The Great Acting Blog: "Actor As Individual Creative Artist"

The notion of the actor as an individual creative artist, is a notion I often advocate on this blog. That is; the actor taking responsibility for his work, defining an aesthetic, not “standing around in the dark, hoping to be picked”. The benefits of such an approach are myriad, not least among them is that the actor can build the body of work he wants, work with people he likes and who share his concerns, and also, the actor can maintain self-respect by being self-reliant and rewarding himself for his efforts. In short: the actor-auteur.

 

It's difficult to find a better exemplar for this approach than the great Steven Berkoff, who went and wrote and staged his own plays, and the plays of others, back when nobody was striking out on their own. Berkoff's aesthetics are his own, strikingly individualistic. And so it is then, I have decided to publish some take-aways, from Berkoff's recent five minute interview with the BBC, in order to further the conversation on this matter.

 

 

• Berkoff says that theatre matters, that it's the last form of communication between people, where you can express the most fundamental thoughts, ideas, and emotions, and do so instantaneously.

• Althought Berkoff writes and directs, he's says he is first and foremost an actor, because acting is something he can do immediately, and because he can also dip into other writers. If he was only a playwright, then he couldn't express himself in Shakespeare, Wilde, Sheridan etc.

• He says that acting, writing and directing are all part of the same tree.

• Says all actors should, at one time, be writers and directors – Shakespeare was an actor and a writer. He says it makes a richer compost if people are expressing the three elements together.

• Says that when you're directing yourself you're not actually directing yourself, but that the audience response, ie – their attitudes, their silence, their laughter, will tell you and teach you.

• Says he did one man plays because he didn't want to wait until he gathered a whole group of actors together, with attendent costs and logistics, casting, agents, and dealing with the temperaments of 8 or 10 actors. He says a one-man show is a unique communication – it gives the actor greater scope because he doesn't have to deal with other actors.

• Says his own plays are poetic and expressionistic, not naturalistic.

• Says “Total Theatre” is use of the imagination. Modern theatre has returned to Victorian theatre with huge sets and flying people. Says that Total Theatre is the ability of the actor to express the genius of the body, express the story without set.

• Says you need to be a good actor to play a villain. Says the best actors play villains.

  
  

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The Great Acting Blog: "Why We Make Art"

What happens if he doesn’t get it?

I always taught that this was a key question when analyzing a script for action, as in: What does the protagonist want? What happens if he doesn’t get it? In Oedipus Rex, Oedipus wants to raise the plague on Thebes, in Bob Le Flambeur, Bob wants to rob 800 million bucks from acasino, and in The Wizard Of Oz, Dorothy wants to go home. The stakes are high in each, the characters have a lot to lose.

My theory on why some people become artists is that the tension of not creating work is so tremendous that they cannot bear it, and so the artist will rush off, often against all reason, like some kind of junkie, and make work. People are not driven to become artists because of politics or out of some intellectual predilection or even by the desire to do good works, but because of some unbearable tension which may only be relieved while the artist is at work. This tension exists in all people, but for the vast majority it can be satiated by consuming some form of art (reading a novel, listening to music, watching a movie etc), and for some others the tension may be a little stronger and so they take up some form of art as a gentle hobby, but it is only a small minority for whom the tension is so fierce that they must immerse their lives in work, giving up the comforts of a regular life. This also explains why the drop-out rate is so high (certainly it is in acting); when the young hopeful sees that  regular work (let alone fame) is not forthcoming, they quit and pursue something less arduous and more routine. For an actual artist, quitting is not an option, their work is their life. For the artist, creative rythmn is everything, as is the sense of a repression being lifted at the close of a piece of work, these are the moments an artist lives for, along with his new, thrilling discoveries.

So what happens if you don’t get it? The “it” here meaning work. Well, the true artist will find a way to work, he’s driven to do so, otherwise he’ll go mad. The ones who sit around moaning will soon fade away, and perhaps that is for the best.

