SPEAKER_00 0:57

In that process of understanding the script, and now you're going into the rehearsal. What are some of the things that actors need to bring into rehearsal process?

SPEAKER_01 1:11

I have a saying, and that has never come unrehearsed, unprepared, or uninspired. So once you really look at the material and you're going into rehearsal, there's something that has to move you inside to connect to what you're about to do. And it doesn't have to be personal, it might be just something like you really love the relationship that's on the page, or you really um connect to or relate to the character. And then um, and that's that's about that's that's what you need to do when you go into you have to be open, you know, you're gonna be collaborating, you can't be stuck on how you're going to do it. I think another thing that actors fail to realize is that every time you prepare or make a different choice, it's gonna come out different. That's great. Until somebody says, keep it, allow yourself to change, otherwise, you're gonna get bored. And I think that's the worst thing is an actor gets bored with a scene because they can't, they never actually did enough deep work on it to allow the scene to take on a life of its own, any ball. So that's another aspect is you you really can't get bored if you really, really keep digging in.

SPEAKER_00 2:28

So you made a comment about collaborating in the rehearsal process. If the actors are collaborating, how do they keep conflict during the scene?

SPEAKER_01 2:41

I don't believe that you should share with your fellow actor your objective. That's your business. That's their business. No one should be directing each other ever. If somebody's telling you how to act something, go thank you very much, and don't do anything of what they said because that's not a collaboration. A collaboration happens in the doing of the work. You can hang out and talk about, you know, your cat or your dog, you know, go take a walk, talk about what you did that weekend. But when you go to do the work, it's your private information that you're holding, and they're holding theirs. And you come together in character as in that scene, in that relationship, and what the scenario is about. So, you know, it's not about making nice, it's about actually doing the work.

SPEAKER_00 3:29

So, for the first, because because there are a lot of new actors that hear a concept and then they think, oh, this is how it is. I want to, I want to be real clear with the rehearsal process because I think that's where sometimes actors get stuck. They don't know the process of rehearsing, and then they come to the classroom and they bring the work and it's different, and they freak out because they're well, we rehearsed it different. That's not how it's supposed to be.

SPEAKER_01 3:58

It's gonna be always different. That's the first thing to know. It's always gonna be different. Every environment, you're in an all of a sudden you're in the theater, it's a different environment, it's gonna change your warm-up, your prep, your moment before. Every time you've changed that moment before, you're launching into a scene different. It's like throwing a ball. How many ways can you throw the ball? When an actor comes to my class, I have a three-page sheet of how to rehearse a scene, step by step by step, by step by step. And you know, you get like a training packet from me when you come train with me. So you know how to apply yourself. There are no rules, but there are boundaries. And the boundary is you don't direct another actor, you don't tell another actor what to do. You don't know, they don't know. You come in at equal equal footing with each other, and you try to do your best and you try to live a new character. Every character lives in their own orbit. So you have to find that orbit that your character's in, and so that there's the dynamics. And then with raising the stakes or conflict in the scene, I have all these tools for that. You know, I have because you were asking about how to keep conflict, you have to play one of the one of the tools that I give you. Um, I have a tool called Um The Root Question, another called the Fire and the Communication, another playing the love, another, um, and these are things I built on my own with working with actors and realizing what I do.

SPEAKER_00 5:24

How important is improv in the rehearsal process?

SPEAKER_01 5:28

I think improv is essential. I think improv is one of the most important. I don't find it, I find it a um, what is it? It's a way of getting there, just like using um the script, it's another form of ownership of the material. So improv, I think, is phenomenal. And a lot of my students that book things, sometimes the star will improvise. And if they have that and it's easy for them, and they're not terrified of improv, they're gonna do well, they're gonna book a lot.

SPEAKER_00 6:02

In the rehearsal process, I saw you working with two actors, and you had them sit uh back to back and do the lines. And I thought that was brilliant because you can't see each other, yet you have to get the material out. And and you had them do it a a couple of times, and each time they did it, it was not only different, but the energy shifted. There uh you went from uh saying the lines to all of a sudden there was a softness, there was a openness, there was giving. And so, where did you get that that exercise from?

SPEAKER_01 6:47

I don't know. I can't say I came up with that one. I don't know where it came from, but I've been doing it. I would did it as when I was an actor. We would I remember when I was an actor, I acted for years. I was on General Hospital, I did a bunch of horror movies, and I remember saying to one of my actors, hey, let's just sit back to back. I don't remember. I don't know if it's mine though. I'm in my a brilliant teacher along the way probably gave it to me.

SPEAKER_00 7:10

Yeah, that's a wonderful. Uh I thought that was a uh what an exercise. What a lovely exercise to kind of calm you, get you out of your nerves, and also feel the presence of the other person.

SPEAKER_01 7:24

Absolutely. I honestly, um, Lydia, I think it's too um arrogant to claim such a simple exercise anyway. It's my stuff that I've created is a little um it's it's obvious I created it. It's it's on the page and how it happened. And I talk about how I how I came to this tool and why it's so such an important tool. I have certain ones that people just I continuously get emails about. I used it, you know. So yeah, I needed it. I needed solutions. That's how I came up with them.

SPEAKER_00 7:56

I want to talk about a couple of other things that new actors do that gets them in trouble and keeps them from getting work or getting representation. What are three things that you see new actors get into trouble with all the time? Like the top three.

