3 Ways To Handle The Post-Audition Waiting Game

So you just left the casting office after auditioning for a recurring role on that gritty new cable series everyone’s raving about. There are easily 10,000 actors who would give up an organ to land a part on that show. You feel you’re perfect for the role and have prepared for the role responsibly.

As you’re walking back to the car muttering your lines under your breath, thoughts—both crazy and lucid—are racing through your mind. “I think I nailed it, but what did they think?” or “Oh shit, that was a mess. I hope they didn’t notice.”

A very common and constant question actors have after a film or TV audition is: “When should I expect to hear back from casting?” The answer is: There’s no way to know. The soonest you may hear is that day and the longest may be up to seven months. Aside from staying positive, owning a functional cell phone, and checking the status of the project on IMDb, here are some other fun and proactive things you can do.

1. Get feedback. Many actors don’t know it’s possible to get audition feedback from the casting director through your reps. Getting an audition critique from casting directors can be a valuable validation or confirmation that something wasn’t working. This type of communication is also part of a healthy routine of building and maintaining relationships with industry professionals. Keep in mind that this isn’t always possible. For example, your reps might have a fragile relationship with a given casting office so they will straight-up tell you that they don’t want to risk either hounding the office or seeming to lack confidence in their clients. Thus, they will opt out of asking for feedback. However, it’s important to ask your agent or manager if they’ll seek out some answers.

2. Prepare a piece for your reps. One of my superbly talented clients regularly performs new pieces for his management team throughout the year. His goal is to show them other types and genres he may also be right for. This is exactly the kind of agent/manager relationship you ultimately want—one in which you regularly communicate.

Make an appointment with your agent or manager to show them another side of you—something they haven’t pitched you for that you feel could be in your wheelhouse. For example, I have one client who constantly goes out for edgy, gritty women. But this woman can actually flawlessly conjure the demeanor of the spoiled debutante with great ease. Instead of making a full-on appointment to perform a piece for her reps as this character, this client just dropped by her manager’s office dressed like a modern, Kennedy princess. After she had dropped off a box of exquisite cookies with her manager—always a good idea—she asked if she could perform a one-minute monologue. Her management was pleased and impressed with the impromptu performance, and now they had evidence that she could dress and act within a new type.

3. Meet up with your believers. As tough as this town can be, everyone has friends who believe in them. Sometimes the best way to smooth out the rough feelings and rawness post-audition is to meet up for drinks or dinner with your friends who are also your fans. Here’s the trick: Don’t talk about the audition; don’t even talk about show business. Make the one stipulation of this hangout that no one can discuss anything industry-related. At first, you’ll find it’s a bit tricky, and you’ll instantly want to discuss the usual—acting class, auditions, the movie you saw last weekend. But when you force yourself out of these habits and you push each other to connect over the other aspects of your lives—yoga, her idiot boyfriend, your telepathic iguana, the new exhibit at MOCA (or MoMA), the new coffee joint with the hot cashiers— you’ll find yourself reacquainting with your lives outside of show business. This will be a refreshing moment, as at the end of the day, you’re a human being first and an actor second. And you’ll likely find that it helps to neutralize the sting of the post-audition waiting game.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

Why You Need To Break Out Of Your Acting Technique

I describe my work with actors as bridging the gap between prior training—be it conservatory or otherwise—and what it’s actually like to work on-set or to prepare for a major audition. The goal: to create inspired work that doesn’t “reek” of acting technique. To do this, you must ultimately be the creator of your own method or technique—one that derives solely from the strength of your own character and personality. This is essentially an “anti-technique” or a “self-made” technique, rather than an attempt to force your unique skill-sets and talents into the rigid dimensions of a famous technique some other artist developed. This is a one-size-fits-you method, and it’s designed to help you respond to your individual needs so that you can make the performance your own completely.

Being the creator of your own technique begins and ends with giving yourself permission to bring your personality to every audition and every role. The success of this depends on accepting the fact that you are far more interesting than the cumbersome weight of character and technique. This isn’t necessarily a pleasant experience. Dealing with yourself—your flaws, quirks, weaknesses, oddities—can be uncomfortable, and it can seem ideal instead to avoid oneself by diving into a “character” or the false security of an intricate acting technique. However, the danger of not bringing your fully flawed self to the role is your work can be stripped of its humanity and can become a mere series of successful gestures, as F. Scott Fitzgerald would say.