The Great Acting Blog: "The Insecure Actor"

I was stunned recently when a colleague of mine, whom I had had a very good relationship with until this point, casually slighted me in public. At first, I was in disbelief because the slight apparently came out of nowhere, and then my survival instinct kicked in as I undertsood the slight to be an attack, and so defended myself. Why did my colleague jeopardise the well being of a hitherto frutiful professional relationship in this way? Because he is insecure about the value of himself and his own work, and his spontaneous insult was merely a symptom of this deeper, underlying fear. The insult itself, the slight, was merely an attempt to bring this value deficit to balance (if only for a fleeting moment). Moreover, it implies a lack of seriousness on their part: a lack of seriouness about themselves, their career, and about our relationship, for what else can this casual sabotage of a professional connection mean? Personally, I would never jeopardise a personal or professional relationship for such a meagre, transient reward.

There can be healthy competition between actors, the sort which innvigorates and inspires, which drives you on to ever greater heights of excellence, and then there is the other sort as described above, which masquerades as the competitive spirit, but is infact the opposite – it is anti-competitive, an attempt to scag everybody, dragging everyone down into misery, sapping the true creative spirit, and in the process excusing oneself from the need to be better.

Stick to the healthy competition and get rid of the unhealthy.

If the actor does infact want to get rid of the unhealthy, then he needs to take responsibility for his work and life – get to grips with the technical aspects of acting, and develop sound philosophy, this in turn creates independence, which means understanding the value of you and your work. It all stems from having a proper grip on the fundamentals of acting. Once this is in place, the actor may become more generous toward his colleagues, seeing that everyone tries to do the best they can, enjoying and being inspired by the success of others' rather than being threatened by it. Understand that your own personal well being is linked to the well being of the production as a whole, understand that the art and craft of acting is far, far greater than any single individual and that you are there to serve it and not for it to serve you. Treat people in the way you yourself wish to be treated. You do not have to be best friends with the rest of the cast, but an environment of trust, mutual respect, and co-operation, is a happily creative environment, which, co-incidentally, leads to stronger work.

 

The Great Acting Blog: "The Joy Of Acting"

 

The characters in my latest short film, Will It Stop Raining In Summer (currently in post-production), are all written “in the style of”, or at least the male characters, Maurice and Roger, are. Roger is having an affair with Maurice's wife, and the syle of the character is that of “The Lover” - impetuous, selfish, passionate, and a little bit dashing. While Maurice is “The Cuckold”; amiable, eager to please, uncool, slightly bumbling. There is no attempt to pretend that the characters aren't their roles. Of course, one of the reasons this is done, is because it is fun to play archetypes – the actor certainly plays the actions in the script, but the pronounced layer of characterization in this situation enables the actor to be larger than life, not simply living the role, but commenting on the role, commenting on acting from the past, and commenting of life itself. The actor enters into a playful discourse with the audience who revel in recognising the archetypal traits of the characters and seeing them at work. It's similar to that experience the audience feels when they see a moment on screen which is true to life, but this time it's true to other films and stories they have seen.

However, for this approach to have an effect, the context within which the artist works needs to be considered – we in the UK have certain expectations about what content films contain, we have those shared cultural experiences from the past which enables certain characters to be archetypal in the first place, and therefore, creative choices can be made with that expectation in mind (and subverted, as the case may be). Creating characters “in the style of”, also acknowledges the artificial nature of proceedings, it acknowledges that what is unfolding before us is a performance, as oppose to entering into a phoney contract with the audience, pretending that the content of the film is “real”. Once that layer of guff has been removed, then whatever artistic richness lays within the material, can be mined and expressed freely, without shame or embarassment. In some way then, employing archetypal traits in a character is an expression of joy about acting itself, and about cinema itself.

 

The Great Acting Blog: "Why Actors Quit"

Orson Welles in Chimes At Midnight, inspiring.

 

 

I ran into an old actor friend of mine recently, who, when I asked him how it was going, replied; “I'm not doing it anymore”, and that he had turned the temporary contract of his day job into a permanent one. Following this admission, he blew out on his lips, scrunched-up his face, and shrugged as if to say; “I've made my decision, it's gone now”. Whenever I hear someone has quit, I still get slightly shocked, although by now I shouldn't. I suppose it's because I know he will now move out of my social orbit and into something more normal, this is especially true since his new job has got nothing whatsoever to do with art. I also know that the questions of his life will change radically, and the obsession with which those of us who remain chase our goals, will probably begin to seem incomprehensible to him. Crucially, by leaving the stage as it were, my friend has severed the bond which exists between actors, and which exists despite the ultra-competitive nature of the life. What is this bond? It is the bond of shared experience, those experiences which are unique to acting but common to all actors, and while those experiences will at least reside in memory, we all know that the ex-actor is no longer part of the hunt.

