Punch yourself in the talk-too-much

My dear beloved readers (he optimistically began), I bring to you a message very close to my heart. It is one that I have needed to share for years, craved to share and known I should share. So here I share my message with you, chosen readers of online opinions. The message is simply,

SHUT UP MORE OFTEN!

No. Stop. Don't swivel your desk chair to tell your friend what I said. Just shut up. Shh. No, don't get all offended and upset with me. That's so adolescent. Open your mind. Think about it.

Babbling on like the token idiot in an american teen movie won't actually help you to achieve anything. It just won't, and that's the truth. Rather go out and find someone you have never spoken to and ask simple questions. Find out as much as you can from that person. Then move on to person number two.

"Why the hell should I?"

Well, if you happen to be any kind of performer or artist, it is a good idea to learn as much as you can about everything around you. Be a student of the world. Learn something new every hour. Make it your challenge. Make it your new infection. Your new obsession. If you're not a performer or an artist, do precisely the same thing. Each hour, teach yourself something new, or allow others to take up the chalk. The reason it's important for you is that you will begin to become a human being actively involved in the world around you. You will uncover secrets, truths, hidden paths and find that your prejudices are misplaced. There are so many more advantages than just these, and each one is just as important as the last.

The world's beautiful complexity is hidden only by your own shadow

Your senses will come alive, and as an added bonus, you'll actively be reducing your chances of contracting Alzheimer's syndrome. Winning all round on this one, my loves!

You all suck.

You do. You're rubbish. None of you have got ANY gumption. Yeah I said that. Gumption. What is gumption? GO FIND OUT! Google the motherfucker! Wheezing gob shites. You all probably smell. I don't mean smell, like you haven't bathed today... I mean the pungent ass clot of a fucking guinea pig.

Now that I've got your attention, I'm quite clearly back - equally clearly, i have a chip on my shoulder, but before I drop trou and dump it all down your necks, I'd like to take back the above abuse. It was just to get you to sit the hell up and listen, instead of skim reading and flicking your belly lint at the screen. I'm cross about a couple of issues.

Firstly, I'm miffed about the cough I've had for awhile now. I get it, okay? I had the goddamn flu. BUT I KILLED IT. Did I? No. It's little finger keeps twitching, regardless of the fact that i hacked it apart with a fucking switchblade. No. It remains in the back of my throat, tickling my goddamn uvula and giggling itself into a state of hysteria when i cough so hard i puke.

PISSED OFF!

Alright, topic two is for you little mini cock wankers out there with two pubes and a mommy complex.  WHO THE SHIT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE MAKING THE WOMEN IN YOUR LIFE FEEL WORTHLESS????? You are a fucking WASTE of life. Just because your mommy dearest didn't fucking make you a birthday cake, or she beat you till you were nearly dead, you have the right to emotionally abuse every lady you know??? "Muurrhhhrhrrr! Mommy BEAT me!" Nobodycaresyoupussy! MAN UP! If that shit really upset you that much, you'd see a freakin' shrink and sort your shit out. What you are currently doing is WEAK.

Okay I'm done.

Respect

Hello to all my stunning readers! I've been quiet for ten days now, which is disgusting of me I know. I do apologize, but at the same time I've been having a wonderfully restful lazy time with my girlfriend, cuddling for days on end, visiting our godson and watching some really rather excellent movies.

A few days ago, while I was blissfully scrolling through Facebook from my mobile phone, I saw that my friend, mentor and guide in theater had posted the following as her status on Facebook:

RESPECT is the keyword to excellence in the theatre individually and collectively!

I could have whooped out loud, I was so happy. Such truth should be celebrated. So many times, we come into contact with people in the theater who have little or no consideration for others, and seek only to glorify themselves.

Self-glorification is fine, don't get me wrong, but the problems start to occur when it is done at the expense of the theater, one's fellow actors, and the audience. This is an epidemic with students that has to be nipped in the bud. I've ached through many awful productions from school shows, to amateur dramatics, to really spectacularly awful professional shows that left me, as an audience member, desperately seeking the closest cup of tea for consolation. Admittedly, there are many factors that can result in an abortion of a production, but I believe that 99 percent of the time, the main problem is a lack of respect. I've made an awesome table that reduces this ridiculously in depth topic to a brief summary.

Learning lines made simple

Learning lines freaks most drama students out to an incredible extent. I find this sad, because it's really not difficult. It may be time consuming, but if that's your concern, I'm afraid you are disgustingly lazy. I'd like to say up front that I am aware that there are many different methods of memorizing text; this is just my method, and in my experience it works like a charm. However if any of you know of other ways, let me know in the comments! Lets do this in steps.

 What you wanna do first, is separate your script into sections. The script as a whole is first divided into acts, acts into scenes and scenes into thoughts. It is important for us to follow this guideline in breaking out scripts into manageable chunks, so that the whole task of learning lines becomes less daunting. Most scripts are already divided for us as far as the third step (scenes), but it is up to us to divide them further into thoughts. We do this by identifying the ideas and steps within the scene, separating them and, only for a little while, isolating them. Each new 'idea' can be indicated with a square bracket, as shown below.


 The next step is to highlight sets of lines with different colours, so that attention can be given to each set individually, as I've done to the monologue below. I've blurred the words out so I don't get slammed with copyright lawsuits. The idea is that we highlight lines in sets of two's (a line here meaning sentence). I've given an example below.


