Focus on what you enjoy. This is especially true for actors, who are constantly being told things like; "yes, but you've got to do years of garbage work in order to get the chance to do the stuff you enjoy". Why exactly? Why must we continually...
Read MoreGuinness plays downtrodden salesman, George Bird, who is given only a few weeks to live after being diagnosed with a rare condition called Lampington's Disease. He decides to enjoy what remaining time he has left, so he quits his job, withdraws all his money from...
Read MoreThe better we understand our work, the more fun we can have with it. The number of expressive ideas available to us increases, and ultimately we become more excited about presenting our work to the world. That’s why basic script analysis is so important, it...
Read MoreThe obsession with "doing emotions" in modern acting is little short of a disaster. It paints the character (and therefore the actor) as a victim, stripping him of dignity. Further, when an actor tries to squeeze emotion out of themselves, they turn inward rather than...
Read MoreGetting acting work, getting any acting work, is a tricky task, as we all know. The numbers just don't stack-up, there are far too many actors for the volume of work available. There are the gilded few of course, who are in demand and make...
Read MoreThis week I was invited to the wonderfully intimate Jermyn Street Theatre, to see David Pinner's The Potsdam Quartet. I have written my response below. In 1945, the "Big Four" of Stalin, Truman, Churchill and Atlee met at Potsdam where they decided how the world was...
Read MoreI stumbled, some years ago, upon Simon Callow's Being An Actor, an autobiography of his first nine years as a professional actor. It revolutionised how I understood my own experience as an actor, leading to a comprehensive re-think about my approach to building a body...
Read MoreThe neophyte actor wants validation, whether that comes via an agent, a casting director, a director, a filmmaker, other actors, it doesn't matter so long as it comes from whoever they want to please at the time. This, I believe, is the normal state of...
Read MoreIt helps to have some first principles to refer to when under pressure, and this is especially true for actors who spend much of their time buffeted by various winds. They help us to say no when we've been mis-sold, they help us to say...
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Noirish Project Coming Soon! Meanwhile, check-out a teaser...
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