 

All the actors I've known who had purely cynical motives, have failed. All of them. It's easy to enter the arena, not so easy to stay there. The industrial model of art is false. It cannot be approached as a salaried 9 to 5 job, because it is not that – the actor is not allowed to settle into a cosy routine, for the actor is constantly being asked new questions. In order to find the resilience to constantly face upto those new questions, the actor must pursue goals which are higher than simply making money; he must have longe range aesthetic, technical and philisophical goals, goals which energize him, lift him, help him get back up off the canvas one more time. The mundane goal of paying bills will not nourish him through lean times, through confusing and frightening times, and will not help him overcome the grinding resistence to his work (which all actors face) – in short, he may decide that the tumult of an actor's life is not worth the hassle, that there are easier ways of paying his rent, and because he doesn't have those higher goals, he is unable to resist the soothing lure of security, and so turns his back on his art.

 

The goals that we set ourselves need to invigorate us to the extent that we can overcome the obstacles which prevent us from achieving them.

 

The Great Acting Blog: "Rewarding & Enrichiching - Being An Individual Creative Artist"

Check out this clip, where Mickey, a businessman, verbally dismantles a competitor (contains rude words).

 

 In 2008, I wrote my first, and, as yet, my last one man play, called The Call. It was about a businessman, called Mickey, who, upon learning he has won a business award, decides to ring up a competitor, Tony, to boast, which in turn leads to a battle of dominance between them, over girls, cars and money. The way the play was structured however, the audience only hears Mickey's side of the conversation. The Call is about many things – it is about our need for contact while simultaneously remaining independent, or at least, feeling that we are independent: Mickey's only relationships are with Tony via the telephone, and with a blow up doll – the phone and the doll are both synthetic and controllable, it is within Mickey's control to terminate contact with Tony or the doll at any moment. But it's also about how the quest for social dominance leads to psychotic behaviour, especially when submission from others is not forthcoming.

 

At the time of the production, I was experimenting with the techniques of Michael Chekhov, an actor who had been frustrated by Stanislavki's plodding contraints at the Moscow Art Theatre. In response, Chekhov devised his own methodology, which stressed that the actor should use his imagination and the “fiery images” he saw there, and incorporate them into his performance. Creative Individuality was also an important component of his technique, as was the use of Iconic Gestures. Chekhov saw the actor as an individual creative artist, not as a director's tool, and his techniques lead to bold, thrilling performances, mystical and bravura. I had written the play with this kind of acting in mind, and the final text was very highly strung, any actor playing this part would need to reach way out of his comfort zone to fill this role, there can be no “just saying the lines”, and that's not to mention of course, the severe technical challenge of pretending to speak to someone on the phone, and doing so for the best part of an hour.

No doubt The Call has been an important step in my education, and is arguably one of the toughest roles I've played. At the time of rehearsals, I became neurotic about remembering my lines (not something I usually have a problem with), waking up at 4 o'clock in the morning, jumping out of bed, grabbing the script, and furiously going over them. I rehearsed doing the play in it's entirety scores of times – I was determined to walk on stage and give total commitment – and perhaps this determination went a little too far at times, leading to obsession. However, I often advocate on this blog, for actors to perceive themselves as individual creative artists, and not just employees, to forge their own destiny and not wait for someone to give them a break, and yeah sure this is hugely challenging, frightening even, and yes it can create pressure and the odd behaviour I have mentioned above, but isn't that the point? Isn't the actor's life about continually putting himself under pressure, then seeing how he deals with that pressure, and in the process, learning about himself, then carrying those lessons forward? This was certainly the case with The Call. It also happens to be a rewarding and enriching way to go about things.

