shakespeare play, and how do we go on to establish a career for ourselves in Shakespeare.

If you are interested in acting Shakespeare, the sooner you start, the better. There are plenty of resources on this site to get you started today. Some of the most common ways to start acting Shakespeare are to join a class, find a mentor, get involved in local/community theatre, go to a drama school, or audition for a Shakespeare production. 

Skip to:

• Why Should I Get Into Shakespearean Acting?
• How Do I Get Into Shakespearean Acting?
• Start Now
• Instigate a Reading Club, or Put on a Production
• Go to Class or Approach a Mentor
• Engage with Local and Community Theatre
• Go to Drama School
• Theatre in Education
• Professional Auditions
• What Skills Do I Need to Act Shakespeare?

Why Should I Get Into Shakespearean Acting?

Acting Shakespeare is an undeniably important part of an actor’s development and career. Regardless of whether we seek to make Shakespeare a significant part of our careers, acting in a Shakespeare play must be an element of our training, as the challenges we will face and overcome whilst acting Shakespeare will give us the tools and skills required to act in any other writing style. 

The list of actors who credit Shakespeare for their development or who have made a name for themselves as Shakespearean actors is lengthy. These actors include Sir Ian McKellen, Dame Judy Dench, Sir Patrick Stewart, Mark Rylance, Ralph Fiennes, Sir Kenneth Branagh, Dame Maggie Smith, James Earl Jones, Brian Cox, Venessa Redgrave, Sir Ian Holm, Christopher Plummer, Laurence Olivier, and Zoe Caldwell. 

Acting Shakespeare is challenging. But like any skill or craft we are trying to develop, we can only hope to achieve a high skill level by challenging ourselves and practising deeply. As a football player we might replace the ball with a weighted substitute, so that when we return to the original it feels light and easy to manoeuvre. As a dancer we might practice difficult routines in the rehearsal room so we may perform simpler choreography with ease. This same logic can be applied to Shakespeare. For actors, acting Shakespeare is our form of deep practice. It will challenge us, it may even seem to be an insurmountable task at times, but when we overcome these challenges we will have developed ourselves in such a way that will make all other writers’ work seem achievable. 

Hey and on an even simpler note – it’s great fun. Seriously, even if you are daunted by the prospect of acting Shakespeare right now let me assure you, it’s unlike anything else to perform. The way the language and the text carries you through your performance, the way the characters behave and the events unfold is truly thrilling. There are plenty of contemporary plays which may leave you feeling dissatisfied with either the story or your character, but you will rarely find that when involved in one of Shakespeare’s plays. Trust me.

How Do I Get Into Shakespearean Acting?

So, we’ve established the importance of including Shakespearean acting in our training and careers, but how do we actually begin? How do we go about getting into Shakespearean acting? Well, like any question of this nature, there is no one single answer. The answer to this question is actually a combination of several solutions. Here are some of those solutions to begin practicing:

#1 Start Now

The dramatic and performing arts do require several people to bring a project to life. The magic of drama is that many perspectives and personalities come together to create something. It is a polyphonic medium (meaning many voices/sounds) unlike fine arts which are from a singular artist. This being said, actors need to take it upon themselves to practice and develop their skills. When it comes to acting Shakespeare, there is nothing in our way from starting now: picking up a text, (which are all free to access online) choosing a character or a soliloquy and speaking the text out loud. You do this – bam. You’ve gotten into Shakespearean acting. Article over. 

Just kidding. Now I know this might sound over-simplistic but it really is true; all you need to do to get into acting Shakespeare is to start acting Shakespeare. Starting to familiarise yourself with the text and the language will only serve to prepare you for your upcoming auditions to really get into acting Shakespeare with a group of professionals. 

Shakespeare is challenging, as we have already discussed. It is not something we can just take a glance at before acting. It is something which requires hard work, diligence and practice. So start that work for yourself now. Start reading plays, start speaking text out loud. We have a bunch of articles here for you to read to assist with the challenge of understanding and speaking Shakespeare, you’re in good hands with us. If you would like to add some further reading to your list after you’ve finished this article, I’d recommend these few:

• How to Act Shakespeare
• How to Read Shakespeare: 6 Techniques
• Shakespeare’s Plays

There are endless resources at your fingertips to help you start, so, no excuses. Make a start now.

#2 Instigate a Reading Club, or Put on a Production

Shakespeare comes to life when spoken aloud with other actors. Perhaps you are striving to work for a professional Shakespearean theatre company, perhaps not. Either way, you should experience what it’s like to act Shakespeare with other actors. Short of successfully auditioning for a play, you can always be the instigator of a Shakespeare group yourself. Whether you simply organise a reading club or you go the whole nine yards to produce your own production of a Shakespearean play, you have the power when it comes to instigating your own opportunities to act Shakespeare. 

#3 Go to Class or Approach a Mentor

As with any skill, our ability to self-educate has a limit. At a certain point we are going to need to seek external assistance and education. 

My interest in Shakespeare began because of an excellent teacher I had in high school, who was an incredible Shakespearean actor and director. With his wisdom and guidance he was able to impart upon me and my classmates the sophistication of Shakespeare as a writer and the potential impact of his plays. When hearing him speak of Shakespeare or watching his productions I was deeply moved and exhilarated, and the enthusiasm for Shakespeare that was sparked by him still exists with me today.

Subsequent teachers, directors and actors have been hugely influential in my development as a Shakespearean actor, too. So many people have taught me so many things about who Shakespeare was, how his metre works and why it is important, how he uses language and language techniques like antithesis and metaphor. All I can really thank myself for is my ongoing curiosity about Shakespeare and the commitment I feel in pursuing it, the rest I owe to other people.

With this in mind, consider how you might begin to seek outside assistance in your quest to get into Shakespearean acting. You’ve already taken a massive step in searching for and reading this article, you’re already on the way. The next step might be looking into a local Shakespeare class or short course at an acting school, or sending an email to a teacher, director or actor you know who has had some experience with Shakespeare.

#4 Engage with Local and Community Theatre

In high school I played fairly minor roles in two Shakespearean plays: Twelfth Night and A Midsummer Night’s Dream. I was never the lead role, and, ironically, I think the lack of validation I felt actually fuelled my desire to pursue Shakespeare into the future. I always wanted more. I saw the actors playing their substantial roles around me and I wanted to experience that. I watched and I learnt from them, storing ideas away for future use. As soon as I was out of high school I embarked on a quest to ‘get into Shakespearean acting’ myself. This was the time before StageMilk, after all, so I didn’t have access to the resources you do – you lucky thing! 

The method I used to go about ‘getting into Shakespeare’ was this. One afternoon, feeling like I should really start to try and get into this thing, I typed ‘Shakespeare auditions in Sydney’ into Google. One of the first websites to come up was a community theatre company located about 50 minutes away from my home. They were putting on a production of Romeo and Juliet. I had a monologue I’d prepared in high school which I revitalised for the audition, and I went along hoping for the best. I performed Henry V’s ‘Upon the King’ soliloquy, and was cast as Romeo. Bang, and we’re off. My streak of minor roles in high school had ended, I was now a titular character in a Shakespeare play. 

The experience I had in this production was wonderful. The ensemble was dedicated, the production team were enthusiastic and kind, it was a fantastic environment to learn and grow. 

Sometimes ‘getting into Shakespeare’ can be as simple as that – a google search and a blind audition. Even if I hadn’t been cast in that production, it still would have given me an opportunity to act Shakespeare, and in completing that audition I’d have been one step more experienced than I had been prior. 

#5 Go to Drama School

Now, this step is easier said than done, I know. Getting into drama school is no small task, and committing to a full term of education within one of these schools is only for those who are absolutely sure of the path they want to take. This being said, an education in acting at drama school is sure to include at least one term studying Shakespeare in great detail. Drama schools understand the importance of Shakespearean performance in the development of their actors, and will prioritise it as a subject of study. 

Studying and performing Shakespeare at Drama school is a fantastic way to get into Shakespearean acting because it is a safe environment to explore and take risks. Moving too quickly into professional performance or getting in front of a paying audience can be risky, as it may limit the willingness you feel to make bold choices and risk getting things wrong. Growth comes from learning from our mistakes, after all.

Another benefit of acting Shakespeare at drama school is you’ll have the chance to play characters you might otherwise not be cast as. Ensembles at a drama school will typically have a small age range, so someone is going to have to get cast as the much older or younger characters. This might sound unappealing, but remember, many of Shakespeare’s greatest characters were older than fifty, and depending on your age it might be a few years before you’re cast in those roles professionally!

#6 Theatre in Education

From drama school we step into the realm of professional theatre. Many theatre companies, particularly Shakespeare companies, will have an education component to their company. This department may produce productions of Shakespeare plays for young people and school kids, which is a fantastic thing to get involved with. In my year post-graduating from drama school I travelled around the country for 9 months with a Shakespeare company, performing abridged versions of Shakespeare plays for school kids ranging from primary school to year 12 (their graduating year). 

In the same way that Drama school provides a safe space for trial and error and development, so too does theatre in education provide an opportunity for quick and exponential growth as an actor. Audiences of school students are unlike any other audience you will experience. They really do wear their hearts on their sleeves: if they like the performance they will absolutely let you know about it, and if they don’t like your performance, the dead silence in the audience or (worse) the sniggers and comments coming at you from the audience will be impossible to ignore. This might sound terrible, but for me it was a baptism of fire into the world of Shakespeare, and now I find myself feeling confident in front of any audience. Trust me, when you’ve performed Shakespeare for 200 14 year olds who absolutely don’t want to engage with what you’re putting in front of them, there’s no theatre going audience which could frighten me. 

#7 Professional Auditions

We’re now beyond the realms of ‘Getting into Shakespeare’. Eventually there will come a time when you are standing on a stage in front of an audition panel for a professional theatre company, performing under the pressure of an opportunity to do what you love. This is a momentous occasion, and it’s only a matter of time before it happens for you. Of course, if you come across a professional theatre company holding general auditions and you feel that you’d like to audition, go for it. You have nothing to lose. Even if you don’t get cast, you will have gotten your face in front of the company, and in this industry people remember faces. You’ll be remembered the next time you audition, and you can use all the intervening time to practise and get better to maximise your chances of success. 

What Skills Do I Need to Act Shakespeare?

With every medium, style and genre of acting comes its own special requirements. Acting on film requires the actor to demonstrate sophisticated technical capabilities of performing within the confines of the frame. Contemporary plays and dialogue are usually fast paced, with intricate three-dimensional characters for the actor to embody and portray. Shakespeare, like these other mediums, comes with its own requirements for the actor.

When people think of Shakespeare, they think language. Shakespeare was as much a poet as he was a writer of plays, so command of language needs to be number one on the actors list of skill-sets to build. Speaking the text aloud as often as possible is essential to build this skill. The actor must also mine into the text for the many poetic devices at hand: antithesis, meter, metaphor, rhyme scheme, as well as becoming accustomed to the differences between verse and prose. 

Along with speaking text and understanding language comes the need for vocal strength. The actor performing Shakespeare must be able to fill a space with their voice and articulate clearly: the detailed and complex language Shakespeare uses needs to be delivered to the audience with immense clarity. 

Shakespeare writes of many different circumstances and features a vast rage of different characters. Having the physical capacity to embody different characters and do a range of different physical activities, (fencing, dancing, stage combat, acrobatics ect) is only going to increase your chances of being invited into a Shakespearean ensemble. 

Conclusion

‘Getting into’ something can be difficult. We usually begin with a goal or a dream, an insurmountable peak which can be exhilarating and daunting for us, and inhibit our ability to start. But every journey like this, including the journey of getting into Shakespearean acting, begins with a single action. In fact, the most difficult part is the prelude to the action: the decision. The decision to pursue Shakespearean acting. And you want to know something? By you being here today reading this article, you have already made that decision. You have already overcome that most difficult step. Now all that is left for you to do is to start taking action. 

Neil Gaiman speaks to young writers about the importance of ‘moving towards your mountain’. He tells them that it doesn’t really matter what you do, as long as that action is moving you a little closer towards your mountain, your goal, your dream. Relieve yourself of the obligation to make each step towards your mountain a leap or a bound, just take a single step. Read a play – no, read a scene, no: read a soliloquy. Pick a favourite character – don’t have a favourite character? Choose a character you know the name of. Type their name into Google, followed by ‘soliloquy’ and click on the first link. Read the soliloquy a few times, try to get the sense and meaning of it, then speak the speech aloud. By doing this – an exercise taking all of 10 minutes to complete, you’ve gotten into Shakespearean acting. You’ve taken the first step. 

Tomorrow, take another step.

The post How Do I Get Into Acting Shakespeare? appeared first on StageMilk.

Flagging the Fear of ‘Talent’

Questions about talent frequently arise in the minds of actors, and here at Stagemilk we are often receiving questions from actors as to whether or not they themselves possess or need talent to achieve success in this industry. 

These concerns are well founded. ‘Talent’ is a word which bounces around in every cinema or theatre foyer. The words “Wow, they are so talented!” have been uttered countless times about actors all over the world. When we are just starting out this word is really loud in our ears. As we are auditioning for drama school or going for our first few professional auditions, this question of whether or not we are ‘talented’ enough can be heard ringing in our ears.

Like with any skill, there is undeniably a level of ease and sophistication the best actors in the world possess. A performance which would be desperately challenging for us seems easy in their hands. Now, I feel that most of us are aware of the importance of hard work and time spent developing our craft in the quest of mastery – that is definitely a factor of these top actors’ work. But there does often seem to be something else; some essence – let’s call it ‘talent’ – that these actors possess which gives their performance an extra edge. What is that THING? How do we get some of it? Or has our level of talent been preordained, fixed into place by some cruel deity, restricting our ability to achieve the success we so desperately seek in our lives?