Giving the performance your own flavor is essential, and it’s your responsibility to deliver it without the scent of someone else’s dated methodology. What may have (theoretically) worked for that acting “guru” in the 1970s may not be effective for you in today’s game. Due to the predominance of new media, motion capture, taped auditions, etc., there has been a landslide shift in the industry. The demands and skills required of actors are constantly changing and in need of innovation and updating.

Multi-camera sitcoms and motion capture are examples of styles that require acting to be lifted up to a higher level of fun—method based approaches train actors to see this as potentially “overacting." Spending an afternoon on the set of a single or multi-camera sitcom should be a prerequisite to a degree at any acting conservatory or school.

Think of acting technique or conservatory training as a scaffolding or blueprint that is necessary for learning how to create characters and to start the journey of living truthfully in imaginary circumstances. Rather than clinging to that scaffolding for dear life during a scene, audition, or performance, the final step is kicking it away when you’re finished with it. The process unveils the difference between acting which smells of technique and the kind that does not. Masterful acting never seems safe or planned. Instead it oozes an organic quality and a sense of danger. This is in part because the scaffolding is gone.

Another issue that tends to be problematic with traditional conservatory training is that it never addresses the need to make the work your own—to leave your “stamp” or “mark”—after you've constructed the technique scaffolding. You will often leave your stamp or mark without even trying; it will occur by just being yourself. However, the confining nature of traditional acting technique often won’t allow it to come through as fully or as powerfully as possible. That’s why you have to be grateful to the training for the foundation it provides, but also have the good sense to jump into the ether when the time is right.

Putting your stamp on your work begins by asking of every line, “What am I saying in my own words?” or “If this were me in this (imaginary) situation, what would I say to my partner?” These are the types of questions that can help you to be emotionally primed and ready for the fictional circumstances you’re about to confront. This type of emotional preparation is essential and should not be underestimated. The difference between “good” and “great” acting is the great actor is always “lit up” emotionally and specifically at the start of every scene. Ultimately, you’re the only one who knows the triggers that light you up and what’s going to work for you in your own method.

As I mentioned in a previous article, there is no one-size-fits-all path to an acting career. Your path to your dreams will be your own. Don’t let anyone sell you a system for success that doesn’t come solely from you. You need to be the one swinging the machete and carving the path through the jungle. This starts by honing your very own anti-technique that begins and ends with you.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

10 Tips For A Winning Taped Audition

The last three years have seen a landslide shift in the casting process. Actors are being asked, with greater frequency, to “self-tape” their auditions and e-mail them directly to the casting office or production team. Every other private coaching session I run is now an audition on tape, where I help my clients capture their absolute best performances.

What’s so thrilling about this trend is the ability to still compete for roles when you’re out of town. You can be enjoying your life anywhere in the world, outside the bubble of the “industry,” and not miss an audition opportunity. Taped auditions minimize the worry of pissing off your agent/manager because the moment you arrived in Cabo, you get an audition for a coveted Q-tip-initiated-eardrum-rupturing scene on “Girls.”

However, it is true that occasionally offices will still insist to see you in person so you must be prepared to jump on a plane to compete for that role!

Here are some tips to make your taped auditions soar!

1. Technical Expectations. During a recent Q&A with my students, the renowned television director David Semel (“Homeland,” “American Horror Story,” “House M.D.”) described what he expects technically from a taped audition (aside from great acting). He said, “It’s important you’re well-lit and that I can hear you.” We’re dealing with industry professionals with extremely demanding jobs. If they click on your footage, and the sound is too low or they can’t see you well, they might adjust the settings on their computer or they might just as likely click to the footage of the next actor.

2. What You Need. Here’s the basic equipment needed to properly self-tape and audition: A quality camera (a no-frills digital camera with a good built-in microphone is all you need), basic tripod, even lighting (natural works great!), a solid color background that is not distracting or shiny, and a reader. Before you begin your performance, do a test to check the lighting and sound. Say a few lines for the camera, record, and then review the footage. Does the lighting look blown out? If so, adjust. How does your shirt look against the background? Inviting and appropriate to the character or unflattering and amateurish? Can you be easily heard on a laptop computer with the volume at a normal level?

This step may take some experimentation to get the lighting, the colors of your wardrobe, and the sound just right. That’s OK. This first step is crucial in creating a solid foundation for you to record your audition and to ensure that industry professionals don’t click away in the first three seconds.

3. Acting. Check out one of my recent articles on this one!

4. Keep that script in your hands. Those lines must be as down-cold as the alphabet when walking into any prepared audition scenario. Though fully memorized, you must keep that script in one hand for two reasons. The first (only applies to in-person auditions), so a casting director never needs to worry if they have to feed you a line. Second, and most important, is that your performance looks like a “work in progress.” Having the script in your hand lends a subtle cue to the director and producers that you’re still flexible, adaptable and more importantly directable with your performance and that you’re not married to a particular take or reading of the character.

