How To Find Your Acting Sweet Spot

Your sweet spot is the specific behavior you propel into a character that’s singular to you. Your ability to recognize it and then radiate it to your audience is your launching pad for tangible artistic success. In no way is this to be confused with those annoying shop talk words like “type” or “niche”—it’s behavior so completely unique and precise to you that you can’t help but excel at it. For example, if your agent dismissively labels you as “girl next door” your sweet spot might be: girl next-door-who’s-really-smart-and-really-troubled. Your sweet spot helps you zero in on a deeper level of specificity on what you bring to a role and character.

In previous articles I described the actor’s "tip”—the one-of-a-kind fingerprint [or mark] of personality you leave on your performance. Unlike a “tip,” which is often an unavoidable part of an actor’s personality, a sweet spot is something you can actively cultivate—much like a persona. It’s an exclusive combination of attitudes and behaviors that are distinct to you and that you connect with in a manner that is simply matchless. I described Zooey Deschanel’s rareness as an “…almost impossible balance of sexuality and oddity...She’s an oddball—and she hides none of it in her acting.” It’s her awareness of this rarity and ability to magnify and radiate it when acting, which makes her singular.

The naysayers who grumble, "Oh, this will just narrow your choices and possibilities as an actor" are dead wrong. Identifying, marketing, and targeting your sweet spot roles can give you a firm foothold in an industry thirsty for something we haven’t seen yet—something new! It leads to those breakthrough roles that will ultimately create a platform to prove you can play other character types and genres.

A client of mine who recently launched her career by booking a very popular recurring role on “New Girl” honed her Sweet Spot for years, ultimately arriving at: fragility combined with morose deadpan humor. When she discussed her audition with me, it was clear that she let her sweet spot shine, saying: “It felt easy and fun like it was right in my ‘wheelhouse’…it didn’t feel like I was doing anything.”

Discovering your Sweet Spot starts with recognizing those behaviors and attitudes you emit brighter and sharper than anyone else. It takes some digging to get at. If you take the example of Zooey, she’s essentially saying, “I’m sexy. No, I’m not sexy, I’m weird,” over and over again. This comes from two very real places inside of her that believe exactly that: “Yes, I’m sexy—no wait, no I’m not.”

Zeroing in on your sweet spot is really hard to do because people don’t have the objectivity to see the behaviors, neuroses, and attitudes that make them rare creatures. As human beings we can be so dense to our own qualities—and it’s not our fault. Often all we lack is an outside perspective.

Do some market research! Talk to your friends and family and ask, “So, what’s different about me?” Make a list and look for patterns and see what you gravitate to and see what themes keep coming up.

An Oscar-winning client once confessed to me after wrapping a huge feature film without a new project lined up, “I know this sounds crazy...but I’m terrified I won’t work again.” Your sweet spot helps you work again and again because it creates continuity to your career and a guide for picking good projects.

And just because an actor is famous and working, does not mean that he knows his sweet spot. An actress like Hillary Swank has a sweet spot, but is clearly not aware of it. Her sweet spot definitely involves taking on masculine energies/challenges, and it would behoove her to select parts that include one or both of these aspects to some great or small extent at all times. Thus, it’s easy to see why she shines in something like “Million Dollar Baby,” but not in “P.S. I Love You.”

On the other hand, Philip Seymour Hoffman knows his Sweet Spot in that nearly all of the characters he’s played from the “The Talented Mr. Ripley” to “The Master” have some aspect of sexual deviance and addiction present in them to some extent.

Cultivating your Sweet Spot is especially important and necessary in Los Angeles where leading woman/man supermodel looks and generic personalities are a dime a dozen. It’s more fun and dangerous to be the curiosity in a group of cookie cutter actors, and it will allow you to create a more memorable performance.

You may at that moment feel like a carbon copy of a veritable actor stew. But relax, it’s just an illusion. Your distinct personality will always set you apart!

This article was originally posted on Backstage

6 Steps To Giving A Memorable Performance

These elements are always present in every piece of “great” acting.

1. Have Fun. If you are not having fun, you can be 100 percent sure it’s not working. Christoph Waltz’s recent Oscar-winning performance in Quentin Tarantino’s “Django Unchained” is a perfect example of this. You can see the fun poring out of his eyes every moment onscreen—it reminds us why we chose this profession.

I recently coached a tremendously talented client on a period piece where she had to play a slave on a plantation. In this particular scene, the character was tortured, raped, beaten and left for dead. The actor heroically made it to the end of the scene with the battle scars and raw emotion dripping from her face and body—it was a fantastic performance. I waited some seconds before asking her, “So…was it fun?” Her response, “Oh my god…yes…I’m embarrassed to say it was.”