I must admit, I’m making myself chuckle whilst writing this. This is absolutely a fear I have experienced in the past, and may still experience yet. These concerns in this industry are absolutely normal, and I want to begin this conversation by validating your experience a little.

The casting process for acting roles can be SO elusive, so mysterious and so unpredictable. We can be given roles we’re sure we are not right for, and we can have roles we were born to play given to someone else. There is no measurable progression as an actor. We are not in a workplace which presents a clear ladder of opportunity, where hard work will be rewarded with promotion, and complacency discouraged with unfavourable consequences. No, this is not our lot as actors. Some actors will shoot immediately for the stars upon stepping out the door of their drama school, and some may never meet their full potential until later in life. Many actors will continue striving for a goal which remains out of their reach for the entirety of their career. 

Whatever this factor is which catapults some to dizzying heights of success, and leaves some strapped to the spoon, whether it is talent, luck, coincidence or fate – there is one important thing to remember.

Focus On What Is Within Our Control

At the end of the day, whether talent or fate is real or not is beside the point. These factors are not useful for us, for they are completely out of our control. Focusing on talent as a factor which will determine our success and the success of others is simply a way for us to shift responsibility off ourselves. It’s a defence mechanism. Praising the talent of a successful actor is simply the flipped side of the coin of bemoaning the success of an actor for sheer dumb luck. 

As hard as it may seem, as unfair as this industry can appear sometimes, my main point to you today is this: focus on what you can control. This sentiment was made popular by Stoic philosophers of ancient Rome. Stoic teacher, Epictetus, says, 

“The chief task in life is simply this: to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control, and which have to do with the choices I actually control. Where then do I look for good and evil? Not to uncontrollable externals, but within myself to the choices that are my own . . .”  — Epictetus

Adopting this attitude will prove invaluable to you as an actor, for there are SO many factors which are out of our control in this game. Whether the casting director likes you, where you’re in the casting bracket for a particular role, whether you land a role, what the audience thinks of your performance, whether you get good reviews are ALL factors completely outside our control, and yet we all place so much focus and importance on these things. This is to be expected – we, as humans, are social creatures, and crave the validation of the tribe. You should not be beating yourself up whilst reading this if you have felt tied to the opinions of others. It’s normal, and BELIEVE ME – I have spent a lot of my life focussed on the thoughts and opinions of others which are out of my control. 

The question of ‘talent’, therefore, fits into this category of things which are out of our control. If talent is this elusive force which provides success in some and restrains others, then so be it. C’est la vie. If talent is merely privilege; that some actors are born with more opportunity than others, then so be it. We cannot cultivate talent, in the same way that we cannot increase our stockpile of ‘luck’. So, now that we’re agreed that we are not focusing on or bemoaning our perceived levels of talent as actors, what the heck DO we focus on?

What Is Within Our Control

There is a big, courageous shift which is required from us to take our focus off the uncontrollable factors surrounding us and onto what we are able to influence. This requires courage from us because it forces us to take responsibility for our every action, and for the result of those actions. No longer can we blame, complain or question the ‘fairness’ of another actor’s success. All we can do with another actor’s success is allow it to inspire us, and remind us that “if it is possible for them, then it is possible for me”. Another person’s success does not mean your failure – even in the closest of races. Your result is your result – and reflects your preparation, practise, work ethic and attitude. 

“Woah woah woah Jack, are you telling me that me not getting a role is my fault?” Ah, I see I am beginning to ruffle a few feathers. That’s a good thing, I believe this is an important and difficult conversation to have. 

No, I don’t think that the result of an audition, (positive or negative) is your fault, but I do believe it is your responsibility. Now, your responsibility can mean any number of things, from your level of preparation, confidence with an accent, confidence with the lines, your hair colour, your age, your look, your emotional state on the day of the audition, and so on. Your responsibility is YOU – not anyone or anything else. Now, what you need to do next is to determine what within your responsibility is within your control. These factors, such as your look, age and even your emotional state on the day, may be out of your control, and therefore maybe not worth worrying about- or simply trying to optimise for the opportunity. These other factors, however, are well within your control. How well you learn your lines, do the backstory for your character, how confident you are with the accent, how hydrated you are, how healthy you have eaten recently, how well you have slept, how kind you are to the casting director and others you encounter, how present you are in the room – these are all factors well within your control, and the ONLY things worth focusing on. 

This is why this is such a confronting and difficult task. There is great solace which can be found in placing blame or fault on things outside our control – our uber driver took a wrong turn. The casting director was in a foul mood. There was a party raging last night so I couldn’t sleep. Whilst all of these things certainly impact our lives, placing the fault, blame or responsibility on them when it comes to the result of our work is short sighted and unsustainable. I say these things because I know, I KNOW that I have shifted the responsibility for my work onto something outside of my control in the past. It was a defence mechanism. “Oh yeah, I didn’t get that because I ran into an old friend right before the audition and that threw me” I have said. “These theatre companies always cast the same actors, it’s such a closed shop” I have said. “They only got that role because they are really good looking” I have said. I have uttered these words at times where deep down in my heart I know that I didn’t work as hard as I could have. That I felt shame about my lack of dedication, and fear at the prospect of me giving it my all and still coming up short. This, (I hope – unless I’m discovering that I’m quite abnormal) is normal, and understandable. But leaning into this challenge with courage will see us developing exponentially over time. At the end of an audition, if we say “Ah that didn’t go well because of ‘X’ (someone else’s responsibility)” we will probably meet our next audition with the same effort and dedication that we met this one. If we actually go through a truthful debrief with ourselves and take responsibility for our work, acknowledging where we may have been able to work harder or more effectively, we’re far more likely to grow and develop and increase our chances of success.

What it comes down to is this: take responsibility for your life, and focus on what you can control. 

Practise and Process

Take your attention off what is outside your control, and bring it back to what is within your control. One thing that is well within your control is your commitment to practise and your process. 

Instead of looking at the ‘talent’ of others, look at the steps they took to get where they are today. What you will inevitably find is that hey, these actors who are so talented and make their work seem so effortless actually were beginners once, and they have come a long way. Now, instead of being daunted by an intangible ‘talent’, we can actually see the steps and process which led to their mastery of craft. What we will find in the majority of the best actors in the world is courage, persistence and hard work. Any natural ‘god given’ essence to their work is minuscule compared to the degree which these actors have had to persist in the face of adversity and overcome the hurdles in their path.

The best actors have worked really hard to achieve what they have today. This means you need to do the same, if you wish to achieve this success too. Even if talent was a true and influential factor in this industry, these talented few would still need to work hard to position themselves in the right circles, and work towards getting their craft known by people in positions of power. Hard work is inevitable, so that’s what you should be turning your attention towards, right now. Today. 

Genetic ‘Talent’

Don’t get me wrong, I do think ‘talent’ is a factor which does exist in many fields, perhaps more than in the acting industry. But I think it is important to make a distinction between ‘talent’, and ‘genetic suitability’. This phrase, ‘genetic suitability’ is something I’ve lifted from Atomic Habits by James Clear. This is a fantastic book, and incredibly useful in service of developing habits and processes which will maximise our productivity and growth. Clear speaks about talent in his chapter, ‘The Truth about Talent (When genes matter and when they don’t)’. When it comes to a conversation about talent, this chapter is really useful to read. Clear speaks of the importance of us seeking to maximise our potential by seeking environments and situations where our genetics will give us an advantage. He writes, 

“The secret to maximizing your odds of success is to choose the right field of competition… The strength of genetics is also their weakness. Genes cannot be easily changed, which means they provide a powerful advantage in favorable circumstances and a serious disadvantage in unfavorable circumstances.” — James Clear, Atomic Habits

This truth is perhaps most noticeable in physical skill sets, where some body shapes are undeniably more suited to certain sports than others. In acting, this factor is less tangible. To be an actor does not require one particular ‘type’ of human. They can be introvert or extrovert, of all different body shapes, all different backgrounds and life experiences. Perhaps, then, what is useful for us to consider is whether or not we are aiming for the area within the acting industry that is best suited for our natural ‘style’. What might be the case is that we’re working against the grain of our personality while trying to break into a particular style or medium of acting. Clear goes on to expand on this notion, writing,

“The people at the top of any competitive field are not only well trained, they are also well suited to the task. And this is why, if you want to be truly great, selecting the right place to focus is crucial… In short: genes do not determine your destiny. They determine your areas of opportunity.” — James Clear, Atomic Habits

Or, in a more light hearted fashion, 

“Boiling water will soften a potato but harden an egg. You can’t control whether you’re a potato or an egg, but you can decide to play a game where it’s better to be hard or soft.” — James Clear, Atomic Habits

So, if this question of talent has got you beating your head against a wall, and you feel you are failing to progress, then perhaps the task is actually redirecting your efforts to a different area of the industry. Perhaps you are more suited to the environment of screen acting than stage. More comedy than drama, for instance. This is not to say that you will not, one day, be able to do all of these things, but in the early stages of your career while you are establishing yourself, it is definitely best to work towards your natural strengths. 

Unapologetic ‘You’

Here’s a final thought for you. One thing seems to clearly exist amongst the most successful actors in the world. This isn’t talent or hard work, though those elements may certainly exist, too. No, this factor is an unapologetic acceptance of self. These actors have got themselves to a place where they are willing and able to give themselves, all of themselves, to the work. They offer themselves up to the craft of acting life a sacrificial lamb – unapologetically, vulnerably, confidently and willingly. Perhaps this is what we must strive to do as well.

In order to best be able to act, we must develop our self awareness. We must deepen our self-acceptance. We must know ourselves so we can give ourselves. The challenge of achieving this self awareness is going to be far more fulfilling and useful for us than focusing on ‘talent’ – this wishy-washy intangible substance that is of little use to us. 

Use your ‘talent’ – that is, using ‘yourself’, and every facet of your being, to maximise your chances of success. People are watching you act to see what you can bring to the role, not just the role itself. People don’t go to see Hamlet, they go to see you playing Hamlet.

That is the whole crux of this article. You are talented, whether you believe it or not. You are talented because you are you, and no-one else is you. You are unique, and you have everything you need to achieve what you wish to achieve in your life and in this industry. All that is left for you to do is to focus on what is within your control and do those things to the best of your ability. With hard work and discipline and taking responsibility for your life, there really isn’t anything which can stop you. Doing these things will ensure that your success is unstoppable and inevitable. 

The post Acting “Talent” appeared first on StageMilk.

Acting “Emotionally”

Now, if you’ve read any of my other articles, you’ll know that when it comes to questions about acting and the craft of acting, I rarely give a straight and simplistic answer. I mean, it took me 6000 words to answer the question, “what is good acting” for crying out loud. This is because acting is not simplistic, it is complex and sophisticated, and questions about it deserve to be and have been explored and debated for a long time. 

The same, I’m afraid, goes for this question today. Although it may seem so on the surface, “How to act emotionally” is not a simple question. It’s going to require us to talk about a few things before finally coming to a point. So, allow me to begin by introducing a little anarchy: I’m throwing out the question. 

We should not be striving to act “emotionally”. 

The reason(s) for this is the following:

• Emotion can be a byproduct of a good performance, but is not the goal of a good performance.
• Emotion is an obstacle, not an objective.

The second of these statements is provable in any ‘real life’ situation where a heightened emotional state is present. Whenever someone is giving a eulogy at a funeral, tears and grief are the emotions which the speaker tries desperately to manage in order to be able to speak passionately and do justice to the person they are speaking of. In a confrontation between two people, emotions will be quelled at all costs – fear and intimidation must be hidden by both parties, not indulged in. In a break up between two people, how often have you heard of both parties trying to ‘win’ the break up by being ‘in the right’ or attempting to hold face and not allow their emotions to get in the way of what they really want to say to the other person. It is in the aftermath of these moments, in the quiet of solitude, where emotion may arise and consume a person. The same is true for a scene between two characters in a scene in a story. The two characters both want to win, whatever that may mean to them in their particular story. No-one ever wants to lose or be a victim, there is always something to be achieved, and emotion, (true emotion, not manufactured emotion used as a tactic to manipulate someone) is always something to be overcome rather than allowed. 

So, with that in mind, I’d like you to consider adjusting the direction you’re pointing your question. Take your focus off the ‘result’ of an emotional performance, and instead turn your attention towards the process of building a character and immersing yourself in a story. Focusing on this process rather than the result of an emotional state will always be more compelling for an audience, even if your final performance is seemingly void of any emotion at all.

The Problem with Emotion as “Function”

Now, I know what you may be thinking right now: “But what if my character has to cry in the scene?” or, “There are heaps of exclamation marks, surely my character has to be completely enraged?” 

I hear you. Believe me, I do. There are many times where it seems as though it is integral to a story that our character gets to a particular emotional place in a scene. Maybe it says “they cry” in the script, or some other stage direction or big print which you feel forces your performance in a particular direction. In certain situations, particularly in the context of an audition, I would encourage you to be wary of feeling the need to desperately adhere to the ‘big print’ of a script. The emotional direction of a character is included by the writer, and the detail and result of what the performance actually ends up being goes through many stages of conversation and development between the actor, director and writer before ending up on the silver screen.

That being said, there are times where I would agree that there is a particular place our character needs to get to, emotionally, for the sense and continuation of the story. I would call this the ‘function’ of the character. The function of the character is like the particular notes you need to hit in the symphony of the story. The highs and lows of the ark of your character which will give the audience the ride and experience the team of storytellers intends.