SPEAKER_01 8:17

Well, the first one is which uh blows my mind is when they think that they're going to get a callback from their first audition and they're so devastated, or their second or the third, or they've gone maybe out three or four times five times and they're not getting a response, and they they're they're they're just they don't get that it's a numbers game. They don't know. A lot of them are green too, they're just not ready. And so this is the second problem, and that is so that's the first one. But second one is is they just haven't trained, they just have not trained, and you cannot drive a car without training. Um, but it seems like acting is like life and like it should be easy, and you know, you should be able to just do it. No, you get so nervous. And the second thing is when you're on set, you really have to deliver, and it can be overwhelming. I've seen newbie actors that have trained with come to me, trained for years or whatever, get their first audition and they're in so much ecstasy that they can't calm down to really focus, too. So there's that other third third problem, which is being able to know that being so happy can mess you up. And you have to be focused enough to play the you know, the conflict, the integrity of what it is that the character's going through. I mean, I I can name it. I have a new actor that's I don't want to say who, he's a star. And I looked at his first, he's done it, you know, he's worked a bit. I looked at his first movie and I go, Oh, you were in euphoria all the way through this. I you're not playing the conflict. And he goes, Yeah, it's a problem. I need help. I said, Yeah, we need to discipline that because the most important thing for actor is to there's five things you control: your body, your face, your emotions. Wait, your body, your face, your voice, your emotions, and where your mind is. Where your mind is, and you have to have be in the thinking and the feeling of the role. So that's a really important aspect as well. So you can't do that without a lot of concentration exercises, um, so that when you get on set, you have focus and concentration. Um, your power is directly related to your ability to focus and concentrate. Your emotions are directly related to your ability to imagine because you have to sustain the emotion, otherwise it dissipates. And that's a problem sometimes using personal triggers, is then you're done and you're exhausted. How are you going to keep with each? You know, you might be the last, I'll never forget. I was a young actor, I had the because I wasn't the star in a project. I had with the last close-up at 4 p.m. in the afternoon. We were called at like five in the morning, and I had to come up with the emotion. And you know, you you wait all those hours. Well, you better be working on your imagination. You better understand how to really trigger yourself so you're prepared to really connect because that might be the best scene of your life, if you're there for it, that will give you more work. And you need every job you do to count, even if it's a freebie, every job bring 100%. It doesn't matter if you're an actor, you bring your 100% to everything you do.

SPEAKER_00 11:35

It reminds me of uh you made a comment about actors who fall in love on set and then can't come with the conflict. And I and I agree, I think I I think that that when you get to work, you have to put yourself in a bubble. It's kind of like even with auditions. I mean, now it's self-tape, but when we were going out uh to the studios and to the casting offices, you had to figure out how to protect yourself from when you walked in until you got out of the audition room, that you could, you know, I had to learn that the hard way. You got in those in those um lobbies and then you start chatting and you get in there and you have nothing to give. You are you have nothing. And so um my question to you is what are a couple of tools that you offer that uh an actor can say, you know what, no matter where I am, I can I can grab on this tool and and get what I need to get.

SPEAKER_01 12:45

This is a quick hack for everyone, and that is music, headphones. Have um pick like four or five songs for your character, put it on your playlist, put your headset in, and just when you're there, just keep listening to the music. I directed a kind of it was a big budget film um called Rain. And it um it went to the festivals, it was Oscar qualified. It's um and the whole time because there's so much going on when you're a director, and um I listened in my head because I did couldn't have headphones, but I was constantly listening to a certain song that inspired me to stay focused. And you can put that song in the back of your mind, and it inspired me so that I was like, of course, directing is just you know, honestly, um it's like the greatest joy. So um it's easy to be focused in a way, but you have can't remember and you can't forget anything, you have to remember everything when you're directing because you can't just look at your notes all the time, it has to be in you of what needs to happen in each scene and what you know, continuity, everything. So um hopefully, music, you know, for every actor out there, you know, that is a wonderful one, you know, music is so powerful and it can keep you focused. A young actor that comes to me that I've maybe just done a couple sessions with, I'll send them to set with with a playlist.

SPEAKER_00 14:15

I love that. Okay. New actors, understanding genres. So they're they're learning script analysis. How do you teach them genres?

SPEAKER_01 14:29

Genre, there's two basic categories, of course, but there's more. I mean, obviously, there's Shakespearean acting, which is the key of tragedy, which is a genre. And tragedy doesn't mean that it's tragic, though. Um, it in our modern day tragedies, um, that's a whole nother I can go talk forever about genre. Let me not talk about that, but then there's comedy and drama basically. Those are the two genres that actors have to be expert at. And I'd be honest with you in that most people that do so much drama want to learn comedy just to have some be lighter. And then, of course, comedy actors need to learn drama. So um they're just they're just completely two different categories, and I teach both, I love both. I direct a lot of theater. When I directed theater, I mostly directed comedy and in film because I was advised by my mentors to do series projects, so I'm a series director. But I think I'm going, I've done a lot of series films, but I am gonna be going back to like kind of a dramedy thing because I just love comedy so much.

SPEAKER_00 15:31

When they get the sides, how do they know if it's a comedy or if it's a drama?

SPEAKER_01 15:36

You ask. You have to ask, because you'd be amazed that somebody will say this is supposed to be a drama, and you're looking at it and it seems so funny. Um, and there are different there, it's a different approach. Comedy is a different approach than drama. I know a lot of people say drama, comedy is just drama faster, but it's not true. Um there is um, but you know, it can be true in some ways. I I hate to invalidate somebody's perception of that because um if it's a dramedy, then it's combo. So, but you I have like I have 16 guideposts to comedy, and they involve they're fun, they're even down to timing, and I teach timing. And then drama is about depth and really slowing down and taking your time, like comedy's fast. Drama, which a lot I get a lot of actors coming to me to help them with getting deeper, bringing out their essence. And I have another book in the works that I'm written that I've written, but I gotta rewrite about essence work, and it's about 16 journeys. Um, that each character every character, there's only 16 basic journeys.