Many method-based or “technique” acting classes sap all the joy and fun out of the process. It’s a tragedy to see actors flattened and deflated when this happens. Just as it’s your job to act truthfully, it’s also your job to figure out how to have more fun in the work. I often tell my students, “Don’t be afraid to look like an asshole or be a freak!” If a technique isn’t working for you—the human actor—look to the animal world, nature, art, or fantasy and find something that corresponds best to the character you’re trying to play. And when you pinpoint what that it is, don’t be afraid to crawl around on the floor hissing like a tiger or jumping from tabletop to tabletop like a lemur to prime the pump of your creativity. It can often help, and it’s definitely fun. 

2. Effect Change. This means breaking through the Plexiglas barrier between you and your scene partner to impact them while also allowing yourself to be impacted by them. There’s a great temptation to be too timid while acting. Irresponsible training has paralyzed actors with the irrational fear of being “too big.” Life is sometimes big—even huge at times!

Working to effect change in your character and in your partner can also give you an advantage in booking the role because you’re making the writing look as good as it possibly can. Screenwriters know all characters must have an arc and have to effect change in one another. They’re not always confident that what they’ve written is accomplishing that. As an actor, you can empower the writing, and when you do, it’s more interesting to watch, thus making you look like a more attractive hire. 

3. Bring Yourself to the Role. This is not be confused with playing yourself. Bringing yourself to the role is using your actor’s instrument (personality, voice, physicality, etc.) to express the character. It’s acknowledging that YOU are the instrument through which the character is expressed. The character must be expressed as the role dictates BUT the personality and humanity of the actor is the heartbeat of the role.

Zooey Deschanel’s character Jess in “New Girl” is a pure expression of Zooey’s own sense of nerdy fun and offbeat personality. What’s completely revolutionary about Zooey is that she strikes the almost impossible balance of sexuality and oddity without all the baggage of looking like another supermodel. She’s an oddball—and she hides none of it in her acting. She’s doesn’t choose between being funny or sexy, she blends them both into Jess, appealing to men and women, while giving herself verifiable staying-power in a fickle business. 

4. Be Committed. Commitment is the ability of the actor to take the audience by the hand and yank them down the rabbit hole. Just as a roller coaster commits to a 600-foot drop no matter what, you also have to commit to the actions of your character just as irrevocably. And the difference is palpable, as it’s the difference between an actor who is acting, and the actor who is living truthfully under imagined circumstances. Commitment, among many other elements, meant that Marlon Brando never had to raise his voice in "The Godfather."

5. Find the Danger. There’s nothing like the exhilaration of watching work that feels like it’s teetering on the edge of danger. It takes an audience’s breath away. You can never “try” to make the acting dangerous—it comes as a by-product of all the above elements. Danger doesn’t always have to be fear of violence or bodily harm; there’s just as much danger present in watching an actor playing a character who is about to go up to the person they have a crush on and drunkenly profess their love for him/her.

6. Put Yourself at Ease. “Great” acting should feel easy and effortless—like there was no “work” involved. That’s a hard pill to swallow for those needing and expecting every moment be like birthing a calf.

Here’s a huge secret: The best pieces of acting should feel as comfortable and easy as if you were simply playing yourself—even if you’re playing an axe-wielding maniac. And that’s a great gift, as you never again have to worry about how your performance was—you know in your gut that it was connected and focused.

There are only two rules in acting. 1. You can’t actually harm another person. 2. You can’t actually have sex with another person.

Anything else is fair game! That should give you a sense of tremendous freedom as an actor. If there are only two rules—and those two are pretty easy to follow—then the world is yours and the colors and shapes you’d like to paint on the canvas of your character are truly up to you.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

Compete For Every Role You're Right For

A good friend once said to me, “What is for you will not go by you.” I deeply believe this to be true, but also realize the opportunities you need to develop your career won’t just fall into your lap—you must actively, aggressively, and strategically seek them out! For actors, this means you must build relationships with casting offices in a smart and sustainable way.

A question I often ask my students and clients is, “Are you competing for every role you’re right for?” The answer is often, “No.”

2013 is proving the busiest year for actors I can remember in regards to work and auditions. Of my 70+ clients booking major film and television work in the last year one third of those actors did it on their own, without the help of an agent or manager.

How can that be?! These actors rejected the mythology that they needed representation to get themselves work.

Why do certain actors compete for every role they’re right for with 40+ major auditions per year while other actors, in the same category, only go out for 0-6 top tier auditions? The 40+ audition-per-year actor is being actively pitched for roles they’re right for, via phone, by their agent or manager directly to casting.