In my first two years at drama school I was really hung up on this conundrum. I felt as though I was incapable of any truthful emotional experience whilst I was acting at all. I ended up having dozens of back and forth discussions with a friend who was completely of the opinion that playing an emotional state should be avoided at all costs. I just couldn’t wrap this around my head. What about all the performances I’d seen, Oscar winning performances which featured incredibly emotional moments? Moments of total and utter devotion and vulnerability from the actor? Having the bug of this question well and truly wedged in my brain, I asked my acting teacher at the time, “If I have to cry in a scene, how do I do it?” I’m sure I also said, “Please help me!” a few times during the conversation, too. His answer was something to this effect:

“Sometimes, when I have to cry as a character, I just imagine myself kneeling down in the middle of a street at nighttime with a streetlamp overhead. I’m looking skywards. My arms are spread wide, and rain, tonnes of rain, is pouring down upon me.”

Pretty dramatic, huh? It took me a while to take that answer and translate it into something tangible and usable for myself. I tried that same visualisation, to little effect. But what I finally realised is that there are many ways to trigger an emotional response in yourself, or rather get yourself to a place where emotion may more easily arise, and the task is actually for each individual to figure out what works for them.

When it comes to acting and emotions, you gotta do you.

To not leave you hanging without any further guidance about this challenge, here are a few additional points/ exercises you might like to try in order to feel more emotionally entrenched in your character.

How to Act Emotionally:

#1 Translate Obstacle into Action

Say the function of our character is something emotionally based. They might need to cry or get angry or become hysterical to propel the scene forward. One thing we can do to achieve this functionality is to take the emotional result, the obstacle of the character, and translate it into an action for us to use. By doing this, we take an obstacle and change it into an aspect of our objective. We’re playing to win. Let me elaborate.

Say you need to act ‘angry’. Well, instead of trying to get to the place where you feel unhinged and enraged, (which simply might be an energetic or emotional place which isn’t available to you today) you as the actor have the ability to take back the reins of the character. You are in control. What is the character hoping to achieve, and how can a state of anger help them to achieve this? Translate the emotional result into a transitive verb; an action you can play on the other character. Instead of playing that state of anger, which is a self-fulfilling and self-focussed task, play the tactic to intimidate. Play the tactic to stun or threaten. Play the tactic to destroy. By truly committing to these actions, your performance will undoubtedly have the appearance of anger, though you as the actor may not ‘feel’ anger at all. Just like a duck gliding effortlessly on water with its feet frantically paddling beneath it, I believe the actor should always be holding the reins of the character. 

Let’s extend this device to other emotional states. How about sadness, grief or other melancholic experiences. Perhaps you could play the action to beg or to surrender. Once again, when we fully commit to these actions as a means to achieving our objective, we may appear as the emotional state our character’s ‘function’ demands from us. By really committing to these tactics, we may even instigate a truthful occurrence of the emotional state itself. If you want more actions to choose from, here is a great list: Actions: The Actor’s Thesaurus.

Take your focus off the emotional result of the scene and place it on objective, it will always serve you better. 

#2 Targets

Declan Donnellan, in his book The Actor and the Target, answers a bunch of FAQs from actors. I don’t believe he answers this question specifically, but he does go to provide solutions for the problems surrounding this question.

Essentially, what it comes down to is the fact that when we are asking the question, “how do I act emotionally” our focus is on ourselves, instead of the things in the world around us. Donnellan would call these ‘things’ around us targets, and he implores us, begs us actors to take our attention off ourselves and onto them.

In the target is all the energy and emotion our character needs. There is nothing within us which will incite a more powerful response from us than external stimuli from a target. A target could be anything: a loved one, a cloudy sky, an animal, a cold breeze, a television screen. When we truly place our attention on the target and allow it to energise us, we will have all the emotional truth we are seeking. I go into more detail about the practical application of this book here: The Actor and the Target.

#3 Substitution

This one comes from Ivana Chubbuck, though many other acting teachers encourage (or deliberately discourage) methods similar to that of substitution. Substitution is the method of replacing the circumstances of a scene, either in a single moment or perhaps in an entire scene, with memories and emotions which you have experienced in your life. The word ‘substitution’ then, comes from the act of substitution an imagined experience for a real one.

I, personally, take issue with this method, as I feel it can only achieve a performance in line with the given circumstances of a story. You are giving a performance which is similar to what the writer is acting from you, but not going the extra mile to imaginatively invest in the given circumstances of the story completely. I believe we all have the capacity to imagine and therefore emulate nearly all experiences which human beings are capable of experiencing. In fact I believe it is said that by the time you are 8 years old you have experienced every emotion it is possible for you to experience, including all the heavy hitters, like wrath and a desire for vengeance, for example.

That being said, this method does work for a lot of people. If you’re keen to find out more about it, head over to Indy’s article here: A Guide to the Ivana Chubbuck Method. She goes into great detail about Ivana’s method as a whole.

One final note, if you do decide to pursue substitution as a method, then please look after yourself! Prioritise self care. As I said earlier, that actor should always hold the reins of the character. If you’re substituting for something which brings you close to unresolved personal trauma, you’re really playing with fire, and putting the safety of yourself and the actors around you at risk.

#4 Allow

This one comes off the back of our substitution chat, not because I think it is the same technique, but it’s a similar method. Allow yourself to be wherever you are on the particular day you have come to act. I know this sounds counterintuitive. I’m playing a Soviet soldier crying over a wounded comrade in WW2 and you want me to allow myself to just be my cappuccino drinking, chino wearing self right now? Yes, kind of. 

There is great power in allowing ourselves to be and feel whatever it is we are currently feeling. If we are feeling a great sense of inadequacy at our inability to reach certain emotional heights – there’s energy to be found in that state! Dustin Hoffman famously talks about feeling completely inadequate in a scene whilst filming Rain Man, and he ended up using that feeling – not the given circumstances of a scene – to fuel his performance on this particular day. The performance he gives in this scene is remarkable and absolutely serves the story. Sometimes, we are exactly where we need to be to give a performance, all we need to do is allow and accept our current state.

Expanding on this, by allowing rather than forcing, we are giving the chance for dozens and dozens of exciting choices to arise which may not have been thought of before. What if your character is not crying their eyes out at the funeral? Does the character deciding to adopt a stoic persona in this moment work for or even enhance the moment? Say you’re feeling uncontrollably giggly today but your character is being diagnosed with a rare terminal illness, what if you were to bring laughter into that scene? Perhaps it would be incorrect for this particular story, but can we say that this choice is un-human? No. As humans, we are truly capable of any emotional experience, and to put ourselves in a box of forced emotional results is to be reductive of the potential of human behaviour. Cry at the job promotion. Laugh hysterically at the funeral. Get unreasonably angry about stepping on that dog turd. 

Go with the tide. Rather than forcing yourself to feel something that you don’t, try accepting where you’re at and working from there. 

If you feel this is not a suitable action for you, or will not be sufficient given the particular place you’re in, then let’s head on over to point number 5.

#5 Manufacture: Play Make Believe

I’m about to speak some acting sacrilege. If it is unavoidable in the function of your character and you must reach an emotional place that you do not feel you can truthfully get to, then manufacture the experience. Make it up. Play make-believe. 

Now, bear with me. What I mean by this is not for you to start your own special brand of melodramatic acting. No, what I mean is for you to use certain tools and techniques to get yourself emotionally primed for a scene. Manufacture an experience, so it is more easily accessible for you for the moments you need it.

I used this technique in a recent production of Hamlet, where I played Laertes. Laertes needs to enter onto the stage in Act four having heard whilst he has been abroad that his Father has been murdered and easily and unceremoniously buried. Once on the stage, Laertes is confronted by his sister, who has been driven mad with grief over the death of their father. I found this task SO difficult, and it took me a long time to figure out a process which worked for me. The thing I needed to meet the emotional challenge of grief, vengeance and shock was a ritual. A ritual whereby I might manufacture an emotionally primed state which I could submerge myself in for the rest of the play, to hit the functional and emotional ‘notes’ I felt Laertes needed to hit. 

My ritual involved three things: 

• Solitude
• Music (on headphones) and,
• Breathing.

Essentially, I would sit backstage 15 minutes (wish) before my entrance. This timing was important, any earlier and I would be ready prematurely, and any later would incite a stress response and a feeling of needing to rush. Then, I would play one song on repeat on my headphones (whilst always having a speck of my attention of what scene we were up to in the play – hands on the reins, remember). This song was the same every performance. Next, I would breathe deeply, and allow whatever I was feeling on that particular day to rise to the surface. This process of sitting by myself, listening to this particular song and allowing myself to feel everything I needed to feel primed me for my entrance. The process during rehearsals and the feedback from the director suggested to me that this ritual was having the desired impact on my performance.

So, the challenge is now over to you. What do you need to do to ensure you’re where you need to be, per formatively and emotionally? Practise what this looks like for you and have your process or ritual clearly identified and tried and tested, for you never know when you might need it backstage or on set, when you feel like you don’t have it in you to do your character justice. 

Conclusion: The Key

I want to leave you with a final little spiel about where your attention is best placed. 

If you take your focus off the results of the performance and place them on the process, you will achieve success in your performance. The process is everything supporting the character, the backstory, the history, the given circumstances, the relationships, the need, the persona, the tragic flaw, the objective, ect ect ect. All these things contain all the energy you need to give your best possible performance. 

Immerse yourself in these elements of your character, become the subject matter expert of the life of your character. Once you get to that place, it’s time for you to listen and allow whatever arises to arise.

I’d like to leave you with this scene from Doubt featuring Viola Davis and Meryl Streep. I’d like you to focus on Davis’ performance. 

In this scene, emotion is boiling within Davis’ character, yet it is an obstacle for her in achieving her objective of getting this particular message across to Streep’s character. Davis is so deeply and personally connected to the story and the given circumstances that emotion arises of its own accord. It isn’t forced, it isn’t premeditated. It just happens. This is the time of emotional expression in our performances we should be striving for. This is what truly great acting looks like. This is how we “act emotionally”.

This is the one scene Davis’ character is in this film. Boom. How’s that for a performance? 

Enjoy

The post How to Act “Emotionally”: 5 Ways to Access Emotion appeared first on StageMilk.

In this article we’ll be dissecting the art of listening as an actor; coming to understand why it is so crucial for us as actors, and how to actively develop our ability to listen deeply, to take our work to a deeper level of authenticity and truth.

Skip to:

• Listening for Actors
• Tools for Developing the Art of Listening
• Physical Warm-ups For Listening
• Meditation and Relaxation For Listening
• Wake Up Your Listening By Listening
• Prepare the Senses
• Pursuing Presence in the Moment: 5 Senses Exercise
• Meisner’s Exercise on Listening
• Practise Day to Day

Listening for Actors

Ok, so what are we talking about when we say ‘listening’? Let’s work backwards – lets begin by stating what listening isn’t. 

• The truly listening actor is not waiting until it is their turn to speak.
• The truly listening actor has not planned their actions or emphasis before the scene has begun.
• The truly listening actor is not trying to show or prove to the audience that they are, in fact, listening.
• The truly listening actor does not prioritise their own emotional experience over their attention on the other character.
• The truly listening actor does not get frustrated or thrown off balance when another actor makes an unexpected choice.
• The truly listening actor does not operate from tension.

Conversely:

• The truly listening actor will find their thoughts and responses in the moment based on the actions of the other character(s) and world around them.
• The listening actor feels no need to prove that they are immersed in the scene, for they are immersed in the scene and responding effortlessly and authentically to the stimulus around them.
• The emotional experience of the truly listening actor is incidental and cannot be predicted. It is whatever it is, and whatever it is is valid, for it is true.
• The truly listening actor will welcome each and any choice from a fellow actor (within the parameters of safety and consent) for everything which occurs in a scene is a gift for the actor to welcome and respond to.
• The truly listening actor remains relaxed, even in the high stakes moments of a scene.

Listening, when it comes to the craft of acting, is not a skill which is isolated to the ear drums. Listening is a full body experience. It is a state of openness which the actor inhabits, every one of their senses is alive to whatever stimulus should trigger a response. We can, of course, listen and be provoked to a response by another person’s words. We can also, (when our listening is truly alive), be triggered to respond by another persons’ expression, gesture or movement. A smell wafting through the air might trigger a memory for us, if we are aware of its presence. Our own bodies can trigger a response from us, when we notice a new spot on our skin or signs of age we had not noticed before. A cool breeze can trigger us into pulling our coats tighter around us. The type of breathing from a loved one can make us behave in a particular way which we best see fit. 

Listening is not simply hearing. Listening is allowing and absorbing every piece of stimulus in the world of a scene.

Even the absence of something is there for us to respond to. A character’s silence or stillness, for instance, can be as loud a response as if they were to scream and shout in your face. When we are alive and listening to the world and people around us, even the smallest of gestures can move mountains inside of us. I often remind actors of this when they are doing a monologue. A monologue, in many ways, is never a monologue. A monologue is always targeted at something or someone, and by virtue of that fact, it is therefore a conversation. And being a conversation, the actor needs to treat it as such. The character does not know that they have been given this block of time to speak everything they wish to say- no, only the actor knows that. So the character needs to allow for the expectation or possibility that something will interrupt them or question them. This expectation requires the actor to be truly listening to what is around them, rather than just indulging in the words they have to speak. A monologue is never a monologue, it’s always a dialogue. It’s always a conversation. 

In short, listening is the foundation of the craft of an actor. Without listening, we are simply ‘showing’ and mimicking. This is not acting. Acting is the craft of emulating real life, and truly listening is to allow the audience to witness life.

With acting, the temptation arises through fear to push things upon that which is outside of ourselves. When we speak we take energy from ourselves and throw it into the world. When we move we dispel energy in all different directions. What takes courage, however, is actually to allow energy to come towards us and fill us, and allow ourselves to be observed whilst this happens.

