I was an undergraduate student studying acting, constantly immersed in a new role, a new persona, and I was on my way to the arts and communication building on campus when I stumbled upon a conversation being had about actors. One peer was sharing his skepticism that he could continue participating in theatre. The "vanity" of it was unsettling him. There was just so much focus on the self and he didn't want to live that way.
There are moments in life when you say something and then immediately realize it to be true- it comes out before you've cognitively acknowledged it.
Before I knew I was butting in, I heard myself articulating the reality that actors are not vain and acting is not mere focus on the self. Good actors are honest. They LOSE themselves in a different persona- they allow themselves to disappear into someone else- and in doing so they acknowledge the humanity in us all. In playing a villain honestly, I realize my own innate ability to BE a villain. I am capable of these actions. I hold this potential within myself. I will never forget the compliment an audience gave a dear friend once- they boo-ed him during curtain call. He played the villain that convincingly. He allowed himself to disappear from view that fully. And we all learned about the nature of good and evil because of his courage.
Good actors are not vain. Good actors are honest and brave.
But it is not surprising that this assumption prevails, is it? Meryl Streep revealed this week that as a student she thought she was "too ugly to be an actress," and that she thought it was "vain to be an actress." Terms like "drama queen" don't paint a desirable reputation for those who build their careers in the performing arts. When I refer to someone as "dramatic," it is most often not a compliment. It is a difficult balance to strike- the reality that in acting, our medium is ourselves, yet WE are not the ones on display when we strut the boards. We're vessels and storytellers, not self-promotors.
And that's what we try to teach our theatre students here at LCA: not to self-promote and indulge in vanity, but to find humanity in their characters, to learn about the human condition through art, and to "hold a mirror up to nature" as the Bard taught us in Hamlet.
What do you think? What does it take to be a good actor?
Before I knew I was butting in, I heard myself articulating the reality that actors are not vain and acting is not mere focus on the self. Good actors are honest. They LOSE themselves in a different persona- they allow themselves to disappear into someone else- and in doing so they acknowledge the humanity in us all. In playing a villain honestly, I realize my own innate ability to BE a villain. I am capable of these actions. I hold this potential within myself. I will never forget the compliment an audience gave a dear friend once- they boo-ed him during curtain call. He played the villain that convincingly. He allowed himself to disappear from view that fully. And we all learned about the nature of good and evil because of his courage.
Good actors are not vain. Good actors are honest and brave.
And that's what we try to teach our theatre students here at LCA: not to self-promote and indulge in vanity, but to find humanity in their characters, to learn about the human condition through art, and to "hold a mirror up to nature" as the Bard taught us in Hamlet.
What do you think? What does it take to be a good actor?
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