 

I hope you enjoyed the clip.

The Great Acting Blog: "The Independent Actor"

Donald Wolfitt made a name for himself at the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre in 1936 as Hamlet, and he tried to persuade the management to finance him on a tour of the provinces. They declined the invitation, so he withdrew his savings and started his own touring company in 1937.

 

 I, like pretty much everyone else, have been indoctrinated to believe that an actor is someone who spends his time asking the powers that be for permission to do work, and occasionally that permission is granted. If a poet wants to work, he merely grabs his pen and starts writing, a filmmaker picks-up his camera, and a painter his brush. This seems patently obvious, none of these people feel that they need to seek permission in order to work, it would be absurd for them to do so. But this is not true for the actor, who is supposed to pass through some process before he is allowed to perform*. And, as always when a new production of my own starts to come into focus, one in which I will not only act, but write the script, direct and produce**, I must once again find a rationale for doing so, or, put another way; make the way clear for artistic freedom by sweeping away the dulling crust which forms around the employee mindset. One of the problems is that there is a tendency to over complicate things – essentially, all an actor does is communicate something to a group of people – but the complications arise when we think of it as a “career”, because then the notion of communicating something to a group of people becomes the holy grail rather than the norm – bizarrely, validation must be sought from outside agencies: attending auditions and meetings, but before we attend auditions and meetings, we have to set up those auditions and meetings, and how are we going to do that, and so on and so forth...yes, it can get complicated, and it's easy to see how the true work of the actor gets lost in the tunnel-vision-pursuit of winning the favour of potential benefactors (as we perceive them) - infact, many who try their hand at acting, quit, as they become overwhelmed, demoralised and exhausted by the constant demands of having to scythe their way through the layers of resistance between them and the audience.

As I try to design a philosophy which will carry me through my next project then , I wonder if the modern notion of the jobbing industrial actor need be rethought, and my mind turns to the pre-industrial actor. In the beginning, there was only the actors, who had formerly been priests but were cast out of the church for being too entertaining, moving from village to village, delivering corner-street oration for their daily bread; if they were good, then they ate, if they were bad then they starved to death (perhaps the choice for the modern day actor is not quite as stark, but perhaps that is one reason why standards are falling despite ever more “training”). But the point is, the actors were there long before the playwrights, long before the directors and the producers, and the theatres and the marketing people, and (the most powerful class in our society) the bureaucrats. Long, long before any these people came along, there was only the actor, who entered the village as a stranger, alone and broke, possessed with only his wits and his intent to create a powerful illusion – he certainly didn't ask permission.

 

So now it's the 21^st century, and actors have been colonized by the paper-pushers – the implication is that the courage and generosity of the actor is worthless, that only obedience has any value. The downside risk of starvation is no longer the motor for the drive to greatness. Nowadays, the street corner is the internet, and digital technology offers the possibilty for the actor to reclaim the work which is rightfully his. It's time to cut out the middle men.

*Perhaps that is part of the actor, his psyche, that needs this process, but perhaps we shall reserve an analysis of that for another time.

**The separation of these job titles is, for me, in practical terms, utterly meaningless. I only separate them here to emphasize my point.

 

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The Great Acting Blog: "Artist As Movie Star - Alain Delon On Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Samourai"

Please watch this 4 minute interview of Alain Delon, upon which, this blog is a response to.

 

Alain Delon is speaking the truth. How do we know? Because he does not try to sell what he is saying to us, he does not narrate his emotions, he does not indicate to us what we should be feeling in response to his words. No, Delon speaks simply and directly, which is how we speak when we  speak about something which is important to us – we do not embellish those things which are important to us, nor do we embellish the truth. It's worth pointing out that Delon was a major movie star at this time, and Le Samourai was a box office smash – compare his interview to those of the modern day movie star: drenched in the slime of self-promotion, expert in the smug schmooze, and all false self-deprecation*, and it is only ever patronizing when they praise the film they are working on (what is really meant is that film did an adequate job of showcasing their specialness).