Rather than me keep waxing lyrical about this, let’s watch a master show us how it is done. Watch the following clip from Shoplifters directed by Hirokazu Kore-eda. I’d like you to watch in particular the performance of Kirin Kiki, the older of the two characters sitting on the beach.

Far out… If you haven’t seen Shoplifters, do yourself a favour. It’s incredible. Watching this scene makes me cry – and I’m sitting in a cafe right now, pull yourself together, Jack!

What makes Kiki’s performance so amazing in this moment is her utter devotion to openness and responsiveness. She is not concerned about the lines of dialogue she has to say or making sure she says them in a particular way or at a predetermined moment in the scene. She is just alive, within the given circumstances of the story, living, effortlessly.

She is watching her ‘family’ (watch the film and you’ll understand why I put the word ‘family’ in inverted commas) and she seems to be completely in alignment with whatever thoughts arise in her mind. She wants to tell the woman sitting next to her that she is beautiful. When that woman leaves, her shoulders hunch – it seems as though she is listening and responding to the weight of the world and her age. She listens and responds to the skin on her ankles, when did she get these spots? She responds to the sensation of the sand she is sit-in on, she picks some up to sprinkle on her legs. this feeling seems to sooth her experience of angst, she looks back up to see her family in the water. Seeing them, she says, ‘Thank you’. This ‘Thank you’ was not written as dialogue in the script, but the director went on to say that this line became a defining and central moment for the film, and actually re-wrote scenes from the film to support this moment. This masterful moment could not have happened if Kiki was not truly immersed as the character and listening with every aspect of her being to the world around her. Listening, then, as Kiki proves to us, does not take strength, does not take concentration, does not take effort, but rather trust, courage, relaxation and immersion.

So how can we develop our ability to listen? It seems counter-intuitive to ‘practise’ listening, as it is something we do every day and have been doing our entire lives, but there are ways we can increase the depth to which we are listening to other characters in the scene, and by doing so increase our connection to our character and our immersion in the scene.

Tools for Developing the Art of Listening

#1 Physical Warm-ups For Listening

The benefits of a physical warm up before we act are endless. We ensure our ability to do our various actions on stage or screen safely and effectively, sure. but what we also do is physically open ourselves to the world around us, which is all listening is. By physically warming up we are relieving tension in our bodies and allowing for relaxation, which in turn will allow for organic responses to arise within us based on the events taking place in a scene.

So, before your next scene, wake yourself up physically as well as intellectually. Allow yourself to respond to both the verbal and sensorial stimuli of the world by switching all the facets of your neurology on. This may be done in many simple ways, like stretching, yoga, tai chi, or even just simply dancing around the room. Get your blood pumping. Give your skin and muscles a chance to wake up and feel alive, then simply allow them to be.

#2 Meditation and Relaxation For Listening

As we have identified above, listening is achieved when we are in a state of relaxation rather than tension. This is easier said than done, as we all know what stress and nerves acting can provoke. Whatever actions we can make in the lead up to a scene to take the reins back of our physical experience is going to help us. Breathing exercises, meditation, or any calming and relaxing exercise will increase our chances of being able to truly listen in a scene and take our focus off ourselves.

#3 Wake-up Your Listening By Listening

Listening to a music of your choosing can be a wonderful way to wake up your listening as well as the entirety of your emotional experience. Music can be incredibly provocative for us, causing effortless responses for us, from emotions rising to giving us goosebumps and increasing our heart rate. Listening to and being effortlessly affected by music is a good example of the place of openness we want to get to whilst acting in a scene.

So, whilst you’re preparing to act, switch your listening on by listening to something on your headphones. There is not one particular genre I’d say which is best to do this with, you just need to use whatever works for you best. What’s more, I actually find that listening to a range of different tracks can wake me up to the range of possibilities for what feelings of experiences may arise within me. Try listening to Reverie by Debussy, followed by Going to California by Led Zeppelin, followed by I Feel the Earth Move by Carole King, for example. 

Remember, there is no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ when it comes to listening authentically and the experiences which arise for you. What’s important is the process of allowing whatever it is to arise, rather than feeling the need to generate something.

#4 Prepare the Senses

Yoshi Oida, in his acting book The Invisible Actor, writes about the importance of the actor-in-preparation cleaning all the orifices of the body, to allow yourself to receive the stimulus and energy travelling towards you in a scene. 

Emma, one of our writers here at StageMilk has written a great article about Oida’s book, which you can find here: Why ‘The Invisible Actor” Is My Ride or Die Acting Book.

And this is the section where she summarises Oida’s instructions to the actor in preparation:

The nine holes, the spine, the hara and the hands:

In Japanese tradition each orifice of the body requires attention. Yoshi gives you simple exercises to work into your practice that brings focus to the eyes, the nose, the mouth, the ears, the anus, the spine, the hara (our physical core and core of our entire self). He considers these our most powerful energy channels that need to be cleared and prepared in order to use your whole being effectively in your work.

These exercises are great to work into your own rehearsal prep or pre-show warmup. Even if you’re yet to acquire any sort of warmups you do on your own to get into the zone, these are a great place to start in order to bring awareness to your body as a complete sensorial instrument.

As I’ve already said, listening is a full body action and experience, so we need to prepare the whole body for the task.

#5 Pursuing Presence in the Moment: 5 Senses Exercise

This exercise is recommended to people who are experiencing anxiety in their day to day lives, but I think it is actually useful for us as actors in pursuing authentic listening, too. Listening is a commitment to the present moment, after all.

The exercise goes like this:

First, begin sitting down with your feet placed flat on the floor, hip width apart. Take a deep inhalation. Next, begin the ‘Five Senses’ exercise. Name (out loud or in your head) five things you can see around you. There is no right or wrong to this exercise. Just name and 5 things. Take a breath. Next, name 4 things you can hear. Take a breath. Next, name three things you can feel. Take a breath. Next, name two things you can smell. Take a breath. Finally, name one thing you can taste. Take a breath.

By doing this exercise you are turning in to the information your sensors are sending to you, and as well as this you are allowing for breath and relaxation to come back to you.

#6 Meisner’s Exercise on Listening

This is an exercise from the great acting teacher Sanford Meisner which I’d like to summarise here for our listening practise.

This exercise is about listening through observation:

Stand in front of another actor, try to ‘neutralise’ your body as much as possible. By this I mean uncross your arms, relax your shoulders and stand with your feet hip-width apart. Next, one of the actors will begin naming the things they see in the other actor. Do this for about 45 seconds to a minute, and for this first round purely name the things that you can literally observe. For example, you might say of the other actor, “You’re smiling. You’re furrowing your eyebrows. You’re breathing. You’re relaxing your shoulders. You’re clenching your jaw” ect ect. Allow the other actor to repeat this process to the first speaker. 

Next, repeat this process but name the things your listening and intuition tells you the other actor is experiencing. This is a process free of judgement, so it’s important both actors feel safe in the knowledge that this is not about getting it ‘right’ or being told what or how you feel. This is simply an exercise in becoming alive to whatever signals an actor is giving us in a scene. In life, it’s important for us to refrain judgement and not read too much into the subtle cues of another person, for it’s almost impossible to truly tell what someone is thinking or feeling. For actors, however, this intuition, right or wrong, can be useful in generating behaviour for us.

So, once again, for 45-60 seconds, name what you intuit of the other actor. For example, “You’re holding your breath. You’re nervous. You want to laugh. You’re annoyed at me. You feel more relaxed” And so on. Repeat this for the other actor.

This process, done in a safe environment with trust can really awaken listening for you and your scene partner, and this effect will carry on into your scene. You can read more about this exercise in our artilce about it here: 5 Benefits of the Meisner Repetition Exercise (That May Surprise You).

#7 Practise Day to Day

We can’t really expect to be able to listen with our whole being at the drop of a hat. It is a skill we should be practising and developing on a day to day basis. Get in the habit of practising, at least once a day, the art of actually listening to someone fully. Minimise distractions, give them your full attention. Listen to the words they are saying, but also listen and be aware of their gestures and body language. Listening to their breath and the pace of their actions. Listen to their silences. Listen to what they are not saying.

Practising this skill will probably make you realise a few things. Firstly, how rare it is that we actually do listen with everything we’ve got in our day to day life. Secondly, how much of an active process it is, and how much it needs our attention and dedication. Thirdly, listening is something which cannot be done with force. When done with force, we may feel we are listening to the words of the speaker more intently, but we will start to notice that we are blocking out the other messages and signals we should be receiving in the process.

The art of listening takes relaxation, dedication and practise. So, start practising!

Conclusion

Listening is a skill which is often glorified in the craft of acting, but is rarely given specific attention when it comes to its development. Treat it like any other element of your craft: your voice, body, text work ect, and spend the time it deserves honing it as a skill. 

True listening as a character can only come from an intricate understanding and adoption of the given circumstances of a story and character’s life. Once you have done your work, you know your lines, objectives and relationships and are immersed in your character, now it’s time to allow all that information to simply exist inside you. If you have done the process work well, then you don’t need to push for any of that inner life to be present with you. All you need to switch on is your listening. Listen to the people and the world around you, and that coupled with your connection to the story will be all that’s needed for your performance to be embodied and deeply truthful. 

So, test out some of the theories I’ve floated in this article! Begin to watch your favourite actors in the moments when they are not speaking, to see how they listen. And the next time you come to acting, place careful attention on the quality of your listening, to ensure that it is alive and present. 

I hope this has been a useful exploration for you, and that you feel more aware of the importance of listening in your acting, and you feel empowered and enabled to develop your listening actively as an essential skill which you possess as an actor. 

The post The Art of Listening as an Actor appeared first on StageMilk.

Being a beginner at anything can be a daunting position to be in, but I have good news for you. The objective of the actor’s journey, whether you are a beginner or a seasoned expert, never changes. The objective is this: to get a little bit better at acting every day. This objective is the secret to success as an actor. In fact, if you replace the word ‘actor’ with any chosen skill or profession, it’s the secret to success in everything. This is what we are here to do today: get a little bit better at acting.

Now, I’ve outlined above my target audience for this article. This is for those of you who are new to the craft of acting, but who are pretty darn sure it’s what you want to do. You’ve done a bit of reading on what the heck acting actually is, maybe you’ve even done a bit of research about training institutions or maybe you’ve even flipped your phone camera around onto your face, pressed record and done some acting. If, however, you find yourself feeling like a fraud, reading this article having not really begun your journey as an actor, that’s ok! You are of course welcome here. I’d just like you to do something for me first. 

What I’d like you to do is to head on over to this article here and have a read: How to Become an Actor. 

That article is a really great launching pad for actors, and I think it’s worth you reading some of the preliminary information about becoming an actor. Once you’ve read that, I expect you to be zipping right back on to this article to start taking some action with me! Let’s move on now to talking about some of the guiding principles I want to underpin our action points today. 

Guiding Principles

There are a thousand things I could suggest that you do to start your journey as an actor. All these tasks may be useful, but what I think will add value to these tasks is if we pair them with a few foundational principles to maximise their effectiveness. Here are three principles I’d like you to consider and incorporate into the action points which will follow:

#1 Action over Motion

I’m reading Atomic Habits by James Clear at the moment. It’s exceptional. Every page has an idea or technique which jumps out at me as being incredibly practical and useful. This is an idea which is directly derived from his book.

We need to prioritise action over motion. What this means is that we (human beings generally, but also actors) spend more time thinking about the steps we will take, planning them out and ruminating on them rather than actually doing them. This is an easy trap to fall into, and one that I fall into on a weekly basis! It’s an easy trap to fall into because motion feels good. Planning all the things we are going to do feels like action, it feels like we’re achieving something. Unfortunately, all we are achieving is the plan itself. Motion is not action. We need to hijack our own processes and start to ensure that we are actually starting to tick things off the lists we are making, and by doing so we are taking action. By taking action we’re getting a little bit better. By taking action we’re moving towards becoming the actor who we want to be. 

#2 Boil it Down

The next trap to fall into when trying to build any skill set is to set our expectations too high with what we wish to achieve. I’m trying to learn a language at the moment and I began by saying to myself, “Jack – do this for an hour every day and you’ll be fluent in no time!” Great, sounds correct, right? An hour a day will make me bilingual for sure. The first day or so was straight forward enough, but by day three I was already thinking, “Aw man, I have to do this for an hour…?!” Whoops. Habit gone. No more new language after that day. I had robbed myself of all sense of achievement with my pursuit because I set myself up for failure by setting too high standards. With anything we wish to achieve we need to take a single step each day. And this single step needs to be simple and achievable.

There are many versions of the seven action points I’m going to outline below. There’s no ‘right or wrong’ way of doing them – the actual doing of them is up to you and your process. What is important, however, is that you make each of the tasks you wish to do simple and achievable. And by achievable I don’t mean ‘achievable some day’, I mean achievable today.

#3 Quantity Over Quality

Another point from Atomic Habits, James Clear flips the commonly used phrase ‘quality over quantity’ on it’s head. I have always prioritised quality over quantity – whether it came to acting, writing, exercising, you name it. The unfortunate fact with that approach is that when we are beginners, prioritising quality actually becomes a hurdle to our development. It’s motion instead of action again. We’re beginners, after all. The task for us at this stage does not need to be quality. It just needs to be quantity. We need to get rungs on the board. We need to get stars on the uniform, reps under the belt, whatever analogy you wish to use. Practise practise practise, repeat repeat repeat. Practising acting, even if the ‘result’ of your acting is imperfect, is infinitely better than imagining yourself doing good acting but not actually doing any acting at all. 