When an actor is truly right for a role, a well-thought-out, well-timed “appropriate pitch” can make all the difference in that actor getting the opportunity to compete for the role.

The vast majority of actors are not being pitched by their representation, they’re being “submitted”—online through Breakdown Services—often times with 600-1200 other actors competing for the same role. If you’re serious about a career in film and television, these Las Vegas slot machine odds are unacceptable. You need to find a way to load the dice in your favor or change the game. This starts by rejecting the "herd mentality" and forging your own path to success.

A very common tale of woe is, “I finally got signed by such and such agent/manager…it’s been 6 months…they’re not getting me out for anything.”

Less than one percent of agents and managers directly pitch their clients to casting. The reason? They don’t have the clout or relationships with major casting directors to feel confident in picking up the phone to pitch their clients for the roles their right for. Other factors come into play, such as uncertainty as to how “right” their client is for a role.

Success in this industry depends on how visible you are. And getting in the room often depends on relationships with casting directors, producers, directors, and anyone else who can give you a shot at a role. Either your reps have those relationships or you must build and maintain them.  

So here are your options:

1. Create your own material! All of my clients who have achieved “celebrity” status ignited their careers by creating their own material. Some examples include: Producing your own play, doing stand-up comedy, singing/songwriting, creating a web series, making YouTube videos, etc. All of these actors achieved acting success by creating a strong platform for themselves in another arena.

2. Send out a newsletter. Create a database of all your industry contacts (directors, producers, actors, casting directors, etc.) and send out a newsletter every few months featuring your recent bookings, personal highlights, and other industry-related accomplishments. This is a unique way to build and maintain your important relationships. 

3. Pitch yourself. If an actor is perfect for a role, a casting director wants to see him/her. There’s a “right way” and a “wrong way” to directly pitch yourself for a role, you’re right for. This is often one of the scariest options for actors, as many actors feel like they don’t have a “right” to use the phone in this manner.

It’s a very small industry. If you (or your reps for that matter) pitch for a role that you are simply not right for, that is the equivalent of wasting the office’s time. There’s a strong chance the office won’t bring you back in, if that is the case.

Make darn sure you’re actually right for that role before pitching yourself.

Your confidence and ability to be “pleasantly persistent” in standing up for yourself is directly related to your success as an actor. In this industry, waiting around for anything to magically fall into your lap is a losing proposition.

Sometimes in being proactive and essentially sticking your neck out for yourself you might burn your hand. But if your career is worth it to you, you have to be willing to do this.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

6 Red Flags When Auditing Acting Classes

I encourage all actors to audit classes when shopping for a new teacher. It’s a lot like dating. When looking for a new acting teacher, you’re looking for a new partner (just not a romantic one). Few people in the dating scene strike gold right away—part of the reason for this, they’ll tell you, is because of all the freaks and egomaniacs out there. The same is true for acting teachers; there are just as many freaks and egomaniacs who make acting class their own personal springboard for feeling important or for not doing the hard work a teacher needs to do.

If you were sitting across from a first date who did any of the following things—described in chilling detail his/her childhood of sexual abuse, said “there’s plenty of room in my apartment for you to move in,” or asked you not to order the soup, simply because they don’t want to watch you eat it—you would run so far and so fast for your life (I hope).

Why? Because they’re red flags. And as experienced daters, you’ve learned to spot them quickly. It should be the same when you’re auditing acting classes.

Below are some common red flags that far too many actors miss during the auditing process.

Red Flag #1: The teacher never delivers any critique to students.

This is a common symptom of the “warm and fuzzy womb” class, a class which acts like a giant womb and feeds off students need to feel pleasant and snug when class is over. Acting class is now like acting camp, and the teacher is more like a camp counselor – s/he is more concerned about being liked and making people feel good than about real work occurring. Other times, the teacher doesn’t have the skills to address and fix what wasn’t working in the scene.

Why to avoid: It’s a gooey love fest with no work being accomplished, and thus, no room for growth to occur.

Red Flag #2: The teacher condescends to the actors and/or their work.

This is a common red flag for abuse-based classes, where the teacher isn’t really interested in teaching (not deep down) and is actually just using the actors as a way to feel better about her/himself. This is common when the teacher is a failed actor.

Why to Avoid: Do you want to improve as an actor or do you want to be mocked?

Red Flag #3: The teacher’s “technique” orbits mainly around expecting actors to dredge up past pain and trauma.

This is yet another common trait of abuse-based classes: it no longer becomes about acting, but about who can dredge up the most pain.