Delon's reverence for Jean-Pierre Melville, his love for the film and for cinema itself, are obvious, and they inspire and refresh – no mere “exploitation of the form” for Delon. He recognises an auteur film when he sees one. I've said before on this blog, that actors need to learn about the aesthetics of cinema in order to choose which work to accept and which to decline, which filmmakers to support, and which to ignore – this is especially crucial with the proliferation of micro-budget cinema in recent years (and similarly, I have called on directors to improve their understanding of the aesthetics of acting, so that they can actually tell the difference between good and bad acting, and not just cast an actor because they've got the right colour hair). Delon describes Le Samourai as a work of art, a word ridiculed by self-styled “commercial” filmmakers these days, but perhaps it's worth thinking about what it actually means, and then we might strive to create same, and find the wherewithal to describe it as such.

 

*..."the director didn't even want me for the role, I had to fight for it, I had to prove to him that I was an artist" (note how the word “artist” here, is used as a term of self-aggrandizement).

 

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The Great Acting Blog: "Closure Of Catharsis Q & A"

Closure Of Catharsis is a feature film I made with Rouzbeh Rashidi at the end of last year. It's about a man who wrestles with himself as he attempts to remember a trauma from his past, a trauma which has slipped from memory. The film is structured around a park bench monologue and intercut with mysterious imagery. It's visually poetic and possesses a dark brooding atmosphere. It's a film I'm immensely proud of, and have taken great delight in seeing it gradually accrue an audience over time (in the proper arthouse tradition); Closure Of Catharsis has so far played in Ireland, Croatia and will do so in Chile later this year. In addition, it has garnered very positive reviews, and is well on it's way to a having a sizeable following. The film was originally inspired by Jesse Richards' Remodernist Manifesto, which, broadly speaking, seeks a new spirituality in cinema, "concerned with humanity and an understanding of the simple truths and moments of humanity", and Closure Of Catharsis is full of such moments. Furthermore, and crucially for my own personal cinematic project, Closure Of Catharsis is a film for the cinephile for sure, however, it can also be viewed by those who might normally seek out more mainstream fare - infact, I screened the film for a group of such people and they were engrossed by it - in a cinema culture as soul-destroyingly conservative as Great Britain's, where most films are merely marketing paradigms (many of those going into filmmaking now, would have gone into advertising 20 years ago), this is important. "Audiences" are not the zombific drones we are lead to believe, quite the contrary infact, they long to enter into strange new worlds, and are compelled by the unusual, the individualistic, the provocative. My point is that the production of arthouse cinema among young filmmakers in my own city is non-existent, but it needn't be, and this has always been my conviction. Perhaps then, with films such as Closure Of Catharsis, it's maker, Rouzbeh Rashidi, is showing the way. While so many filmmakers spend their time moaning about "funding" (yawn) or begging us to "like" their Facebook page, Rashidi spends his time actually making films, making cinema, and in the process developing and refining his aesthetic and mode of production, thus arriving at a point where a film of Closure Of Catharsis' calibre can be produced. Rashidi has, in the corners of Dublin and Tehran, quietly rewritten the rules of the filmmaking game.

And so it is then, he and I will travel this week to Bristol, where Closure Of Catharsis will be screened at Cinekinosis, which is curated by acclaimed filmmaker, Juan Gabriel Gutierrez. Subsequent to the screening, there will be a question and answer session in which I am expected to participate in, and, having never done so before, I begin to think about how I can do it well and prepare correctly - this is especially important for somebody as beloved of speaking waffle as I am. I think it is particularly problematic for actors to speak about their work because inevitably it leads to speaking about themselves, which may in turn descend into solipsism. On the other hand, there is the loathsome false modesty, which seems to be the favoured tool for self-promotion among our leading  actors: pretending that they are clumsy and disorganised, cute and innocent (when we all know it takes aggression, ambition and hard work to build a career). Either of these routes is repulsive, and both help to foster the generally terrible image of actors as self-obsessed, trivial and phoney. When I think about those who speak about their work in a way that I find engaging, they tend to be honest and unpretentious, simple, and possessing a genuine desire to communicate something, and in a form which may be meaningful to the listener. In the end then, the same values which I aspire to in my actual work; truth, directness, generosity and strength, should also be present when speaking about my work - it's about taking responsibilty: audiences come to us artists in order to be delighted, and are willing to suspend their own self-consciousness and place their well being in our hands to obtain that delight. The artist, therefore, is in a hugely privileged position,  a position which should be cherished and handled with care, and those who would abuse it should be despised. The audience responds most strongly to the artists who take care of them.                                                         

The Great Acting Blog: "Never Compromise"

 

Checkout the video, it's a 5 minute short film by Mike Leigh, "The Birth Of The Goalie Of The 2001 FA Cup Final".

