Tuesday, November 03, 2009




degree of difficulty

Sometimes I think the best thing that I can teach anyone about acting is how difficult it is to do it well, not so they will feel discouraged, but so that they will never become complacent. Good actors make it look easy, and it often doesn't seem like it requires any specialized knowledge, just walking and talking and not bumping into the furniture, as Spencer Tracey famously quipped. But the grace that a good actor exhibits in performing a role well is either the product of a freakish natural talent that almost no one has, or the result of hard work and sustained imaginative and intellectual engagement. And even the freakishly talented ones need help in shaping a performance, even if they supply regular flashes of brilliance at particular moments.

In promoting my class, I do have to put messages out there about the power of the approach that I teach, and there is power in it, without a doubt. But that power doesn't remove the difficulty of acting. That is a disappointing discovery for many. But as frustrating as the difficulty may be, it is the challenge of facing that difficulty that prompts us to stretch ourselves beyond our previous capabilities, to achieve what would have previously been out of our reach. And that means that the difficulty is nothing that anyone should want to avoid or be rescued from. "We must do what is difficult because it is difficult", the poet Rilke wrote. I am happy to show people what acting involves, to point them in the right direction, give them tools and procedures to follow, and to help them along the way. But I would never want anyone to think that I am here to make things easy. I'm not that kind of acting teacher.
Posted by Andrew Wood Acting Studio at 12:50 AM 1 comments




Saturday, October 31, 2009




the balloon boy's parents met where?

From the Los Angeles Independent

ABC News' Denver affiliate KMGH-TV reported Friday that the Heene parents met as aspiring actors at the Lee Strasberg Institute of Theatre & Film in West Hollywood, and lived for many years in the greater Los Angeles area
.

See what happens when you study Strasberg?

:)

Although they did manage to fool everyone until the kid blurted out that it was all for show...
Posted by Andrew Wood Acting Studio at 12:01 AM 1 comments
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Friday, October 30, 2009




acting while carrying half a million dollars

A student emailed me today, and mentioned having watched a documentary about the making of "Jackie Brown". He says that apparently Tarantino always uses real props, and so the bundle of money in the final sequence of that movie, half a million to be exact, was real money.

I am sure those actors all found it very simple to...invest in that scene.
Posted by Andrew Wood Acting Studio at 11:23 PM 0 comments







it's not easy being swank

In the SF Chronicle today, Hillary Swank affirms the importance of hard work:

Q: Many people probably think of you as the actress who won two Academy Awards. But between "Boys Don't Cry" and "Million Dollar Baby" you made nine movies, and between "Million Dollar Baby" and "Amelia" you made five. Can you talk a little about the mistaken idea that you just take a role, act, win an award - easy as that?

A: I'm so glad you said that, because even with "Boys Don't Cry" people said it was an overnight success. I'd been acting since I was 16, and I won that Academy Award when I was 25. Obviously, it's such a great honor and privilege to have won an Academy Award, and to have two is mind-blowing. Something like that happened off of my doing what I love. But, yes, there's a lot of hard work. It's a constant challenge, fighting for roles that you love. As Clint (Eastwood) says, you always aim for the bull's-eye, but you don't always hit it.
Posted by Andrew Wood Acting Studio at 4:26 PM 0 comments




Thursday, October 29, 2009




the actors in the hallway

I arrive early at the space where I teach in LA on Wednesday nights. My classroom is off a hallway that has doors to studios where other classes are taught simultaneously with mine. Invariably, there are actors out in the hallway at a quarter to seven, clutching scripts (or sometimes not) and speaking earnestly to each other, apparently "rehearsing". Thet are all in street clothes, so it doesn't appear that they have given any thought to what they will wear in their scenes. Because they are rehearsing in the hallway, they have no physical environment. In a word, they got nothin. And they know it. And they are about to present that fact to their teacher and their peers, in their class. The resulting anxiety is so palpable you can cut it with a knife. I unlock my classroom and make my way in as quickly as possible, tape my poster up on the door, and then close the door, and wait for my students to arrive. I do my best to shed any of the free-floating nervousness that may have found its way into me as a result of passing through this activity.

My class starts, and 90 minutes in, we take a break. I head out into the hall to run down to the corner store and/or make a pitstop, and there are still actors out in the hall, reading off of photocopies and getting ready for the big moment. I am told that these actors are preparing to read in their "cold reading" class (I'll take that canard up another day).

The misguidedness...it burns. The practices I promote in my class for rehearsing couldn't be further from what is on display in the hallway. First off, I strongly encourage students to rent space to rehearse, rather than rehearsing in someone's apartment, let alone in the hallway before class. The act of formally setting aside time and space to give to rehearsing is very significant, apart from the practical advantages of such an arrangement, which are many. By setting aside time in this way, the actor affirms for herself the importance of what she is doing when she rehearses. She says to herself: "What I am doing when rehearsing is important enough to take steps to assure it gets done well."

When you do that, the creative part inside of you has a way of waking up and taking notice. And then, you never know what might happen. With the actors in the hallway, you always know what will happen: not much.
Posted by Andrew Wood Acting Studio at 8:18 PM 3 comments




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