Advice for the Actor

Some observations I have found helpful and am endeavoring to incorporate into my own art:

Believe in what you are doing!  If you do something with absolute commitment, you will be undeniably compelling and your charisma will be infectious.  Be fearless!  Seek the truth in all you do, risk everything, restrain only what is immoral.  Create art that is sprung from necessity, not from contrivance.  Open upwards and outwards, do not contain.  Share, do not be self-indulgent.  Find a community that nurtures you and challenges you.  Do not take no for answer, and do not stop at yes, but continue towards “and.”  Love the art you do, love the artist you are, and love the artists you work with and the audience for whom you perform.  Be bold, but don’t be distasteful.  Pornography is shocking, but nudity can be meaningful.  Baseless obscenity can disturb an audience, but the purposefully vulgar can move them.

Always listen, speak when it is necessary, and remember that you are a part of a whole, not the whole part.  Art begins in life and carries onto the stage, so remember to keep that art in your life long after the final bow.  Always train.  Never, ever stop training.  The day you stop growing is the day your art dies.  If you are bored, search for the compelling.  If you are boring, believe more strongly in what you are doing.  But please, please: be fearless.  Carry your fearlessness wherever you go, whether you are acting on a stage, reading in your home, walking through town, or eating in a restaurant – be open to everything, but afraid of nothing, confident in who you are and what you can do, but always ready to change and grow.  If you do this, the profundity of your art will carry over to every area of your life, and individuals will watch you, whether you are performing Hamlet’s soliloquy or tying your shoelaces.

~ by AlwaysActingUp on October 8, 2009.