5. Don’t slate! Unless specifically instructed to, a rookie mistake is to always slate for a self-taped audition. It’s an understandable error as it’s pretty much standard before every live audition in a casting office. When the frequency of video auditions started taking off last year, my celebrity clients always refused to attach a slate to their tapes. When I asked why, the reason was always the same, “I don’t want this to look like every other audition they receive.”

6. Follow all instructions. Most self-tape requests come with very specific, seemingly anal, instructions from the casting office—some with very strong warnings that if even one small step is overlooked the tape will be automatically rejected. These instructions pertain to: lighting, framing, sound, file names, and your reader. It’s extremely important you read and follow all instructions for taping and sending. Triple check them. You don’t want your audition to be eliminated for a silly reason like not following some office’s fantasy of precision and competency.  

7. Your reader. Your reader should be as close to you as possible while being off-camera, positioned just right or just left of the camera. It’s perfectly fine if your reader is the opposite gender to the character he/she is playing. It has never made a difference in an actor booking the role off the tape. 

8. Framing. You should be in the center of the frame with the bottom of the frame at the center of your chest and the top of the frame slightly above the top of your head.

9. Sitting or Standing. Ideally, the camera should remain in one position throughout the scene otherwise you risk distracting your viewer (producer or casting director) from the main event: you. Don’t let the person behind the camera try any artsy or fancy camera movements. Chances are, it will just look off-putting and clumsy.

Listen carefully to the start of the piece and make a choice whether you’re sitting or standing throughout the scene.

10. Shoot every scene individually. Unless instructed, shoot every scene separately—they can all be edited together afterwards. Getting to put your best performance on tape is an awesome opportunity! You no longer have to deal with those awkward transitions between scenes that you can’t escape in a live audition. It can be tough in an in-person audition to go from the scene where you’re begging for your life from the lunatic gunman to rattling off highly technical data as an engineer for robots in space.

Taped auditions allow you to shut off the camera and take as much time as you need to jump into a new scene, allowing you to truly capture and record examples of your best work ever.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

3 Ways To Make Your Acting Dangerous

Even non-actors can spot acting that has an element of danger to it—even if they can’t articulate that it is in fact the sense of danger that keeps their eyes glued to the screen or stage. One of the major dynamics at work which makes “Breaking Bad” such a phenomenal show (aside from brilliant writing and great casting) is the element of danger that all the characters commit to fully. The actors on the show either commit to instilling their acting with such danger or to being visibly affected by it. These commitments can’t help but foster the very palpable sense that something really terrible may happen at any moment—which makes it truly glorious to watch.

It’s your job to figure out where the danger in the scene is and to consistently ask yourself where and how you can add a more genuine element of danger.

1. Surprise Your Partner. Surprising your partner is one of the simplest ways to infuse your acting with some danger: doing this is akin to knocking your partner on his or her ass. Everyone needs to be knocked on his/her ass once in a while; when it comes to professional acting, it’s practically a necessity. Many people in the industry know the story of Robert DeNiro’s notorious improvise in “Cape Fear” when he surprised Julliette Lewis by sticking his thumb in her mouth before he kissed her. “‘Before we did that scene,’ Lewis recalled, ‘(Scorsese) said nonchalantly, 'Bob is going to do something.' But he wouldn't say what. I'm sure they didn't know how I was going to react, if I would stay in the scene or lose it’". Pushing your partner to the brink—to the teetering balance of either staying in the scene or losing it, is truly a gift bestowed upon them as you’re doing your job and your best at injecting the scene with verifiable danger.

2. Because You Wanted To. This tip can be particularly helpful when playing very disturbing characters or a character who has done something you truly believe (accurately or not) that you would never do. Forget the amateur psychology involved in looking at why your character did whatever he/she did. Just decide that whatever it was your character did, it was because you wanted to—and say it over and over. This can help in removing a great deal of the extraneous crap from your mind regarding your character, and it can help simplify your view of the character as someone who takes a certain pleasure in what us civilized folks regard as pure evil.