To Summarise, these are the three points I want you to apply to our seven actions today:

1. Take action today, don’t just make a plan.
2. Make the action simple and achievable today
3. Repeat the action. Prioritise quantity over quality.

Seven Actions For New Actors

#1 Read Shakespeare

I’m a big ol’ Shakespeare nerd, hence why this is point number one. Shakespeare is the best way for actors, new and experienced, to practice deeply. Shakespeare is never surface level practise, it’s never something you can phone in, it’s always a challenge. This is why it’s the best thing for you to start practising today.

Acting Shakespeare, to use a physical analogy, is like a full body workout for the actor. It engages the mind, the voice, the body and the imagination all at once. Every aspect of the actor’s instrument needs to be involved in the task of performing Shakespeare, which is why it’s so damn useful for us to practise it. 

Now, one thing I want to make clear is that I do appreciate the challenge Shakespeare’s work presents, in terms of accessibility to the text and our understanding of it. What’s essential for you to know is that it is ok to not immediately understand. Whenever I do Shakespeare, whenever anyone does Shakespeare, we go through an initial stage of prioritising understanding of the story, relationships and words on the page. I don’t think reading or understanding Shakespeare comes naturally to anyone, the experts have just done more practise. So, when you tackle Shakespeare, apply the same method as the pros:

1. Understand the words and story. (Dictionary in hand, translate the words and make sure you understand what is happening and being said in a way that is meaningful to you)
2. Gently begin bringing the text to life. (Speak the words out loud, move around a bit while you are speaking.)
3. Begin to incorporate character. (Mine the text for relatability and character. Begin to physicalise through your character and emphasise the words in a way more in line with the circumstances of the scene)

This is a simple process, and one you should begin today. Acting Shakespeare is a challenge, yes, but that’s no reason not to do it. In fact, that’s one of the main reasons why you should do it. 

In line with our guiding principles, let’s make this an active and achievable task. Instead of committing to reading the entirety of Shakespeare’s canon by next Thursday afternoon, boil it down. All I want you to do is to read one single soliloquy. Not even a single play, not even a single scene: a single speech from one of Shakespeare’s characters. Oh gosh, but there are so many characters!! Ok, I’ll make the process of choosing really simple for you, too. 

Read either this soliloquy from Hamlet Act 1 Scene 2, or this soliloquy from A Midsummer Night’s Dream: Helena Act 1 Scene 1. 

Read the text once in your head, then once out loud, nice and slowly. There, you’ve just gotten a little bit better at acting today. Well done. If reading some Shakespeare has inspired you, pursue that energy and keep going a little further today. If not, that’s ok too! Let’s move on to tip #2.

#2 Get on Camera

Action is the word of the day, so let’s get in front of the camera!

There is nothing between you and practising acting today. You don’t need to wait until you’re in a drama school, you don’t need to wait until you’ve graduated, you don’t need to wait to be told what to do. If you’ve landed on this website and you have an interest in acting, you will possess an intuition about how to act: all you need to do now is to start practising.

Start today by recording yourself doing something on camera. That’s right, just do something. Anything. Tell the camera your name, your favourite type of music and what you had for breakfast. Watch the recording back and see what you notice. This might feel 1000 miles away from acting, but it’s actually an incredibly valuable first step. To be able to act well on camera, we need to be able to know how we behave and act in our everyday lives. Plenty of actors, from Stella Adler to Heath Ledger famously spent a lot of time recording themselves, sometimes acting, sometimes just being themselves. This awareness of who they were and how they came across on camera contributed to their ability to play a particular character or emotion on a film set while the real cameras were rolling.

So, boil it down. The ideal place we want to be is doing a monologue or a scene on camera once or twice a week. This boils down to you standing your phone on a chair and a pile of books, (or a tripod) hitting record and letting the camera see you for 60 seconds or so. Watch the recording, notice how you react to seeing yourself on camera and begin to get curious about what is possible for you while the camera is rolling. This is a simple as anything step which you can achieve today.

#3 Watch Everything

One of the most essential tasks for an actor in the early stages of their career is to begin consuming and absorbing great acting and storytelling. Again, this is a task which you can begin right away, as long as you don’t let the size of the task paralyse you. There is an endless list of films to watch and theatre to see. In fact, it’s impossible to see it all. Maybe if you locked yourself in a room for your entire lifetime you’d be able to watch the majority of good cinema and recorded theatre from around the world, but then you wouldn’t be doing what you love: acting. So, let’s simplify this task and start from the beginning.

You don’t have to watch everything, but just know that everything you do watch will contribute to your craft and ability. There are many directions to go in. Do you watch the great films from the 20th century? How about all the fantastic films from last year? What about all the incredible films made in languages other than your own? What about experimental films, early films or concept films? What about TV shows, web series, filmed theatre, opera, ballet? Woah woah woah. Yes, there’s a lot. So let’s boil it down. I think the simplest place to start to ensure that what you are watching will be worth watching is to look at the Oscars list of best picture winners. You can find it here: Oscars Best Picture List.

Pick a year to start, say, 1980, and watch a film a week until you get to this year. By the end of the year you will have watched a whole bunch of the best films ever made. This practise will expand your understanding of what ‘good acting’ is, and what is possible in the craft of storytelling. 

From there, you might like to pick an actor or director whose work speaks to you, and explore laterally to see what else they have made or been a part of.

Actively watching films, rather than passively watching them, is a super easy and effective way to get better at acting. To actively watch something, all you need to do is switch on your awareness of the fact that the film is being manufactured by the filmmakers and actors to make you, the audience, experience something. How are they doing that? How is the actor behaving on the screen? Start asking questions, and over time you will start realising the answers.

#4 Begin Your Self-Education (Start Reading!) 

Reading about acting, (or reading about anything, really) is one of the key components of development. There is a wealth of accessible and affordable knowledge right at the fingertips of the new actor, all you need to do is to grab it. So many of us will begin throwing our money in every direction instead of seeking knowledge for ourselves in our own ways. Don’t get me wrong – a good acting teacher is an essential part of the actor’s early development, we’ll definitely talk more about that later on. But for now, as we’ve noticed a few times already in this article, there is no need to wait! The process of learning and developing as an actor can start now, today. 

There are heaps of people out there who have written about acting, and plenty of acting books. The amount of books out there can contribute, once again, to our inaction. Paralysis of choice, I believe it’s called. So let’s boil down the task of reading acting books into something devastatingly simple. The lack of effort this task will require from you is astounding – in fact, you won’t even have to leave this website!!!!!

StageMilk has a STACK of articles written about acting books, summarising them and giving you background on why you should read them. We conducted a poll with our readers about which were the top acting books, and the top three results were the following:

• Respect for Acting, Uta Hagen
• An Actor Prepares, Konstantin Stanislavki
• The Actor and the Target, Declan Donnelan

So, great. There you have your choices boiled down to three options. Now, let’s boil down the task of actually reading these books into something achievable today. StageMilk writers have written articles about these three books, which you can find here:

• Uta Hagen:
• Konstantin Stanislavski
• Declan Donnellan

So, your action for today, when it comes to educating yourself, is to read ONE of those three articles. It might take you 10-20 minutes to do this. By doing so you are contributing to your craft, and you may just energise and excite yourself to read more and pick up a copy of the books which inspired the articles. Happy reading!

#5 Begin Training

All the steps you’ve taken up until now in this article are self driven, self motivated tasks. Awesome. Good on you for taking control of your career and development as an actor. Now, let’s outsource our development for a moment by talking about professional actor training. 

There are plenty of avenues to begin your professional training as an actor. From drop in classes to full time training, it’s hard to know where to start or which direction is best. Again, rather than falling into choice-paralysis or endlessly motioning towards taking action, let’s make a start with something practical. 

Relieve yourself of the obligation of choosing the ‘right’ course for the moment, there will be time for that later. Now, especially if you’re new to acting and only have a few classes under your belt, is the time to select and pursue. Whatever city you are in, there should be an acting academy or institution which will offer a drop in class or a one off class. This is the best place for you to begin your search. 

Once you have identified a class that looks interesting, all you need to do today is to make some kind of future commitment to attending that class. That could mean registering your interest via email, putting the class in your calendar or signing up and paying for the class. By doing this you are committing your future self to the task. You are SO much more likely to actually attend an acting class once you’ve paid for it as opposed to the one you’re considering but aren’t sure about.

We can take control of our future actions by taking action today. Find an acting class and book it in! That’s a really significant step for today – in many ways actually attending the class is the easy bit. You’ve done the hard work, and now you get the reward. 

This epic article is your go-to guide for finding the best short courses around the globe: Best Short Acting Courses Around the World.

Follow that link, find the city closest to you, choose one of the schools and GO! Your acting training is underway.

#6 Voice Work

‘Acting’, as in pretending to be a character on stage or screen, is the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the skills and craft of an actor. There are so many underlying elements to what makes for a good performance: skilled physicality, vast imagination, curiosity, intelligence, courage, improvisation, collaboration, devising and research are a few of these elements. One of the most important, however, is your voice.

If you end up attending a full time drama-school course, you’ll end up spending a LOT of time working on and developing your voice. This doesn’t mean singing, necessarily, but rather strength and malleability of your voice to be able to portray different characters in different spaces for different mediums. The best actors I’ve ever seen can be heard and understood clearly in a full 800 seat theatre whilst only whispering. A good actor’s accents are flawless. A good actor can shout without damaging their vocal cords. 

Now that you are aware of the importance of voice work and the inevitability of it being a focus area of your training in the future, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t start developing your voice today. 

Voice work can take many forms: you might like to practise singing your favourite song or try one of our voice warm ups, or maybe you’d just like to start trying to mimic your favourite accent. Whatever you decide to do today I’m going to leave up to you. Remember: do the action today, make it achievable (even 5 minutes of humming, singing or doing tongue-twisters is good) and then repeat this practise as often as you can. Decide to arrive at your formal training feeling confident about your vocal ability, rather than just starting to learn in an institution. In fact, the same rule goes for all of these action points. By taking your development as an actor into your own hands, you are ensuring you will gain more out of your formal training than you would if you were starting from absolute scratch. Good on you, I wish I had done the same!

#7 Physicality

This one follows hard on from voice work. Acting is a physical craft. It might not be as athletic or rigorous as playing a sport, but I can guarantee you that the majority of successful actors have command over their body and its abilities, rather than being limited by them. 

Any physical practise, whether it’s yoga, running, weight lifting, sport, boxing, dancing, martial arts, horse riding, meditation, you name it, is going to be beneficial for you as an actor. It gets you fit, which helps you feel better both mentally and physically, it increases your capacity and physical confidence, and it’s a healthy long term investment.

So, rather than deciding to be a marathon runner in 3 weeks, take action and go for a 5 minute jog this afternoon. Or stretch for 10 minutes once you’ve finished reading this article. Or sign up to your local mixed netball social club, whatever. 

Acting, no matter the role or the medium, requires actors to be in peak physical condition. Being on stage requires the ability to maintain focus and energy for 2-3 hours every night. Acting on screen requires endurance over 10-12 hour working days for weeks on end. If you’re not physically up to the task, your acting will suffer and you will rue the day you didn’t take Jack from StageMilk’s advice and go for that jog!

Conclusion: “Rolling, Camera Set, And…”

Action! You’re off! Maybe you’ve been ticking these actions off the list as you’ve been reading, or maybe you’re about to tackle all of the above in an hour of power. Either way, you’re taking action towards becoming the actor you want to be. So many actors are out there, making plans, imagining all the things they want to do, making motions towards becoming the actor they want to be, but you – you’re actually doing it. Good on you. Keep it up.

Three principles will help you keep your progress consistent and effective: make it achievable, make it consistent, and put it into action. 

These are 7 simple tasks or focus areas which you can take action on today. There are so many other things you can do to become a better actor, but even the most powerful action is meaningless if left on the bottom of a to-do list.

The task is not winning an Academy Award next week. The task is getting a little bit better at acting today. 

Welcome to the craft of acting! You’ve chosen a wonderful, exciting, challenging, fulfilling and inspiring passion to pursue. There are many actors who have come before you for you to learn from, but it’s up to you to decide how you wish to traverse this environment, and it’s up to you to decide the type of actor you wish to become and the steps you wish to take to get there. 

The time is now, go out there and get ’em!

The post Seven Actions for the New Actor appeared first on StageMilk.

Skip to:

• Drama School Training
• 1 Year Programs
• Short Courses
• Drop-in Classes
• Alternative Training

Before You Begin…

In the process of deciding where to go and train as an actor, it’s important for you to do a little bit of thinking at the outset. What I’d like you to think about is “what interests/excites me most about acting?”. Notice that I haven’t asked the question, “What type of actor do I want to be?” This question can be a bit paralysing and hard to answer; I’ve been doing this for a decade and I’m still not necessarily sure I can answer that question for myself. What’s most useful for you at the moment is to pursue what brings you the most joy. Following your gut and heart is going to be the most reliable strategy for you.

So, what brings you the most joy? Do you love the theatre and being in front of an audience? Are you keen on the classics or more interested in the contemporary? Do you dream about film sets? Are you a triple threat musical theatre aficionado? Do you enjoy comedy and making people laugh? Are you interested in alternative theatre: mime, or other physically based theatre styles? List your top five focus areas on a page to keep them front and centre in your decision making process. 

Next, think about the commitment level which suits you best in your acting training. Is this a hobby you’re interested in pursuing alongside your main career, are you pretty serious about pursuing acting but keeping your other pursuits alive to be safe, or are you all in, ready to plunge head first into the pursuit of an acting career? There’s no right of wrong about this decision – it’s up to you. Only you can know what is right for you, it’s your time after all: the most valuable commodity you have. Spend that time in the way which suits you best.