 The third and final step is where the actual work comes in. This is the part where you start to learn your lines. Scared? Don't be. I'm about to give you a really simple method that will make all the difference to the amount of time you spend studying your text. What you do is, learn the first set of lines you've highlighted, so that you know them 100% off by heart. For the average person, learning two lines takes approximately five minutes. One you've remembered the first two lines, move onto learn the next two. When you've remembered those, try to recite all four lines. When you can do this, move onto the third set of two. Then try to recite all six that you've learnt. Continue this cycle until you've reached the end of the section. Then, restart the process with the next section. Once you've memorized the next section, try to recite the two sections you've learnt. Make sure that you speak the lines you are trying to learn out loud. That is the only way this works!

Once you've memorized the entire script using this method, it is imperative that you practice reciting your lines everyday! This is the only thing that will solidify them in your mind. Remember to say them out loud!

"Thats all very well," I hear you say, "but what about dialogs?!" No problem! What you do, is speak your lines out loud, and read the other person's lines in silence. This seems to create a divide in one's mind between the lines one must say and the lines one must be 'fed' by the other actor(s).

There you have it! Try it out and let me know how well it works for you!

Terry Pratchett's Nation

Terry Pratchett, best known for his Discworld series, is an amazing author. He created a whole new universe in exquisitely tangible detail that undulates in a never ending tango with normality. I have been a great fan of Terry Pratchett's novels for many years, frequently losing myself in the endless depths of each new page. My latest Terry Pratchett fix came from his novel Nation which is best described as a work of genius; a powerfully worded window into new possibilities.

In Nation, Pratchett tells the tale of a young island boy on the cusp of manhood, faced with seemingly insurmountable challenges. Pratchett weaves humour, suspense and action into a stunning tapestry, dripping with beautiful language and engaging imagery.

Imagine my joy, when I read in a local newspaper about London's National Theatre simulcasting live productions via satellite to a cinema near me! My excitement almost made me hyperventilate when I discovered, upon further reading, that Nation would be showing!  NTLive, as the initiative is called, is a truly amazing experience, and Nation was just the most spectacular show to watch. We got to see all the effects, puppets, expressions and action up close; so much closer than the theater could ever get under normal circumstances. I'm astounded by the whole affair.

Apology

Hello everyone! Good God it's been far too long since I've written anything. What with exams and moving from Wordpress to Blogger, I've had almost no time to sit down and write about everything that's been going on in my head.

However, that's all sorted now, so I'll be writing for you all with alarming regularity. Watch this space!

Get to Know Yourself

Twisting Oneself to Obtain New Understanding

In my constant travels within the endless undulating highways of my imagination, I’ve stumbled across an amazing way of getting to know precisely who you are, where you stand on any issue in life, and what you are willing to tolerate. It’s a 5 step powerhouse of a procedure that I’ve glued together with scraps of ideas from many different and long forgotten sources. It’s pretty basic to understand as a concept, but is quite tricky to get the hang of, in practice.
Okay, first of all I’d like to explain exactly why this exercise helps actors with characterization (the process of connecting with the character you intend to portray), and how it can benefit the population in general.
As actors, we are forever experimenting with different characters, emotions, ideas, challenges and feelings in an effort to prepare a memorable performance for our audiences. In order for an actor to successfully “become” a character in every way, it is essential for the actor to leave their own personality, habits, traits, feelings, emotions, inhibitions and all the other little bits and pieces of themselves behind.  As a fellow actor and I agreed in a conversation we had a few weeks ago, it is impossible to leave yourself behind if you don’t have complete awareness of who you are and what makes you tick. My peer’s statement was, and I’m paraphrasing here, “You cannot bring eve a small part of yourself onto the stage.”
For people in everyday life this tool is useful for building opinions, stepping into another person’s shoes to view life from their point of view, and to strengthen your resolve so that you know precisely what you are and are not prepared to cope with or tolerate.
This all got me thinking about how one can become so completely and intensely aware of oneself. I didn’t have to wait long for the penny to drop; it was obvious. One simply has to take it step by step, and embark on a motivated journey of discovery. Here’s how to do it:

1. Make a true statement about yourself/your beliefs/your life, etc.
2. Make the exact opposite statement.
3. Convince yourself that the opposite statement is true.
4. Explore your thoughts and emotions for signs of how this may be affecting you.
5. Make sure you break away from this process while remembering your experiences.

Confused? Let me offer an example of this hugely helpful process.

1. I am a trustworthy person.
2. I am not a trustworthy person.
3. Convincing myself that it’s true.
4. I’m feeling dark, contemplative, sly, angry, vengeful. I’m thinking about ways to double-cross people.
5. Breaking away from the process.

The benefit? I can now see how people, that I feel aren’t trustworthy, function. I can put myself squarely into their shoes and almost “see” through their eyes, the situation that is currently affecting me. This allows me to handle encounters with these people with more skill, or to better understand the character I am attempting to portray. Play around with this method, and see how it benefits you in life as well as in your career.

The possibilities are exciting and endless.

In closing I’d like to apologize for my scarceness this weekend, as my girlfriend and I were attempting to hike in zero degrees Celsius, far from internet access. I hope my post on attracting new theater-goers helped ease the boredom a little.
Once again, thank you all for the support!