3. Fool Your Partner. If you’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting someone who’s different from us mere mortals—such as a remorseless criminal, or a real true psychic-clairvoyant, people who have special abilities or unique pathologies that separate them from the ordinary folk—you might notice that they often look at people differently. When I say look, the actual, physical use of their eyes is different. There’s a certain lingering quality that can be loaded with a great deal: the criminal calculates, assesses, and determines weak spots. The psychic clairvoyant can be weighed down by a sense of you and the bigger picture of your past and present not accessible to others. Give your partner a look when the cameras aren’t rolling and when the curtain isn’t up that is just meant to slightly alter his/her reality or perception of you. For example, if you’re playing the sadistic boss that humiliates your partner at the end of Act II, find that sadism in yourself, and communicate to your partner through your eyes, when you’re not acting. In this sense you are suggesting, only through look, that you just might in fact be the sadist, the psychopath, the adulterer, the child molester, or the liar that you’re playing.

Consider how the element of danger in a scene would be different if you gave your partner a look off camera while he’s relaxed and drinking a lemonade that said, “Tonight I’m going to fuck your wife.” This look will just last a fraction of a second. Your scene partner may not even consciously register that this has happened. But somewhere in his subconscious, the seed has been planted.

When you let go of the fear of looking like an asshole or a freak, you drag your partner with you onto the thin ice of dangerous acting. On this thin ice, there’s no room for ‘acting technique’ as you shouldn’t feel like you’re ever doing anything; the acting will feel alarmingly easy. The hardest part is giving yourself permission to really go for it, trusting in the knowledge that you’re interesting enough. This trust and the constant commitment to danger is what separates the “good actor” from the Oscar winner.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

5 Ways To Stay Sharp When The Industry Slows Down

The last two years have been the busiest for actors in recent memory. That being said, it’s not busy for everyone all the time. There are some known stretches of industry downtime and some unexpected pockets where everything grinds to a sudden halt and leaves us wondering if we’ll ever work again. How we deal with those periods of inactivity is directly related to our ability to stay ahead of the game when the industry picks up.

1. Make a list of your “sweet spot” projects.Now is the time to make a short-list of those “Sweet-Spot“ (hyperlink to: http://www.backstage.com/advice-for-actors/backstage-experts/how-find-your-acting-sweet-spot/) projects—the one’s you feel you would be perfect for! This is the first question I ask my career coaching clients during a session. Imagine your agent, manager, or best friend handed you a pen and paper and asked you to come up with a list of current television shows and films (directors and production teams) you feel you’d be perfect for. This process requires a lot of fun and imagination. It asks you to really get clear about your long-term and short-term acting and career goals. One of my extremely talented clients confessed she always dreamed about being an elf or fairy in a Peter Jackson film. That’s the kind of fun you can have with this exercise.

Creating this list gives you a reason to sit down with your agent or manager to show them what they didn’t know you’d also be perfect for—not that you should ever need a reason to meet with your reps! Developing this type of list can help you and your agents/managers get on the same page, and it can better convey to them where your head is at and vice-versa. It can also assist you in refocusing on important goals and developing fresh ones, while brainstorming innovative strategies for achieving them. I’m not endorsing that you do something crazy that will get you arrested, like throwing a hot dog at Tiger Woods, but now is a perfect time for dreaming up some daring, out-of-the-box strategies for gaining the attention of industry members.

2. Take that well-deserved vacation. Taking a mini-break from all things industry-related can be the recharge needed to keep you at your best for the start of a new casting season. Leaving Los Angeles can help you get a dose of much needed perspective—the kind that can only come from spending time with people who don’t have headshots and have no problem telling you their age. Spending time with people outside of the industry can help ground you and also give you time to miss the gleeful freak show that is Los Angeles. And in the end, you’ll find that you’ll start to feel wistful for L.A. and for the people who understand what you mean when you say, “they need me for ADR” or “I had to read cold” rather than greeting such statements with a quizzical look.

A common fear among actors is, “What if my agent calls with a big audition when I leave town?” That was a valid concern a few years ago, but due to the prevalence of taped auditions, that excuse is no longer valid. Every other private coaching session with my clients is an audition taping session. All you need is a quality video camera (found on every new smartphone), decent lighting and an Internet connection.

3. Stay in class. Staying in a quality (hyperlink to: http://www.backstage.com/advice-for-actors/backstage-experts/6-red-flags-when-auditing-acting-classes/) acting class during slow spells will keep you sharp for your next major audition which, oftentimes, comes without warning. Now is the perfect time to have a love affair with your craft all over again. It offers a great time to audit like crazy (heck, have several love affairs), or to really throw yourself into scene-work or audition work like a madman. If money is tight right now, throw together your own scene study class with like-minded actors. The slow summer is the time to sharpen the knife of your craft until it becomes a razorblade. So that when things do get going again, you can charge out of the gate swinging.