 

This week, I had a meeting which could've lead to some work, sadly however, when I arrived for the meeting, the director didn't know my name. Oh dear. In any normal business meeting or job interview it is not only encumbent upon the employer,  but in the employer's best interest to know at least something about the person he might be employing. Now, I have a policy that if you don't know my name then I don't want to work for you. Those of you reading this who are not in the acting profession but do some rational work, are probably dumbfounded that I even need to put such a policy in place. However, I unhappily report that such shoddy behavior is not unusual, and implies little respect for the skills and merit of each individual actor, and therefore for acting generally.

Why complain? There are millions of actors out there apparently, shouldn't I simply be grateful for the chance to be seen? Surely everyone has to kiss some ass at some point, what does it matter if you get what you want in the end? I could sacrifice my principles for short term gain (I would question whether you'd actually gain something though), I could do that, it's very easy,  infact, it's far easier to do that than to actually adhere to the precepts I've laid down for myself. But the trouble is, this way of operating eats away at your soul (if you've got one that is), it affects you're mindset, how you view your life and your work. All of the actors I know whose guiding principle is money, are unhappy. All of them. They have little or no interest in acting anymore, they sneer at the use of the term “artist”, they have forgotten why they became actors in the first place, they just don't give a shit.

And here in lies the irony of “The Arts” -  many decide to become actors (or any kind of artist) because they want to escape the 9 to 5 salaried routine, they want more adventure, and they want to dedicate themselves to something which they love, something which gives their lives purpose and meaning. However, once that decision to be an actor has been made, many actors then strive to turn their acting careers into routine 9 to 5 jobs, they want to stamp out (having failed to learn to cope with) the insecurity brought forth by the very adventure they sought in the first place. Any kind of aesthetic, or artistic principle is thrown out the window in pursuit of a salary (that's if principles were even articulated in the first place).

So it is I came away from my meeting feeling a little bit lost. I had betrayed my first principles because I thought I could trouser a couple of quid easily. My annoyance at the guy not knowing my name was a symptom of my unconcious knowledge that I was in the wrong the place, and by my own choosing at that. As with all actors, I'm trying to construct a body of work over time, and I'm doing it the best way I know how, a little straying from the path is not the end of the world so long as we learn from it.  But if I cannot construct that body work within a framework of aesthetic and ethical principles, then everything I do is worthless. This means that the actor must have a point of view on ALL ASPECTS OF PRODUCTION, and further, the actor must look at what type of culture the production he is working on at that moment, is contributing towards, in order to make decisions about which kind of work to do. Rarely if ever will the actor have control over a whole production, he is one part of it and should concentrate on doing his job as well as he can. But he should not be oblivious to the production as a whole, and how it marries with his own point of view. And if the actor developes the strength to continually refer to his principles and never stray, he is less likely to find himself in meetings with people who fail to remember his name.

As I was scratching around for inspiration this week, I stumbled upon Mike Leigh's “Golden Rules”*, and after a 50 year career (and still counting), his number 1 Rule is: -

NEVER COMPROMISE

Good luck.

* Here's the full list of Leigh's Golden Rules. http://www.moviemakerdigital.com/moviemaker/iss91_vol18?pg=90#pg90

The Great Acting Blog: "From Fake Independence To A True Artistic Culture"

Being independent has nothing whatever to do with money, or lack thereof. It has got nothing to do with the means of production. Independence is about how you think. We're currently seeing the proliferation of filmmakers who describe themselves as “independent” because they operate with very little money and outside any organized structure like Hollywood. However, the true objective of many of these “independents” is to win the affection of a large corporation, or perhaps become one themselves, and the starting point for this effort is to produce a script which is merely a bad rip- off of the latest commercial success. What's independent about that? Nothing.

