Moment Before
Guiding the new crop of NIDA grads over the last two months has been… glorious
I have watched them develop & gain more screen craft specifically in the last three weeks
Than my NIDA year group did over their full three years (back in 2010)
The secret?
They have been practicing being on set
Without actually being on set
Replicating the on-set processes
And taking the time to slow down, make mistakes and debrief afterwards
They have been thrown in the deep end
And have quickly realised that what is most valuable in a self tape format
Doesn’t necessarily translate to what’s most valued on set
I have adored watching their growth
One of my favourite moments
Has been our weekly Monday debriefs
We sit down
We analyse the footage
We identify the strengths (what’s working well)
And we identify the most important areas for improvement.
At the end of one class
A student asked me
“What are you seeing that’s working well for us?”
My answer?
“Three key things
One
When I see you focussing on breathing as yourselves, I see better work
Two
When I see you using the questions in the text to simply ask the person standing in front of you that question, I see better work
And three
When I see you taking responsibility for the moment before, I absolutely am seeing better work
Let’s discuss
Breath
You are the most valuable currency you have in this industry
Not who you think or feel you should be
And the key to getting good at giving yourself to the lens
Is to practice
Literally practice breathing in front of the lens
So much of generic acting training is about stretching young artists to their full light (love) or full darkness (fear)
Which results in plenty of pushed shouts and cries
And tension in the artist = tension in the audience
It’s icky
And more importantly
When you watch any performance that you love
Those extremes usually only make up a tiny fraction (lets call it 2-5%) of the protagonists journey
The majority of the work which is required in order to get to those scenes where you release those extremes
Is made up of simply breathing, listening and having honest conversations
So why is the majority of generic acting training focussed on the tiny 2-5% of screen craft?
Well
It’s damn more interesting to stand a kid up in class and make them cry in front of everyone than it is to practice breathing.
But my focus is to make actors actually get better, so they can give the most generous work they can when it counts most.
A pivotal moment in my own growth
Was when I realised I was trying to do incredibly complex things
And trying to achieve gigantic results
At a time when I couldn’t even breathe as myself in front of the lens under pressure
It took a lot of effort to flip the equation around
To understand that pros do less, better
Let’s clarify
As a professional working artist
You won’t get employed consistently to release those extremes of light and darkness
Until you are technically able to consistently breathe as yourself in front of the lens under pressure
So focus your training on getting great at what is actually most valuable
Breathing as you.
Next.
Questions.
Almost every scene you do will have a question in it as some point.
Some text with a question-mark after it
I can hear the great Kevin Jackson in my head right now
“THE WRITER IS GOD”
Over and over again
I see young artists treat question-marks as if they are full-stops, commas or ellipses.
They are not
They are question-marks
And they are their for a reason
It means one human being is standing in front of another
Asking them for some information
Which they don’t know the answer to
Information which carries repercussions
Information which can change their life
I know this is something very simple
But it’s almost like a cheat code in acting
A technical way of jumping back into the present
And a present actor is bloody delicious to watch
Simply ask the person standing in front of you that question
That one action will take care of the majority of the work required in that moment
So
When there is a question-mark
Ask the question.
Next.
Moment Before.
At some point
Hundreds of extras and crew will stop what they are doing
Everyone will look at you
And there will be silence
You will hear the words:
“Final checks”
The hair and costume department will scurry around you and start trying to make your hair and clothes look identical to the take before
When the checks are completed
The first AD will say:
“Quiet on set”
The camera and sound department will then confirm they are ready to go
“Camera’s rolling”
“Speed”
Someone with a clapping board will then go between you and the lens
And say a few words which will help the editor in several days, weeks or months time with the organisation of this take
And then
The director will say
“Action”
Yikes
What a time
The moment before you are to give your best work
Is FILLED with chaos
So much possibility for distraction, head noise, fear
This moment in time
In between “final checks” & “action”
Roughly speaking
This is usually between 10-60 seconds
This is your moment to focus
You have done all of that preparation
Spent hours working on this scene
Spent hours warmup up
Spent hours travelling to set
Spent hours In hair and makeup
Spent hours waiting in the trailer
It would be a shame
To do all of that work
To then throw it all away because of the chaos that comes just before your take
Everyone else is getting paid take ownership of their work
So take ownership of yours
In those 10-60 seconds
What do you need to do
To get where you need to get
So you can give what you need to give
So can contribute the work you want to to the tribe
Clarify the one or two most important things for you to do in that moment before
Clarify what you need to take care of in that time
So you can simply release your work on cue
Remember
It’s more valuable and sustainable for the camera to simply catch you living
Than it is for you to manufacture effort or boil up fake energy on the word “action”
Make it easy for yourself :)
The goal is not pushed/controlled effort
The goal is free flowing self expression
Hope this helps
X