Why to Avoid: You’re an artist looking for an acting teacher not a shrink. This one-dimensional technique is going to foster one-dimensional acting.

Red Flag #4: The teacher invites the class to critique another actor's work directly to that actor.

It was drilled into me from my early days at NYU that students should NEVER be allowed to directly critique other members of class after they presented work – that's the teacher’s job. A student can safely comment or make an observation as long as it’s directed at and to the teacher, not another student. Actors don’t directly critique (both positive and negative) other actors on a film set. Why would you do it in acting class? The reason you don’t directly offer critique to a fellow actor is the possibility your comment may shut them down to you when working.

Why to Avoid: If the teacher is allowing this s/he doesn’t understand the damage such critiquing can do or s/he doesn’t care.

Red Flag #5: The teacher doesn’t know everyone’s name.

This is common in over-crowded scene-study classes where the celebrity teacher (Madame 0oh-la-la) likes to pack the actors in to the room’s capacity. The mentality is that Madame Ooh-la-la is so important, she won’t learn your name until you’ve proven yourself and your work worthy of her knowing your name.

Why to Avoid: You’re paying off her mortgage with your monthly class fee. She should know your name.

Red Flag #6: The class is over-crowded.

This is of course related to Red Flag #5, and is so common that far too many actors miss it. An overcrowded class does not mean you’re getting a great teacher that helps push actors to the next levels of their ability. It usually means you’re getting a teacher who is too cheap or clueless to open up other sections of the class so that it’s not so damn crowded all the time.

Why to Avoid: Overcrowded classes means everyone suffers and their ability to work is stunted.

Is it about them or you?!

Does the teacher make it about their Ooh La-La acting method or technique or do they make it about you? Is it your goal in class to please the teacher or for you to feel empowered in the scene and reach your “booked-role potential”?

The Best Of All Worlds: Ultimately, I believe every actor must be the creator of their own technique. A “good” teacher and class must value and reward the strength and uniqueness of an actor’s personality, not some doctrine. The teacher must be able to, in a supportive manner, address the elements that weren’t working in the scene and help the actor(s) find a fix during the working session––before the actor(s) sit back down.

I describe my classes as “Private Coaching in a Class Setting.” Classes are small enough for actors to coach one-on-one with me until they come through something and have a way of doing the piece that’s on the tips of their fingers, ready to bring into an audition or on-set the next day.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

How To Prepare To Be An Awards Presenter

Unless you’ve ever presented, received or been nominated for an Oscar, Grammy, Golden Globe, or Emmy, it's hard to imagine the amount of pressure on these performers.

The pressure might seem odd, as the role has been booked and the excellent performance recorded. It seems like the bulk of the work has been done. All the performer has to do is show up on awards night, act natural, and try not to hit the champagne too hard, right? Wrong.

In addition to coaching actors for their film and television roles, I also coach presenters for all the major award ceremonies, and believe me when I tell you that awards presentations can be truly terrifying—even for the most seasoned actor or musician. As one of the celebrity clients I coached said regarding her Grammy presentation speech, “I’m a bit embarrassed I need help with this, but there are millions of people watching and I need to be myself…Help!”

One of the first reasons for extreme anxiety is the sheer volume of viewers for these award shows. Another reason for nerves has to do with the pervasiveness of the Internet, an often unkind entity. Who can forget Natalie Portman’s snort/laugh during her Golden Globes acceptance speech and the fodder for days and days of fun that gave the online playground? My clients truly believe – and rightly so, I feel – that if they make one false move, they can do irreparable damage to their careers. 

The final reason for nerves orbits around the fact that when presenting at awards, there is no “character” or mask to inhabit. It’s just you, unmasked and live, in front of these hoards of viewers. This can really freak an actor out—particularly the ones that enjoy or seek refuge in playing characters.

It has always been my firm belief that the personality of the actor is nine-tenths of the performance. Due to over training and excess “technique,” actors have been trained to believe they’re not interesting enough as themselves, so they must construct a whole façade to hide behind. This buries an actor’s humanity. I believe the ultimate goal of the performer is to reflect the audience’s humanity back at them.

When a presenter is scared, there’s a tendency to start trashing the script and not speaking the speech as the writers put forth. Or there’s a tendency to stand around woodenly (ahem, James Franco). This only makes the presenter look petty and weak.

When coaching for awards presentations, I help the presenter bring their lit-up and empowered selves to the podium. I call it finding the “hook” of the speech. A “hook” is the performer’s light-up right before they make the speech. Something they can activate on the tips of their fingers before they walk on stage. It could be a specific attitude, a funny, dark or sexy image, a piece of music, etc. Anything will do as long as it doesn’t force them to “feel something.”  It must be activated in seconds. Perhaps the most genuine (and extreme) example of this is when Roberto Benigni, director of "Life is Beautiful," accepted his Oscar in 1999 by dancing across some seatbacks.