Of course, the vast majority of these phonies fail in their attempt to become big shots. And so, they do the next best thing, and mimic, what they perceive to be, the behaviour of a Hollywood player in order to make it look like they are one. But the difference between the actual Hollywood player and the fake, is that the Hollywood player possesses real world accomplishments (regardless of the griminess of the pole climbed) whereas the fake's accomplishments exist only in his head. By copying Hollywood, the fake strives to convince himself (as much as to convince others), that he too is part of the club, but of course, his membership is a fantasy, and, perhaps then, this is the closest he will ever get to the land of make believe. These losers read somewhere that Hitchcock treated actors like cattle (oh really?) and so decide to do likewise thinking this alone will get us to recognize and bow before their genius, and that they too are capable of making a movie like Shadow Of A Doubt or Strangers On A Train. Of course, the real reason the phony treats actors like cattle is because they are absolutely terrified of actors, and of acting, and rather than allay that terror by learning to understand the craft of the actor better (because that's a real pain in the ass right?), they decide to convert their fear into contempt, and invoke Hitchcock (or whatever Hollywood prize cow they choose for whatever situation presented) in order to justify their pig ignorance. It is very difficult to spot these fakes before you've wasted time on them, but the only sure fire tell-tale sign I've found, is that their script stinks to high heaven and they don't care, or worse, they don't realize.

It takes enormous courage and strength (built up over time) for a filmmaker or a playwright or an actor to go his or her own way, to stand alone and express their own view of the world, to define and employ their own aesthetic, to produce their own films, to start their own theatres. Perhaps it is more difficult now than it's ever been, for we are a people brainwashed by the screaming indoctrination of the fame and fortune principle, and anyone who tries to produce work outside of this principle, which is to say an actual artist who dedicates his life to his work and longs to produce something remarkable,or, put another way: an actual independent, is seen as illegitemate and unserious.

Many times the artist produces work which doesn't look like anything that's gone before, and we find it difficult to accept because it is too unsettling, too startlingly original, or it reveals an ugly truth about us humans for the first time. Harold Pinter's debut play in the West End, The Birthday Party, lasted just a week, playing to empty houses, before closing. Orson Welles was largely ignored during his lifetime and many of his films denigrated, buried, and/or taken away from him and re-edited by hacks, his works only became celebrated masterpieces after he died. Often, for a true artist, the typical channels in our culture for producing work are closed off, those channels being too conservative or they have an agenda other than aesthetic (usually commercial or political). Robert De Niro, an actor with a towering body of work, was embarassingly bad in auditions and got work originally through his friendship with Brian De Palma, and Samuel Beckett self-published his early novels, a mere 200 or so people read “Murphy” in the first 4 years of it's existence, and yet now, in the 21^st century, Beckett is held aloft as one of our most important writers. Suddenly, I think of the great John Cassavetes, an actor who struck out on his own, and produced some of the most remarkable and influential films in the history of cinema, some of which he spent literally years making, and Cassavetes often re-mortgaged his house and lived on credit in order to fund them. Point is, if he had asked someone's permission to make his difficult films, they may never have come into existence because he was not employing any formula in their construction, but giving expression to his own vision, and, further, his scripts would most likely have dumbfounded the corporate accountant or the government official.

Actors: I urge you not to become jobsworths. If you come across a true visionary, an artist, chances are his or her work will not look like the picture drawn for you by your drama school tutor or by some accredited “handbook”. Watch as many films as you can, explore the arthouse even if it's not your usual thing, read as many scripts as you can, because that's how you'll learn to tell the difference between a good film and a bad film, between a good script and a bad script, between the phony who gets a kick out of manipulating actors, and the real filmmaker who only wants to do good work. And perhaps then, by teaching ourselves the critical tools and therefore the ability to recognize a real artist when we see one, we actors can validate and support their work through the employment of our skills. And, in so doing, we can actively help to create a true artistic culture, one in which we can participate with pride, one that energises us, and inspires us to greater heights, one which loves the audience and strives to serve it by offering works of beauty, works of grace, and works of truth.