Static! Gotta love it! Nothing better than listening to that radio station that won't quite tune in. Or having your digital cable pixellate into meaningless squares right at the climax of your favorite movie,yeah, good times!
We as actors frequently give static to our audiences. What do I mean by that? When you drop out of character, that's static. When your facial expression doesn't match up with what you are trying to say, that's static! When you enter the stage to play the one scene you are in and you stand like a bump on a log until it's time to deliver your three lines and then become overly animated, that's static!
Static is any and everything that actor's do to interfere with what they should be communicating to their audience. It's when the stress of your life shows through your acting. It's when you are obviously thinking about what you will do after the show instead of being in the moment, and just like you love to listen to static on the radio audiences just love it when you check out in the middle of a performance! Not!
Getting and keeping an audiences attention is a skill that is essential in any acting career. Getting their attention is not hard at all, just give them something interesting to look at or listen to, make them laugh or cry or scratch their heads. Keeping their attention is just a matter of getting their attention continually. But the hardest thing to do in live performance is to win an audience back once they check out!
Once you lose an audience's attention due to static it is very hard to win them back! So, you ask, what does this have to do with warmups? Everything! As human beings we are constantly communicating. Your brain processes enough information to fill eight sets of encyclopedias every sixty seconds, in your sleep! That's right! So as an actor your job is to purposely communicate only what you want them to see, hear or understand! How?
Well, figuring out how to communicate the right thing is easy! The trick comes in where eliminating all of the other things (the argument you just had backstage, the birthday coming up next week, your math test on Tuesday) from showing up in the way you move, talk, sing, and dance onstage! Audiences see this stuff! That's where a good warmup routine comes in.
By taking your mind away from the outside world for a time and focusing in on the world of your character you eliminate your excess communication. This can't happen as you make your first entrance, it must take place before that, and it has to be on purpose. Just like an athlete getting ready for the big game, you need to learn a good warmup routine!
Check out this article for a series of great warmup exercises I have been using with my students for years. Use what works for you! Remember, tune in! Eliminate that static!
1 comment:
good article
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