Thursday, April 13, 2006




Acting and introspection

Recently, in class, an actor asked me about how I was able to ferret out a particular point in the text that was of crucial importance for understanding what was going down in a particular scene. She said she had read the play carefully several times and not understood this point. I had to reply that it just takes practice to learn to read for the hot, critical, lifemaking details and features of a script. We work on that skill in the class all the time. However, a little more than that needs to be said. As much as I feel that there are particular ways in which an actor needs to learn to approach a script, it is also true that an actor needs to be a sensitive reader and a nuanced observer of life's rich pageant in general. And this means a degree of introversion. Rilke enjoined his young poet to "find his solitude." The same could be said for actors. Often, we tend to associate a kind of extroversion with actors: actors are gregarious people who like to be in the spotlight, to receive attention. There is nothing wrong with these qualities. An actor does need a desire to be seen, to share himself or herself and his or her experience. However, I think what is often forgotten is that an actor needs an introverted side as well: he or she needs to have a keen sense of the landscape of his or her own thoughts and feelings, in order to have something truly rich to share with an audience. In my experience, one of the best ways to develop this is through reading. Reading is usually a solitary activity, and reading fiction or plays involves entering another world, and coming to terms with the complicated realms of life depicted therein. If one reads reasonably good literature, there is usually richness and complexity aplenty. It is through this activity that one can develop one's eagle-eye for the critical factors in texts. One learns about the world, and one also becomes more intimately acquainted with how texts work: what are the points they hinge on, what are their centers of gravity. So the bottom line is: I advise actors to read. Read stuff you enjoy, but also stuff that challenges you (in other words: read some good literature). The benefits will be large if you can cultivate reading as a habitual way of meditating on yourself and the world and spending time with yourself, getting to know your own soul.

That acting has both an introverted and an extroverted dimension is one othe things that makes it distinctive as an art, and also one of the things that makes it so fascinating
Posted by Andrew Wood Acting Studio at 7:25 PM 1 comments




Tuesday, April 11, 2006




"The aspects of things..."

"The aspects of things that are most important to use are hidden from us because of their simplicity and familiarity. We fail to be struck by that which, once seen, is most striking and powerful." --Ludwig Wittgenstein

There's a lot in this quote for actors. When looking at a scene, we have powerful urge to say to ourselves that we have dealt with this or that aspect of a scene, even before we have identified it to ourselves. We want to get it off our desks, as it were. I often think succeeding as an actor amounts to the ability to resist this urge.

Suppose you are playing a scene in which you are welcoming a sister who has been away back home. You talk about what has changed on both ends, eventually some grievances are aired, etc. But the most basic fact here is that you are SISTERS. This means a set of expectations, and a whole history of those expectations being met or not, confidences, rivalries, etc. All of this is bound to be of paramount importance in any scene between two sisters, and yet the question "what is it to have sister? " is precisely the kind of question that does not get asked BECAUSE it seems to be such a familiar relationship as to render the question unnecessary. But it is precisely these seemingly unnecessary questions that yield up the greatest fruit for actors.

Your character is a doctor. Why? Because of the money? It's prestigious? What's prestigious about it? Why does it have the prestige that it does? Why a doctor and not a venture capitalist, or some other highly lucrative or prestigious profession? These are the questions that must be pursued, relentlessly. But before they can be pursued, they have to be identified. To identify them, we have to learn to STOP ourselves in the act of shunting them aside, of getting them off of our desk, just as in the Alexander technique, you stop yourself from constricting your neck before speaking or moving. We have to own them. And then, when we appear in our scene, we will own something, and therefore have something to give.
Posted by Andrew Wood Acting Studio at 11:01 PM 0 comments




Wednesday, April 05, 2006




daily kos

Hi all,

Those of you who know me know that I am not a politically-minded guy, I don't tend to hold forth about politics or Bush or Iraq or whatever the topic of the moment is, but like most people in the arts, I do harbor a belief, no, scratch that, I know for a fact that the left is way better than the right, and that I would love to see Democrats in charge in 2008. Today in the Chronicle there was an article about a Blog out of Berkeley by liberal politico Markos Moulitsas Zúniga. His blog is apparently now the most popular liberal blog on the web. The story was interesting because he seems to be keeping it real and fending off donations from party muckety mucks that would put him in their pockets. His story of growing up a dweeby teen who hid out in the library during lunch in highschool and who tried a lot of things before finally finding his voice resonated with me. Anyway, I have subscribed to his blog, and it seemed like it would be a good thing to pass on to people of conscience like all you folks out there at home.

Good night, and good luck.
Posted by Andrew Wood Acting Studio at 1:05 PM 0 comments







get your Shakespeare on

Hi all,

A colleague of mine from the Drama School, David Koppel, has started a company and they will be doing a production of As You Like It this summer in Alameda. David is a great guy, and a very talented actor. He is currently appearing in Death of a Salesman at the Altarena Playhouse.

Here is the information on the auditions:

ARClight Repertory Theatre
A new Bay Area production company dedicated to the creation of dynamic, imaginative and entertaining theatre is holding AEA/Non-AEA auditions for its inaugural summer production of Shakespeare's AS YOU LIKE IT at Alameda's Altarena Playhouse.

Artistic Director David Koppel, will direct this production set in 1789 France prior to the revolution.

Performance Dates: July 7 - 23 / Fridays/Saturdays at 8pm & Sundays at 2pm.

Rehearsals: Mon-Thurs (evenings) & Saturdays (early afternoons)

Auditions: Mon. 4/24, Tues. 4/25, Wed. 4/26 from 7:30pm - 10:30pm

Callbacks: Tues. 5/2, Wed. 5/3 from 7:30pm- 10:30pm

All Auditions/Performances will be at the Altarena Playhouse
(1409 High St. Alameda/www.altarena.org)

Prepare: 2-3 minute monologue from Shakespeare's As You Like It or another appropriate Shakespearean comedy. / Cold Read scenes from play provided at auditions. / Be prepared to sing a folk song a capella.

Questions/Confirm Date of Attendance:
Email David Koppel (dkoppel2003@yahoo.com)
Posted by Andrew Wood Acting Studio at 9:42 AM 0 comments




Monday, April 03, 2006




Diane going like gangbusters

Four-time Mother of Invention veteran Diane Karagienakos was recently cast in a key role in the feature film Little Bruno (www.littlebrunomovie.com), she appeared on an episode of "The World's Most Astonishing News", a Japanese TV show, and the award-winning stage show that she co-created, Come Fly With Me Nude, will be debuting in Los Angeles on May 5, with her in one of the two leading roles.
Posted by Andrew Wood Acting Studio at 11:13 PM 0 comments




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