Now that you have your focus areas and your ideal level of commitment, let’s have a look at your options.

Drama School Training

• General/comprehensive focus
• Significant time commitment (2-4 Years)

The top tier of acting training has always been and remains to be attending a drama school. This method of training has produced the majority of successful actors out of all of the training options. 

Attending a drama school is for actors who have well and truly ‘caught the bug’. They are hooked on the idea of becoming a professional actor and wish to dedicate a significant amount of their time and money to that pursuit. Drama school courses are usually a full time commitment for 2-4 years of your life. The length of the course will usually vary depending on the graduate degree the institution offers. 

In a full time drama school course you can expect to be immersed in a wide and comprehensive range of actor training. You will develop your voice and body – your instrument as an actor. You will learn about the history of acting, theatre and filmmaking and appreciate the importance of knowing whose shoulders you are standing on as an actor and storyteller. You will, of course, go into great detail of a range of different acting methods, such as the techniques of Stanislavsky, Meisner, Stella Adler, Larry Moss, Uta Hagen or Susan Batson. Some institutions cover several of these techniques, some prefer to focus on and master a single technique. Neither of these approaches is necessarily better than the other. 

As well as developing your craft as an actor, you will also develop your ability to collaborate with others; devising and writing your own work, performing in plays, making films and working as an ensemble with your peers. You will also have the opportunity to be directed by a range of directors and acting teachers from your industry – one of the main benefits to attending a full time course.

If this arrangement seems like it is what you’re interested in, great! That’s fantastic, and an exciting opportunity lies ahead of you. The first step of the process now is for you to select a school (or schools) which appeal to your interests. Each and every drama school will vary in focus and priority slightly when it comes to their approach to actor training. That being said, the structure for drama schools are quite similar around the globe. 

Here’s a list of acting schools written by our team here at StageMilk to help you with this decision making process: List of Acting Schools.

I’d suggest you choose a selection of three schools which would suit you well. Most drama schools have an audition process for their students, and some can be quite challenging to get into. Know that most actors have to audition for drama school more than once, (I did!) and if this happens to you, that’s absolutely normal and actually a positive thing in the long run.

If you’re concerned about the affordability of a full time course, head over to Andrew’s article here: How to Afford Acting Training. It’s wonderfully comprehensive and I hope will give you the confidence you need to pursue your ideal style of training.

One final note for you. Once you’ve selected and been accepted into a school, I’d like you to read this article: How to Get the Most Out of Your Training. This one was written by me, and contains my reflections on how to actually make your drama school experience as worthwhile as possible. All too often I see actors who have been accepted into a full time course begin to get lazy and feel entitled to future success by the mere fact they have been accepted into an institution. Getting into a school is only the first step, after that it’s up to you to actually milk the experience for all that it is worth!

1 Year Training Programs

• Narrower focus
• Medium time frame

Moving down the ladder of time commitment, next we come to the ‘one year course’. Most professional institutions will offer courses like this. They are, as the name suggests, only one year long. There are several pros and cons to this arrangement.

The primary benefit of a course like this is that it is less of a time commitment than a full drama course. As well as this, a one year course is usually still full time – so you are still cramming a lot of training into your year at that particular institute. As well as this, since the course is attached to a drama school, you’ll usually be taught by the same board of teachers as the main 2-4 year ensemble. A one year course is a fantastic place to start if you are unsure of the commitment you wish to make to the pursuit of acting, or if you have not been accepted into a 2-4 year course but would still like to spend the year training.

A 1 year course will obviously contain less content than a full 2-4 year course, which is not necessarily a bad thing. If the course you’ve selected is tailored really well to your interests as an actor, it may be all the training you need to get into the industry and start auditioning.

This being said, with a narrower focus of training and information comes its limitations. There is a reason drama school courses (2-4 years) are the length they are. There is an enhanced growth and development as an actor which comes from being submerged in a course for an extended period of time. As well as this, the connection formed in an ensemble who have been together for 3 years is unlike anything else. 

So, have a think about whether this style of training suits you. You can use the same links in the full time course section above in assisting you in deciding which institution will be best for you.

Training through Short Courses

• Singular focus 
• Short time frame 

Short courses are a wonderful way for actors to test the water of training, and they continue to be valuable for experienced actors who are keen to get back into the classroom. 

Short courses are offered by acting institutions and smaller schools, and there are a tonne to choose from around the world. A short course will usually have a single focus area. This might be comedy or Shakespeare, auditioning for the camera, or Chekhov, for example. Every short course you can imagine which would be useful for actors has probably been conducted at some point in time. 

A short course traditionally runs for 6-10 weeks, with 5-10 contact hours per week. The benefits of doing a short course are numerous. They’re a way for an actor to focus on developing a particular skill for a few weeks, and they are a great way for the actor to ‘stay in shape’ when it comes to the performative muscle. They’re also an awesome way to meet new people, to work with new teachers or directors. A short course is a perfect way to dabble in acting if you’re unsure of how interested you are in it, or to identify one skill you would like to work on specifically. For example, a little while back a friend of mine wanted to develop her skills when it came to comedy and comedic acting. To do this she spent much of a year jumping from short course to short course offered by a range of institutions and taught by a range of teachers. This suited her well; she still benefited from a range of teaching perspectives, without having to split her focus to a range of subjects that she was already confident or less interested in, (Like she may have had to in a 1 year/full time course). 

The limitations of a short course are pretty straight forward. Usually short courses only have one or two sessions a week, and that isn’t really enough time to establish an ensemble. Also when it comes to skills development, practising once a week will be a much slower approach than training every day in a full time course. That being said, I’ve made a lot of connections and friendships in short courses which remain today, and on top of that, short courses are usually quite affordable. 

Now, over to you. If you think a short course is your cup of tea, and the type of training you need right now, all you need to do is pick one and enrol. These courses usually don’t have an audition process (another benefit) so you should be set to go. To assist with the choosing process, here’s our list of the best short courses for actors around the world: Best Short Acting Course Around the World.

Training through Drop-in Classes

• Singular focus
• Minimal time commitment 

Finally for traditional actor training, we have the drop in class. A drop in class is a one-off, all in experience. They will usually run for a half day or a full day, and sometimes they might be two days (over a weekend). 

In line with the pros and cons of all the courses we’ve spoken about so far, I’m sure you can predict where the drop in sits. It is such a tiny time commitment, so there’s no need to worry about that element. They are inexpensive (usually – “famous” acting coaches can be unbelievably expensive. Work your way up to those ones…). They afford you the opportunity to drop in, meet people, practise your craft, build a particular skill set and go home that evening having become a better actor. They are an awesome and valuable thing to do. For actors who want to try something new, want to work with a new teacher to gauge their style, or for people who have never acted before and want to give it a go – a drop in class is an awesome choice.

Unfortunately, there’s only so much one can achieve in a drop in class, no matter how good the teacher is. The teacher will attempt to give everyone individual attention, but there is only so much time which can be divided amongst the group. You may learn some exceptional lessons in the time you have watching the other actors or working directly with the teacher, but it will be up to you to follow that up with practise and further development of that skill.

One final note on the ol’ drop in class: they can be kinda intense. With the whole ‘one night only’ vibe comes a heightened level of adrenaline and energy, both from the participants and the teacher. Everyone wants to squeeze every morsel of worth out of the class as possible. This can be an intimidating environment to act in for the first time. If you are an absolute beginner, I’d say that actually a short course is probably your best bet. A short course will give you enough time to settle in and grow your confidence. After that, shop around! Do a bunch of drop in classes, build your skills and confidence. 

Training: Alternative Avenues

Now, all the methods I’ve outlined above are pretty traditional ways to train as an actor. It’s important to know that these are not the only options you have. Of course, you may decide you wish to skip the whole training bit and start going for auditions straight away, (a daring approach which only leads to success for the 1%, who then usually seek full time training after their first job anyway). Here are a few options for other avenues of training as an actor which might interest you.

Learning ‘on the job’

What better way to gain experience than to simply start practising? Now, for this approach I don’t necessarily mean you start approaching casting directors and doing auditions – no. The best way to learn on the job as a beginner is to become involved in as many amateur productions of films and plays as possible. This approach is not a new one; it was an incredibly common and successful method for some of the British greats like Rowan Atkinson, Emma Thompson, Steven Fry and Hugh Laurie, who all earned their chops in theatre societies at university before being picked up by an agent and starting to earn money from acting. 

Finding any way possible to get yourself on a stage or on a camera speaking lines of dialogue is going to be beneficial for your development as an actor. I can’t recommend this approach to beginner actors highly enough; however, the benefit of this approach is capped at a certain point. At some stage you will need to seek outside perspectives and direct feedback about your work. It’s the journey of any skill development: practise and feedback from an expert. So, get curious. What local theatres are nearby? Is there a university theatre society you can become involved with, or what’s more; can you instigate a performance of some kind? This curiosity will see you gaining and growing skills which will stay with you for your whole career.

Alternative Skills

We’ve been talking about training our acting skills in a traditional sense – by going out and practising acting. However there are many other methods of training to be an actor which don’t always involve ‘acting’ specifically at all. I mean, of course, training in other performative art forms aligned with acting. This could be mime, clowning, commedia dell’arte, physical theatre, performance theatre, stand up comedy, skit comedy, musical theatre, opera, stage combat – even working on a film set in an alternative role. Finding yourself in any performative environment can be useful for an actor. It can give a unique edge to their performance style, and will be an interesting asset to their performative toolkit.

So, have a think. Perhaps you’re limiting yourself to the ‘well beaten track’ options for training. What’s the path less followed? 

Practice

Finally, if you want to train as an actor – then just go act. Find a script (Hamlet is on Google – I will not hear “there’s no good free material” as an excuse) and point the camera on your phone at your face and read the lines. So many people wait until they have been accepted into a drama school to begin acting. WHY?! Why does a position at a drama school give you permission to act? There is nothing stopping you from acting right now. Don’t wait, get into it. Build your craft and confidence that way, then, when the time is right, seek an outside eye or an acting course to get even better.  

Conclusion: It’s Your Career

There are plenty of options out there for you, and deciding how to begin your training is a significant decision. But what is most important is that you train in your way, whilst remaining curious and open to the perspectives of your teachers and mentors. 

But also, remember that there is time. You might commit to a full time course and realise it isn’t right for you. That’s ok! There are plenty of other places and courses out there which will be better suited to you. Prioritise your desired training style and then go after it with everything you’ve got. 

Look to the actors who inspire you who have come before you. The way they gained their experience may be a really useful guide for how you’d like to get yours. Take inspiration from all over, try a whole bunch of different things, and figure out what works for you. Action is to be prioritised above contemplation. The time is yours to get into it and start the development of your craft. Go forth and good luck!

The post Where Do I Train as an Actor? appeared first on StageMilk.

Your Post-Graduate To-Do List

Graduating from any degree brings with it fear and uncertainty, but graduating from a drama school brings with it that little extra dose of mystery that can be hard to navigate. Trying to make it as an actor is a challenging pursuit! There’s no two ways about it. It’s a wonderful thing to pursue, that’s for sure, but unfortunately we are robbed of most postgraduate support which other career paths are able to provide their newbies. But- fear not. Here at Stagemilk, we’re here to help. I’ve compiled a to-do list for you; 9 things which I think will give you some great clarity and momentum for the beginning of your career. Let’s go!

Skip to:

1. Begin!  
2. Say ‘Yes’ 
3. Keep Practising after Drama School 
4. Watch Everything You Can 
5. Invest in Yourself 
6. Avoid Comparison 
7. Update Your Acting Profiles
8. Plan Your Post-Drama School Career 
9. Debrief 

#1 Begin!

WELCOME to the industry. It’s a place filled with wonderful opportunities. If your drama school experience was anything like mine, then I’m guessing that your exit from that institution was probably the most challenging and turbulent chapter. That’s ok, that’s totally normal. Unfortunately, graduating from drama school can bring out some bad qualities in people. Insecurities will rise, your classmates might’ve experienced jealousy or resentment at their lack of success or the success of others. The uncertainty of success in this industry floods through the doors of drama schools around time of graduation – a harsh reminder of the reality of the industry.

What’s most important right now is that you stop for a moment and take a breath. Now is the time where you begin. It’s the most wonderful place you can be. You now have a toolkit from your training as an actor, you are well prepared to do the job you need to do – but now you get to begin learning what is required from you as an actor to have a career. You’re a beginner, and you will never be a beginner in the truest sense of the word again. Being a beginner isn’t a bad thing – quite the contrary. It’s the best place you can be, and accepting the fact that you are a beginner once you have graduated is an incredibly healthy thing to do. 

I’m often caught writing about the importance of actors adopting a ‘beginners mindset’ in their careers: a mindset which is all about growth and curiosity rather than rigidity and needing to ‘know’ the answer to every situation. A beginners mindset is really hard to adopt as an experienced actor, because it feels nice to feel like we know everything. I’ve been there. What’s great for you is that you are a beginner. You just need to allow yourself to be a beginner and you’re immediately placed for growth in your career. 

Practically speaking, your beginners, (or growth) mindset means the following: You embrace challenges, rather than avoid them. You persist in the face of setbacks, rather than give up. You see effort, work and process as the key to mastery, rather than looking for shortcuts. You learn from criticism rather than ignore or deny it. Finally, you learn and find inspiration from the success of others, rather than feeling threatened by their success or comforted by their failure. This mindset is the bedrock of your career, and will allow you to grow and learn exponentially and reach ever higher levels of success in your career. 