4. Educate yourself. Oh, so you never saw “Apocalypse Now”? What about “Annie Hall”? Never caught the first season of “Lost”? The slow season offers an ideal opportunity to educate yourself. As a serious member of this industry, you have to have seen the timeless films which shaped filmmaking and the values of this business, along with important shows that continue to influence writers, producers, and networks at large. Just as doctors and other clinicians absolutely have to keep up-to-date on the latest research for their fields, actors too must have a solid foundation by seeing the work and artistry which have influenced and continues to influence this business. If you want to work or continue to work in this industry, you must take the time to be knowledgeable about it.

5. Grow some humility. We can all agree that there’s nothing more repulsive to be around than a self-absorbed actor. People also don’t want to work with a self-absorbed actor. Quiet times in the industry are your opportunity for you to stop thinking about yourself and to start thinking about others. These experiences—like visiting nursing homes, reading to kids, giving out toiletry-packs to the homeless—can help humanize you more, and give you a broader viewpoint from which to see the world. These experiences are all crucial to building your craft. Furthermore, it can help you understand that while this industry is cutthroat, you did choose this life, and there are a lot of people who have it a lot worse than you do.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

Why You Need To Create Your Own Path To Success As An Actor

Throughout my years as an acting coach, I’ve seen actors attempting to launch A-list careers and achieve major success by trying to fit through the same small door as everyone else—attending cattle call workshops, sending postcards, practicing gimmicky acting techniques taught by Madame Ooh La La, taking non-craft-related personal empowerment classes, etc.

On the one hand, I don’t blame them. Many careers actually have been forged on the formula of: receive audition, perform well at audition, book job, repeat process, get noticed in time. If this approach is working for you, congratulations. Move onwards and upwards, dear friend.

However, if one aspect of this particular formula isn’t helping you, it might be indicative of the fact that you’re embracing too much of the herd mentality. The herd mentality is a term that I use in this business to refer to “widespread beliefs” that permeate throughout the minds and mouths of actors that can actually be crippling and prevent the actor from moving forward. For instance, ideas like, “you need an agent to book work” or “casting directors don’t want to meet actors without credits” or “leading men/ladies have to be traditionally handsome” or “strong characters don’t show vulnerability.” Obviously, the bulk of the ideologies connected to the herd mentality are based on fear. Take the first example. If “you need an agent to book work” is absolutely true, then the actor can stay in a safe zone of inactivity. It’s not up to you to shake the tree, it’s the agent’s job. Therefore, you don’t have to face your fears of what will happen when you pick up the phone or start making some scratches on the old drawing board.

If you accept the idea that “leading men/ladies have to be traditionally handsome,” and your charmingly crooked nose and confetti freckles won’t suffice, then you get to just stay in the safe zone of what you’re used to: character roles. Now I have nothing against character roles –they’re often the more interesting parts, but that’s another article. However, accepting this limiting belief means that you don’t have to jump into the red mist of marketing yourself as a leading man/lady. You don’t have to get leading actor headshots. You don’t have to show up at auditions where all the traditionally attractive actors are and try and compete against them.

There is no one-size-fits-all path to an acting career. Your path to your dreams will be your own—don’t let anyone sell you a system for success that doesn’t come solely from you. You need to be the one swinging the machete and carving the path through the jungle.

The good news is that because there is no one-size-fits-all solution to this conundrum, I can’t instruct you on what to do exactly. It will take some soul searching. What I can tell you to do is first, look at where the failure is, and second, look at where your resistance is.

Try to examine the things in your life that you’re not willing to do right now—given the fact that you haven’t done them yet—and perhaps, examine if the inactivity might be the actual obstacles in your way. These obstacles might just be about pitching yourself to casting directors, writing and performing a one-man show, starting your own web series, or teaching acting to kids. Often when we’re in a situation of failure, we need to look at our own resistance to see what is preventing a solution from coming through.

Consider success in the industry as the ability to get around a brick wall. All the years you’ve spent auditioning and going through the traditional method for success are akin to taking a shovel and attempting to a dig a tunnel around the wall. But it’s not working—and it’s back-breaking work. 

In reality, if you want to get past this brick wall, it might just take gathering the courage to either grab a rope and climb right over it or it may take the courage to pick up a sledgehammer and knock right through it.

In this example, climbing or destroying the wall symbolizes the absolute necessity of forging your own path, and shaking off the herd mentality of “land audition, book job, get noticed.” Success is never handed to anyone and no career was ever forged using someone else’s model.

This article was originally posted on Backstage