True And False
Not long ago I read David Mamet's book, "True And False" --basically a critique of acting, actors and especially acting schools and teachers. It was really great and I'd meant then to kick-start this journal but even then failed to record some of my insights. Stupid lazy me.
I was just going through a notebook on my bedroom floor as I was cleaning when I found the page on which I'd recorded what I felt were pieces of gold from Mamet's book. These, I think, should sit in every actor's brain for all eternity and remind them of simple truths--not just for acting, but for life.
"That is what acting is. Doing the play for an audience. The rest is just practice."
What a concept, huh? We worry so much about how to do this and this for this effect and this effect, we sometimes just completely miss that there's a simple reality to acting. The truth is that when it comes down to it, Theater needs exactly three things (and even that is debatable, given new ages...): 1--A location. 2--The Actor. 3--An Audience. One is pretty self explanatory. Wherever theater is taking place, that is the location it needs. If you have no location... well then you kinda don't exist, do you? I don't mean to get into an existential ponderings, so let's just leave it at that. Two is simple as well. The actor. The subject. The thing observed. It doesn't even need to have a purpose or a meaning; if it sits upon your stage and acts upon an audience, it is a piece of theater. Three--and here is where Mamet's comment is most potent-- is the audience. Without them, there is no point to our job as actors! We are acting upon nothing! We are affecting nothing. This is just practice. Practice for when we are affecting someone or something. That is when practice ceases, and the profession of acting begins.
And when you think of it that way, doesn't it free you a lot more? Go ahead, take care of those technical details of character and shit as you have to. Take your time with it and do it right. Just remember that its just practice until you're in front of that audience. Then you had better have spent all your practice well.
"The theater belongs not to the great but to the brash."
I love that. Think of the great actors: Lawrence Olivier. Grace Kelly. Marlon Brando. Scarlett Johanson. Robert DiNiro. They are not the top of their profession because they are great actors or because they excel at their craft... they are brash. The history of any one of these will show you a story of challenging what they knew and trying something different. As actors, we need to know no fear and to hit the deck balls to the wall, not depending on our great training and excellent accolades but on our natural ability and instincts. Actor training, according to Mamet, may be a waste of time altogether, because it burdens actors with the responsibility to act. Fuck that. Be brave. Take the stage. Know who you are and what you're doing. Do the fucking play and do it well.
These last two have less to do with acting but are still fucking awesome.
"It is not a sign of ignorance not to know the answers. But there is great merit in facing the questions."
Hows that for some deep shit? Don't feel stupid if you don't have the answer. But pursue the question with all you got. This is very similar to something I've been saying: I don't need answers. Rather I need questions to answer. The joy and thrill in bravely and brashly attacking a question just suits me better than being contented by an answer. As actors, we have to live in action. On the stage we can be given the answer to our question, and the play ends there. I kind of feel is the same way with life: if we stop pursuing the answers we seek, are we really living anymore? So let no one tell you that you're stupid for not knowing or getting something; the only stupid thing about it is if you're asking and unwilling to do what you need to find out.
This one, however, is my favorite.
"There is nothing more pragmatic than idealism"
Tell me that doesn't just smack with power. It just makes sense that we should strive for that ideal world. If we're not, then we're simply settling for lesser life.
"But you can never really reach an ideal state!" someone shouts from the gallery.
No, perhaps not. And we should learn to deal with those things that are less than ideal that are right in front of us. After all, what else do we have to work with? But should this divert us from striving from the best all the same? Why should we? We all want the best for ourselves and each other, and we certainly can't achieve it if we're not trying for it. We have to see things as we would like them to be ideally to know how close we are to it now and to know what our goal to reach is. By living that way, you are doing a service to yourself and to everyone. I can imagine that a society of people who live striving for that perfection every day--even when they know they aren't going to get it--would reach a happy living much faster than a people who continue to settle for the lesser and lesser.
I was just going through a notebook on my bedroom floor as I was cleaning when I found the page on which I'd recorded what I felt were pieces of gold from Mamet's book. These, I think, should sit in every actor's brain for all eternity and remind them of simple truths--not just for acting, but for life.
"That is what acting is. Doing the play for an audience. The rest is just practice."
What a concept, huh? We worry so much about how to do this and this for this effect and this effect, we sometimes just completely miss that there's a simple reality to acting. The truth is that when it comes down to it, Theater needs exactly three things (and even that is debatable, given new ages...): 1--A location. 2--The Actor. 3--An Audience. One is pretty self explanatory. Wherever theater is taking place, that is the location it needs. If you have no location... well then you kinda don't exist, do you? I don't mean to get into an existential ponderings, so let's just leave it at that. Two is simple as well. The actor. The subject. The thing observed. It doesn't even need to have a purpose or a meaning; if it sits upon your stage and acts upon an audience, it is a piece of theater. Three--and here is where Mamet's comment is most potent-- is the audience. Without them, there is no point to our job as actors! We are acting upon nothing! We are affecting nothing. This is just practice. Practice for when we are affecting someone or something. That is when practice ceases, and the profession of acting begins.
And when you think of it that way, doesn't it free you a lot more? Go ahead, take care of those technical details of character and shit as you have to. Take your time with it and do it right. Just remember that its just practice until you're in front of that audience. Then you had better have spent all your practice well.
"The theater belongs not to the great but to the brash."
I love that. Think of the great actors: Lawrence Olivier. Grace Kelly. Marlon Brando. Scarlett Johanson. Robert DiNiro. They are not the top of their profession because they are great actors or because they excel at their craft... they are brash. The history of any one of these will show you a story of challenging what they knew and trying something different. As actors, we need to know no fear and to hit the deck balls to the wall, not depending on our great training and excellent accolades but on our natural ability and instincts. Actor training, according to Mamet, may be a waste of time altogether, because it burdens actors with the responsibility to act. Fuck that. Be brave. Take the stage. Know who you are and what you're doing. Do the fucking play and do it well.
These last two have less to do with acting but are still fucking awesome.
"It is not a sign of ignorance not to know the answers. But there is great merit in facing the questions."
Hows that for some deep shit? Don't feel stupid if you don't have the answer. But pursue the question with all you got. This is very similar to something I've been saying: I don't need answers. Rather I need questions to answer. The joy and thrill in bravely and brashly attacking a question just suits me better than being contented by an answer. As actors, we have to live in action. On the stage we can be given the answer to our question, and the play ends there. I kind of feel is the same way with life: if we stop pursuing the answers we seek, are we really living anymore? So let no one tell you that you're stupid for not knowing or getting something; the only stupid thing about it is if you're asking and unwilling to do what you need to find out.
This one, however, is my favorite.
"There is nothing more pragmatic than idealism"
Tell me that doesn't just smack with power. It just makes sense that we should strive for that ideal world. If we're not, then we're simply settling for lesser life.
"But you can never really reach an ideal state!" someone shouts from the gallery.
No, perhaps not. And we should learn to deal with those things that are less than ideal that are right in front of us. After all, what else do we have to work with? But should this divert us from striving from the best all the same? Why should we? We all want the best for ourselves and each other, and we certainly can't achieve it if we're not trying for it. We have to see things as we would like them to be ideally to know how close we are to it now and to know what our goal to reach is. By living that way, you are doing a service to yourself and to everyone. I can imagine that a society of people who live striving for that perfection every day--even when they know they aren't going to get it--would reach a happy living much faster than a people who continue to settle for the lesser and lesser.