#2 Say ‘Yes’

You know that Jim Carey film, Yes Man? Yeah – be that guy. It’s been ages since I’ve seen that film and I have no idea if it has stood the test of time, but the principle still holds fast. As a recent graduate of drama school, as a beginner, it’s time to say yes. Say yes to any and every experience which comes your way. I know you may turn your nose up at this idea, it’s not always an easy thing to do. Some jobs might seem beneath you or not worth your time, but the reality of your position right now is that you don’t know what you don’t know. There are experiences to be had, lessons to be learnt and people to meet from even the least exciting of opportunities. 

Say yes to everything which is in line with your goals as an actor, and say yes to the opportunities which aren’t. Try everything at least once. Earn the right to say ‘no’ later in your career. It’s a great feeling too… 

Saying yes leads to more opportunities to say ‘yes’. Saying ‘no’ has a lot of value, too, don’t get me wrong. But a ‘no’ should come from a place of having options and deciding where our energy is best placed, what we wish to give our time to. At the beginning of our career we need to get the wheels turning and get those opportunities rolling in – there’s no use choosing to do nothing over choosing to do something, even if it’s coming from a hope that something bigger will be around the corner.

#3 Keep Practising after Drama School 

So you’ve finished your training! Awesome! Does this mean you stop training…? Nope. Keep going. Along with your inherent beginners mindset, what the recent graduate has above the experienced actor is fire and momentum. It’s crucial you keep that going for as long as possible.

Though it might feel like you learnt everything there is to know about acting at your drama school, chances are you’ve still got a bunch to learn. Studying acting, once the actor is past a certain level, becomes less about studying certain methods and more about working with certain coaches. Each coach will bring new insights to the craft of acting which may unlock something for you. Once you’ve graduated from your institution, you’re now free to explore the wide world of acting training. We offer a bunch of things here at Stagemilk to keep you busy, and alongside that you should seek out drop in classes and audits with coaches as much as possible. 

Additionally, one of the unfortunate aspects of drama school training is that you are training in a vacuum, to some degree. It’s really important you get out and work with other coaches and train with different actors to ensure you haven’t worked your craft into a fixed routine born out of the validation you received from your classmates at school. This process can be a bit ouchie – unlearning your habitual acting patterns – but again, it’s all worth it and all in line with your beginners mindset. 

Along with going to acting classes, broaden your horizons. Go to different classes! Do improv, stage combat, Shakespeare, dance, singing, fencing, sport, art, you name it! It’s one of the privileges of our career pursuit that we get to study a wide range of skills to become better at emulating another human’s life. 

Finally, know and understand that you don’t have to pay someone to be able to practise. It’s now up to you to instigate opportunities to practise. Organise self tape sessions with a friend(s). Organise play readings. Do scene workshops. Do whatever you can to keep practising and keep learning. 

I remember feeling the need to prove that I knew everything once I’d graduated from drama school. I didn’t need to prove that, and I also didn’t even need to know everything. I had such a long road ahead of me then, as I do now. There is so much left to learn, and all that is important to me is that I get just a little bit better each day. That’s a much more sustainable thing to focus on than trying to be the best right away!

#4 Watch Everything You Can 

This one follows hot on the heels of point #3. One sure-fire way to get better at acting is to watch other actors acting! WATCH EVERYTHING. Watch movies. Go to the theatre. Go to the whacky performance-art your friend told you about. Explore the range of what is possible in performance. It can only make you better and add to your imagination and knowledge. Become a connoisseur of the cheap-ticket deal. Figure out every back-door way of getting to see shows as often as possible. Theatres are always offering discounted tickets, especially for students and industry members. There’s really no excuse for not watching a lot of acting. Again, as per point #3, watching a wide range of acting will ensure you haven’t boxed yourself into the same choices time and time again. Get out there and see what’s possible.

#5 Invest in Yourself

Your drama school years are behind you… Your wonderful ensemble of classmates has disbanded…(that is, until you decide to all be in a play together in like 3 months). Now is the time to take all that energy you were investing in the people around you and channel it into yourself. You’ve heard the analogies: the actor is both the instrument and the musician. The actor is their own business and product – all squished into one little person. Since the career of an actor is about getting better at performing, being the best person for the job and positioning yourself to get the job in the first place all at the same time, you’ve really got to prioritise looking after yourself. You’ve gotta be the best version of yourself, so you can give the performance that you need to give.

Investing in yourself means making goals and executing them in the many areas of your life. How do you invest in yourself mentally and physically? Financially? Spiritually? All these questions are worth considering and beginning to answer. Use your time now to figure out the type of actor you want to be, and start taking the steps towards that version of yourself.

#6 Avoid Comparison

Now, this is something you’re sure to experience to some degree in your time post graduation. Comparison. Woof. It’s a time. You’ll see the actors you’ve trained with or actors you know or actor’s you’re similar to auditioning and booking jobs which you’re made for. This is bound to happen, and will happen throughout your entire career. Comparison is the death of joy. As soon as you start to compare yourself, (and don’t worry, it will happen, it’s normal – you’re not a bad person) you’re not focusing on things which are worth focusing on. You’re focusing on things you can’t control, which will only lead to self doubt, resentment and bitterness. These are feelings which are really hard to shake off once they take hold, and a resentful actor is one who is difficult to cast. It really quickly becomes a vicious cycle: You compare yourself, you get resentful, you jeopardise an opportunity of your own due to that resentment which makes the resentment grow. 

If you’ve been in this place of comparison or you’re there now, don’t worry. Good on you for noticing that. Just make the decision to begin the process of letting those feelings go. Focus on the productive things; your own learning and skill development and the success of your friends, (you know deep down in your heart you want all the best things for them.) As the saying goes, “The rising tide raises all ships”. You will only benefit from the success of someone you know, you’ll never suffer because of it, (except in your mind when you choose to compare!)

#7 Update Your Acting Profiles

Right – down to business. The next couple of points are career-oriented action tasks. 

PROFILE. How’s yours looking? If your drama school headshot was anything like mine, it’s worth you shopping around for an effective update! A really useful thing to do post-graduation is to tackle all the elements of your profile as an actor which need tending to. This means a headshot update, creative an effective showreel, making sure you’re on the relevant casting websites, Pursuing meetings with agents if you haven’t got one already, putting together a voice reel for voice-over casting, updating your bio/CV, signing up for your local equity membership, to name a few. 

All of these elements (unlike the careers of your classmates) are things within your control. If you feel yourself getting the urge to compare or complain, turn your attention to these elements. Make sure they are all the best they possibly can be. Take your time to ensure that all these elements are of a high quality, but shop around so that you’re not spending all your cash in one hit. 

#8 Plan Your Post-Drama School Career

I’ve used the word ‘turbulent’ a few times in this article. It’s a pretty apt word for the experience of being thrust out the doors of a drama school and into a volatile industry. One thing I found really useful in being able to navigate this storm was to map out all the different elements of my career which I wanted to identify and tackle. To do this, I drew myself a model and called it, ‘The Cathedral’. Bear with me, folks.

The picture above is an outline of the shape I created to encapsulate the different areas of my career I wanted to focus on. The roof of the cathedral is where I identify my super objective – my main goal. This is best as something positive, focussed on process and attainable, rather than something focussed on result, (eg winning an Oscar). This super objective is held up and sustained by all the work which lies beneath it. 

The pillars of the cathedral are the different markets you’d like to work in as an actor: film, theatre, voice over, virtual reality, musicals, you name it. In these columns you can go into as much detail as you like, listing your specific goals in this area, actions to achieve those goals, identifying your network or who you need to get in front of etc etc.

Finally, the bottom layer of the cathedral model is the foundations of your career. These elements, like all the elements of this model, need to be determined by you for what serves your career best. For my cathedral model, my foundations are my network, my skills, my profile, and my wellbeing, (encapsulating finances, relationships and health.) 

This model is simply a structure for you to input where you currently are in your career and where you’d like your career to go in order to give you some clarity. I find it immensely reassuring being able to see things mapped out in front of me, it really enables me to forge ahead feeling confident I know what I need to be doing.

#9 Debrief

Finally for your to-do list, take some time to conduct a debrief on your time at drama school. It’s a pretty intense chapter in your life, and it’s worth taking a moment to ask yourself, “What the heck was that all about?!” 

Personally, I love journaling. I find it really fulfilling and it gives me a lot of clarity. You might like to try this whilst debriefing on your time at drama school. Debrief on your memories, what were the glorious times, what were the challenging ones. What made you laugh yourself in stitches, what made you cry? What made you passionate? What made you angry? What made you feel most creatively fulfilled, and what did you feel you never quite got the knack of? Rifle through your experiences, write about your relationships, and begin the process of making some sense out of the whole darn thing. This process can be immensely valuable in allowing you to clarify why you went to drama school in the first place, and, (now that you’re on the other side of it) allow you to identify exactly what you hope to achieve in your career as an actor. 

Conclusion

“It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.” ― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

I’m doing a LOTR marathon on the weekend so forgive my indulgent quote above. But hey, I think it’s appropriate! It’s scary stepping into the acting industry! But oh boy is it EXCITING. I hope this has been useful to you. There are plenty of resources here on StageMilk to give you further clarity on what’s best for you to be focusing on in your career right now. What’s most important is that you take your time, look after yourself and be curious. All those things will see you well placed for a wonderful and sustainable career as an actor.

The post What to Do Once You’ve Finished Drama School appeared first on StageMilk.

A bit of background

Hey, so, I’m an actor first and foremost. I have a limited amount of technical understanding about filmmaking and camera technique, but I do have experience in acting on film sets for the camera. One thing I’ve been considering quite a lot recently whilst watching films, but also while reflecting on some of my own on-screen work, is that there aren’t many resources out there for learning about how the camera lens affects our performance. This knowledge is usually learnt through on-set experience, which is great and invaluable, but I want to take a shortcut here, and make sure you feel as though you are prepared to go on set and do your job even if you have a limited amount of experience under your belt. 

This curiosity about how the camera lens affects our performance has come from two things: watching actors who seem to thrive in the frame, and moments where my work seems stifled by the frame. What it’s taken me a little while to learn is that all the choices the director and DOP make in regards to capturing the scene: the lens, the angle, the focal length etc – all have an impact on my performance. Just like with any performance, I need to understand my audience. And when it comes to working on a film set, the camera is my audience. I need to perform for it – and to do that I need to understand what it sees. Let’s begin by talking about the standard way directors and DOPs cover a scene, and come to understand how this process affects our performance.

Skip to:

• What is Coverage?
• The Wide Shot
• The Medium Shot
• The Close Up
• The ‘Special’
• Finding Your Frame

What is Coverage? 

The word used to describe the process of filming a scene time after time to capture it from each desired angle is ‘coverage’. The filmmakers are literally ‘covering’ the scene with eyes and making sure they have every angle they could possibly want for the edit room. This process turns acting for the camera into a very unique task for the actor. The actor must be able to repeat their performance countless times whilst retaining both the blocking of the scene and the sense of newness and spontaneity within it. It’s no simple task.

A very simple and commonly used shot list for covering a scene with the camera is the following: Wide shot, medium shot, close ups and specials.

The Wide Shot 

About the shot: Coverage of a scene will usually begin with a wide shot. This is how it works: a shot on a wide angle lens (usually 18-35mm) capturing the scene as a whole. The frame this shot produces will contain much of the setting of the scene and the actors in the scene. This shot can serve as a ‘master’ shot for the director and editor; it’s a shot to refer or cut back to in the editing room, one that captured all of the action.

How does the wide shot effect the actor? Two things are important to understand about wide shots and master shots. 1. There is room to move, and 2. Make sure you’re happy with your physical choices. 

Firstly, it’s important to realise that there is room to move and be physical whilst acting on camera, particularly on a wide lens. One trap I’ve fallen into is ‘shrinking’ my performance moving when from stage to screen, because I assume any movement will be too extreme in the frame. Wrong. Once we get down the shot list into close ups and ECUs (extreme close ups) then yeah, sure, we’ll reign it in. But for now, allow as much freedom of movement and physical expression as you and the director feel is appropriate for your character. The camera does respond well to full gestures! The amount of times I’ve watched my work back in pain because of my half-baked physicality. I’d go to point at someone or something but only half the gesture would be there. I’d go to spread my arms wide out to the sides but I’d only lift them halfway for fear of being too big. Move past this limitation, Jack! The camera wants to see the full range and reach of your physicality, just like the audience does on stage! Ok pep talk over, sorry about that, folks. Writing these articles is good for my development as an actor, too. When the filmmakers are shooting on a wide lens, or from a distance, allow your physicality to be larger. If they need you to reign it back in, they’ll tell you. 

However, what you need to understand is that since this shot serves as a master reference shot for the filmmakers, you need to make sure you’re happy with what you’ve done physically in the scene so you can stick to those choices for the rest of the coverage. Once your choices are made in the master wide, the person on continuity will be on you like a hawk if you start to make new choices later on down the shot list. 

The Medium Shot

About the shot: A medium shot (Mid, or MCU) is where the filmmakers start to capture the individual performances of the actors. The shot is usually captured on a 35-50mm lens, so if you hear the DOP using those terms you can be pretty sure you’ll be in a mid-sized frame. Each character in the scene will get their own mid and close up in the coverage of the scene. This means the shot list can get pretty lengthy. If you’re doing a scene with 6 people sitting around a dinner table, you might be there for a while doing the scene a LOT of times! Get comfortable. Manage your energy. Depending on the lens used, the camera might be close to you or far away from you. What’s more important for you as the actor to understand is what the frame is. Professional actors will frequently be asking ‘what frame am I in?’ to understand the borders of what the camera is seeing in order to tailor their performances as such.