Think of past awards ceremonies and the speakers who really shook the room when they presented. What did they do? They affected the greatest change while making their speech. The most memorable speeches that you can recall are probably by the ones where the presenter was able to radiate their true selves outwards in a seemingly effortless manner. I still remember Meryl Streep’s speech from the 2012 Oscars. It was honest, unexpected, self deprecating, and gracious. It completely won me over. She started from a genuine place, of authentic humor: “Oh my god. Oh c’mon. Alright. Thank you so much. Thank you, thank you. When they called my name I’d had this feeling I could hear half of America going ‘oh no… oh c’mon…why… her…again?’ But whatever.” Then she ended in an even sincerer place—highlighting the friendships this business has given her and the joy of making movies with her friends. That kind of authenticity is apparent to every viewer and it allows the performer to give the audience yet another gift—a glimpse at their real self.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

3 Steps To Booking The Roles You Deserve

I coached 68 clients to book roles in feature films and network TV last year.

This success—not a byproduct of luck or forces of nature—was a direct result of all 68 actors honing specific, crucial elements in their audition performances.

These actors knew that reaching their “booked-role potential” was in part related to their ability to use aspects of their real selves—even if those facets of their personalities were bizarre, ugly, perverse, bitchy, alarming or downright creepy.

As Ron Perlman said, “I've always felt there were aspects of me that were monstrous, and you can either hide from it or confront it, embrace it and understand that those are aspects that make you unique and…that's the very thing that makes you who you are. That's your emotional and spiritual fingerprint.”

I like to call what Perlman is describing as one’s "tip." A tip is the unique fingerprint [or mark] of personality you leave on your performance. Here's how to make your mark on a performance and book the roles you deserve.

1. Figure out what your distinct "tip" is. A "tip" revolves around the idea of something extra you give to your performance without even trying—it’s something they’ve never seen before and didn’t know they wanted. That something extra is YOU, and it’s the elusive something about you that makes it possible for you to be memorable among a throng of actors.

One of my clients has an innate gentleness to everything she does—it’s just a part of who she is and how she has always interacted with the world. Thus, even when she’s reading for the part of a sociopath, she doesn’t try to bury that gentleness. Instead she stamps it on her performance to make it even more disturbing. Another client’s "tip" was simply that he exuded the vibe of a young Willem Dafoe—effortlessly. There was something about him that was always just teetering on the edge of creepy, even when he was just eating a sandwich.

You might not like your "tip," just like the way you might not like the shape of your nose, but it’s yours and it’s unavoidable.

Embracing your tip gives you such a profound advantage because it allows you to put your stamp on the character in a way that no one else possibly can. Bryan Cranston memorably describes auditioning for “Breaking Bad” and wanting to make a formidable impression on the creator, Vince Gilligan. “‘I wanted to go mark Vince,’ Cranston said to the Los Angeles Times in 2011. ‘I wanted to creatively lift my leg on him, and the script, and leave my scent so that he saw me and nobody else doing this.’"

2. Don't act your technique of preparation. When the role has been responsibly coached and prepared, the actual “acting” should feel as easy and effortless as if you were simply playing yourself. This can seem terrifying for two reasons. First, you won’t feel like you’re doing anything, and second, you may not feel you’re interesting enough. However, the end result is your work will appear seamless to the producer and director, and they’ll simply see the character as if he or she was a real person who happened to walk into the audition. That’s magical.

3. Stop trying to guess what “they” want. Imagine how ludicrous it would be if the waiter in a restaurant tried to guess what you felt like ordering? Imagine how even more ludicrous that would be if you didn’t even know what you felt like ordering? Because no matter what the waiter picked, he’d be wrong.

More directly stated, Apple co-founder and CEO Steve Jobs said, “A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.”

Your job is now to stop guessing and make a strong choice—and make it one you really like. It should be the fun choice, the choice that lights a fire under your ass and the choice that’s a little scary. Not the choice that “seems right.”

What’s certain is that “they” are not looking for a neat presentation of acting training, nor are they looking for a choice made on guesswork.

Whenever we’ve seen amazing performances, the acting techniques that these stellar actors have studied are nowhere to be found. Instead we just have people. New people who have been invented by these actors—characters we call them. All tremendous actors have gone through the task of bringing themselves to the part and taking their training, balling it up, and chucking it out the window.

This article was originally posted on Backstage