How does the mid-shot effect the actor?  Get comfortable with asking the question, “what’s my frame?” A mid shot can vary a lot, and different filmmakers will have a different definition for a ‘mid’ – some wider, some closer. You, as the actor, have the responsibility of asking the right questions to determine how much playing space you have for your performance. A mid is tricky; you’re closer in than you were in a wide, but you’re not super close. This means you have a bit of playing space to be physical, but also are required to reign your physicality in a bit. 

The Close Up

Ah, the close up. We actors place so much pressure on ourselves when our close up comes around. There’s nowhere left to hide; all that’s left is us and the camera, staring into our soul. It’s good fun, right? 

About the shot: Functionally, a close up does what it says it’s going to do. It gets close to the subject, drawing the audience’s focus into them specifically. Filmmakers will use a lens longer than 50mm for shooting close ups. The frame of this shot will focus on the actors face and eyes, usually used to heighten the emotional and internal experience of the character at that point in the scene.

How does the close up effect the actor? Again, know your frame. The frame of a close up can vary in size, and the definition of what a close up/ECU (extreme close up) is between different directors may vary. Additionally, just because the shot is a close up does not necessarily mean the camera will be close to you. In fact, it’s more likely that the camera will be further away from you shooting on a long lens, giving a nice depth of focus to the shot. In this case, it’s extra important to know the size of your frame. The camera might be a few meters away from you, but the frame might just be on your face, forcing you to restrict your movement drastically. 

The ‘Special’ 

A ‘special’ refers to any scene-specific shots the filmmakers wish to capture in coverage to make sure they have got all the story-telling elements of the scene covered. This could mean an ECU on a prop that you’re handling, or a cutaway to something else which is happening in the room whilst the scene takes place: a clock ticking, for instance. The need to capture these shots may have arisen whilst you were covering the earlier shots; a choice you make might’ve informed the directors need to capture that action specifically. All that you really need to know about these types of shots is that you may be directed quite prescriptively within them, and that’s ok. You don’t necessarily need to channel all your performance into these moments, just communicate clearly with the director to be able to give them the shot they wish to get.

This has been an oversimplified breakdown of a shot list. If you want to know more about which shots may arise when covering a scene, this page is pretty darn comprehensive: Ultimate Guide to Camera Shots 

Finding your Frame

One of my favourite phrases from an acting teacher of mine was, ‘take care of the structure and the content will take care of itself’. This rule applies to us when we’re acting for the camera. The shot used, and the frame it creates for us, becomes our structure, and this structure dictates the content needed from us within it.

I was interested in writing this article because I wanted to make sure actors felt more freedom in their early on-set experiences than I did. Looking at my early on camera work, my close ups are often fine, I seem comfortable within them, probably because these are the shots which are most similar to a shot used to record a self tape. Wider shots, however, (anything from an extreme wide through to a medium shot) left me feeling and looking unsure of what I had ‘permission’ to do. How ‘big’ could my performance be? 

I want to wrap up this conversation with a real-world example of what I think thriving in the frame looks like. This is a scene from Black Mirror, featuring Andrew Scott. Have a watch:

In this scene, Scott has perfectly tailored his performance to the demands of the frame. At the beginning of the scene, the frame is tighter, and we (the audience) are more closely drawn into the micro expressions on his face as he processes the information that his hostage is merely an intern. As this information drops for Scott’s character, however, the frame widens and allows for the full range of Scott’s physicality to emerge. Andrew Scott is a theatre based actor who thrives on film. He has complete confidence with giving a performance which would be big enough to go on stage in front of a 800 seat theatre whilst on camera. Scott understands how the camera sees him, and thrives in his understanding of the medium. 

Conclusion

I hope this clip and this exploration today has given you freedom and permission, rather than fear and restriction. Acting on camera does not have to be small or restricted, it can actually be quite physically large and expressive. What is required from us actors is that we understand the medium to the best of our ability so that we can tailor our performances as such. Just like you’d need to ‘find your light’ on the stage, the same goes for ‘finding your frame’ on camera!

The post Acting for Camera: How to Use the Frame (Framing Technique) appeared first on StageMilk.

Skip to:

• Why Does Self-Conciousness Arise?
• 3 Ways to Combat Self-Conciousness as an Actor

Self-Consciousness is Natural

First up, let’s immediately relieve some of the pressure you may be experiencing by reminding ourselves that self consciousness as an actor is completely normal. Every actor I’ve worked with, no matter how established and experienced, has had to deal with their own form of self consciousness from time to time. 

Acting places the artist in an incredibly vulnerable position. In fact, taking that notion a step further, acting actually requires a level of vulnerability from the artist. Not only are we putting our artwork (our performance) into the public domain for scrutiny and criticism, as all art is, but we are also the artwork. Our performance is at one time both an indication of our taste and ability free for anyone who has the time to dissect and decide how they would do things differently. 

Since this is the reality of our profession, that it places us in a vulnerable position and that a level of self-consciousness is to be expected, then there is no use beating ourselves up about it! Right at the outset of us understanding how we can best deal with our self consciousness, we need to be kind to ourselves. We need to accept that it is normal and that the task is not actually to remove our self consciousness, but to acclimatise to it and thrive in spite of it.

Why Does Self-Consciousness Arise?

There are many reasons why an actor might get self conscious, and perhaps one of these reasons is what has brought you here today. Self consciousness can happen both when we’re performing and when we’re not. When we’re acting, we can be self conscious about our performance itself, and when this arises it may manifest as fear. You may say to yourself “I don’t know what I’m doing” or “I don’t know who I am”. On a stage or a set we can become all too aware of the eyes of the audience or crew watching us, expecting us to do our jobs perfectly. It can be pretty scary, this acting thing! Such a shame we love it so much. When we’re not acting, self consciousness may arise due to our perception of our own ability or self. We may think we’re not as good as other actors or have issues with our appearance or how we present ourselves. Self consciousness may arise in the casting room when we have to try to calm our nerves and be the best version of ourselves for the casting director. 

There are SO many factors of this profession which may induce a self-conscious state. Rather than getting bogged down and daunted by all of these scary hurdles we have to overcome, let’s instead talk about the ways in which we can combat these obstacles and empower ourselves, so we can do what we love with the best of our ability.

3 Ways to Combat Self-Consciousness as an Actor

Let’s look at a few things we can do when that inevitable self-consciousness starts to creep up on us.

#1 Search Outside Yourself for the Answer

Self consciousness is a manifestation of fear which arises from inside our minds based on our perceived reality. More often than not, the thoughts we are feeling about ourselves are not shared by anyone else, and even if they are: that is outside our control and not worth worrying about. 

So, if self-consciousness is arising within us – if self consciousness is a focus which is directed towards ourselves, where is somewhere we could seek the answer to freeing ourselves? You guessed it. Outside yourself. We must turn our attention away from ourselves to gain freedom from self consciousness. Declan Donnellan’s book The Actor and the Target deals with this issue in great detail. Donnellan teaches us that all of the actors’ concerns about their performance: “I don’t know what I’m doing”, “I don’t know where or who I am”, can be solved through the use of a Target. The Target is anything seen through the eyes of the character to which attention can be paid. The target is the opposite of self-consciousness: it is consciousness about the world around us and the character. The place, the people, the relationships and situations of the character. 

If this concept interests you, check out my article about The Actor and the Target. 

If you’re someone who deals with self consciousness to do with your performance, whether you feel often as though you don’t know what you’re doing or what you ‘should’ be feeling, practise turning your attention to the world around you, rather than what’s going on within you. Set yourself the challenge in your next rehearsal room/ process to take responsibility for the challenges you’re facing as an actor; whenever a question arises in your mind which has you turning your attention upon yourself, begin by turning things around and searching for the answer outside of yourself. There are so many more solutions to be found outside ourselves than inside ourselves. If you’re self conscious about the fact you’re not reaching a certain emotional place with your character, relieve yourself of the obligation to find that experience within yourself. Search instead in the eyes of another character, or in the world around your character – full of detail and history which may inspire you to feel through them.

When we are self conscious about our performance, we are just adding yet another pair of eyes onto ourselves. Allow the audience to be the ones with their eyes on you, you don’t have to do that as well. Your eyes, your attention should rather be outside of you – on all the powerful and evocative forces surrounding your character. In the world around your character is energy and inspiration tenfold to the power of our own isolated emotional storage facility. 

#2 Practice Self-Care

In performance, the key to combating self consciousness is to turn our attention away from ourselves. Once we’re out of performance, however, the key is to get to know ourselves a little better. 

If self consciousness is a real ongoing problem for you, if you find it difficult to find self acceptance when reviewing your work, then you might like to consider starting a journey of self care. Self care is actually a really common and essential practise for the actor. Being in such a vulnerable position so frequently means that the actor is prone to having their ego and resilience battered around a bit, and it’s important that we prepare for this reality accordingly.

If the concept of self care is something daunting, foreign or too esoteric for you, consider it this way. Just as you would go to the gym to strengthen your muscles to be able to withstand greater challenges, so too is it worth strengthening our minds and resilience in order to be able to withstand the setbacks and disappointments of this industry. After all, rejection is a guaranteed element of the career of an actor. We will be told ‘no’ 99% more often than we will be told ‘Yes’ and if we’re not careful and don’t have the practises to take care of ourselves in place, we will start taking these ‘no’s as indication of our self worth. 

There are many different methods of self care, and only you will be able to determine which is most effective for you. What’s most important with any self care practise is that it is focused on the self. It is about you and it is for you, not anyone else. If you’re completely new to the concept of self care, the following list of practises is a great place to start, as they have great benefits for combating self consciousness and for your craft as an actor in general:

• Meditation
• Journalling
• Therapy
• Lifestyle awareness: Diet, sleep habits and exercise
• Reducing comparison: minimise social media use.

That last point on the list, “Reducing comparison” is of particular relevance to us as actors. Social Media will always be feeding us evidence of the fact that the people around us are doing so much better than we are. Be endlessly aware that social media is not an accurate representation of ‘reality’ and that behind those screens, everyone is dealing with their own challenges. As best as you can, reduce the amount of time you give to comparing yourself to other people. You will not find solace or a reduction of self-consciousness in jealousy, resentment or self-disparagement. 

The practise of self care will allow you to dig a little deeper into your understanding of what is fuelling your self consciousness as an actor. Self care will simultaneously allow you to understand where that self consciousness is coming from, and also allow you to recognise and notice when you are being too harsh on yourself whilst feeling self conscious. 

So, start getting curious. Ask other actors in your network, how have they managed their self-consciousness? How have they taken care of themselves in times of self-doubt? You’re not alone in this experience. I’d bet nearly every actor has had to find their way through self consciousness from time to time, and each may have an insight for you as to how they’ve navigated this period, and which practise of self care worked best for them.

Read more on: Self-Care for Actors.

#3 Search for the Golden Moments

Here’s an insight I learned from an actor who was two years above me whilst I was in first year of Drama School: 

“Search for the golden moments in other people and you’ll build your ability to recognise them in yourself.”

I think this is such wonderful advice, and particularly pertinent to the challenge of overcoming self consciousness. As we discussed in point number 1, this is a practise which takes our focus off ourselves and onto what’s outside of us. 

When you’re watching another actor perform or even rehearse, (any moment of an actor in process) search for their Golden Moments. Search for the breakthrough moments, search for their moments of victory, or their moments of overcoming struggle. Turning your attention to seeking out other actors’ Golden Moments is an endlessly rewarding process. Firstly, it will remove the temptation within you to compare yourself to them in a negative way and experience thoughts such as, “I wouldn’t do it like that” or, “I wish I could do that”. These thoughts of comparison aren’t actually all that helpful for us; they either give us a false sense of security that we’re already good enough and don’t need to keep progressing, or that we will never achieve what we want to achieve. If we instead search for the golden moments, we will sooner be able to recognise them in our own work. If we see an actor overcoming their own self consciousness, we are able to analyse that breakthrough and assess what we can learn from it. If we see an actor pick themselves up after a ‘defeat’ on the rehearsal room floor, we may find the courage to persist in the face of adversity the next time we’re on the floor.

Searching for the golden moments in the people around you requires humility and may not be a simple task at first. Often, the way we see ourselves and the way we see the world may be closely linked. If we are struggling with self consciousness, our perception of the world around us may be overly negative. By searching for the golden moments around us we give ourselves the chance to bring the positivity we seek in the world into our self perception. 

I really can’t recommend this process highly enough. I used to be someone who would only see the shortcomings in another person’s abilities. It’s not something I’m proud of, and it has taken a lot of work for me to recognise that this was actually coming from a place of self consciousness and self doubt. I didn’t want to be a judgemental, self conscious person and actor anymore, I instead wanted to be someone who could see the golden moments in others. In doing this, I gained the ability to see the golden moments in myself, and by seeing those golden moments my craft as an actor improved exponentially.

Conclusion

The task of overcoming self-consciousness is not a quick nor easy one. It is a process which requires self-investigation and the courage to face your fears. By reading this article and asking yourself the question, “how can I overcome this?” you have taken the first step. Thank you for taking that first step! 

Let’s continue moving forward along this path. Let’s leave ‘self consciousness’ behind us and replace it instead with ‘self awareness’. The more aware we are of who we are, how we work and the person we want to become, the better able we will be to achieve all those things. 

We’ve covered three simple yet powerful steps today towards achieving this goal: turning our attention from ourselves to a ‘Target’ outside ourselves, investing in self care and searching for the golden moments. All of these practises require just that: practise. Actively incorporate these tools into your day-to-day and craft as an actor, and I’m sure you will start to see and feel the benefits of them in your ability to manage any self consciousness which may arise.

The post 3 Ways to Combat Self-Consciousness as an Actor appeared first on StageMilk.