Ser Autosuficiente como Actor

There is absolutely nothing wrong with seeking the feedback and opinions of others when it comes tochoices. Seeking theapprovalof others though is where things begin to become destructive.Below are seven easy way to ensure that all the work you are doing in your classes and career development is leading you towards the ultimate goal of emotional, intellectual, and creative independence. I am not suggesting that you ignore outside feedback, only that you never rely on it to thrive.1. Break things down.Break every goal down into its component parts and create a plan for how you might go about achieving it, even if its preparing for a role. Allocating rehearsal time, mastering line-learning, conducting background research, and exploring the physical and emotional life of your character are all parts in need of careful individual consideration. Just as one doesnt become Mr. Universe overnight without a plan, one does not become a full-time working actor by simply desiring it as an outcome.2. Employ the +1 and 50/5 rules.In my article, The 1 Thing Actors Must Know About Taking A Risk, I outline my +1theoryof risk. What is the point attempting to take multiple risks simultaneously when one hasnt yet mastered any one individually? Then spend at least 50 percent of your time focusing on the difficult parts (the risks) even if they comprise only 5 percent of your entire plan. If, by applying the same amount of effort as you do to your strengths, your weaknesses developed equally across the board then they wouldnt be called weaknesses.3. Make failure a daily goal.I encourage actors in my e-book, Choices, to seek out whatcould beand whatmight bein their work instead of whatwill beand whatshould be. In doing so, actors make interesting, uncommon, and unique discoveries by investigating areas in which their gut may habitually tell them not to waste time exploring. The one common trait of all who would be considered successful in their chosen field is that they have failedmoreoften than anyone else. Their success is in having takenmoreshots at the target than anyone else. To take risks one must walk a fine line of almost daring oneself to fail, for to guard against the possibility of failure entirely is no risk at all. 4. Employ intelligent skepticism.To never question your teacher, parent, or authority figures is a predictable path to mediocrity and creative stagnation. Every creative, passionate, and innovative person Ive ever admired in the world has made his or her own decisions based upon intelligent skepticism. The ability to test the voracity of an idea through questions and practical application (as opposed to simply disagreeing in order to prove intellectual dominance) is integral to all independent thinkers. 5. Acknowledge the input of others.Its easy to focus so heavily on your own hard work that it leads to the erroneous belief that nobody else played any part in your ultimate success. Regardless of howself-sufficientyou are, there are always people to thank and acknowledge for the support andadvicetheyve given along the way. Do not mistake thanking others for dependence upon them. Independence is using whats in ones environment to stimulate growth, including teachers and mentors. Dependence is not being able to survive without them.6. Use S.M.A.R.T. goals.This useful mnemonic acronym stands for specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound goals. Popularized by business management specialistPeter Drucker,these goals need little further explanation and can help professionals in any field in which they find themselves choosing to excel. If an actor were not given acting or career directions that fit these criteria he or she would do well to adopt them independently. Ideally, by following this guide in the first place, outside feedback would be welcome, certainly, but by no means necessary.7. Claim responsibility for both successes and failures.At the end of the day independent actors and thinkers take responsibility for their decisions. Whether you followed the instructions of someone else or not, it is you who made the decision to take the job or audition, follow the directions given, and produce the result that the world now sees in front of them.If you desire to become a truly self-dependent creative being in the world, then accept that you have the power to makechoices, but also the responsibility to accept the resulting consequences.

Lo que Debe Saber un Actor sobre tomar Riesgos

Have you ever competently crossed a tightrope without falling off? Are you able to ride a unicycle, or expertly juggle nine balls? What about all three tasks at once? And what if I strung the tightrope across the Grand Canyon, lit the balls on fire, and loosened the wheel?Though rarely as demanding in terms of strength, balance, or outright danger, the mechanics of acting can be just as taxing on your memory, concentration, and reflexes as circus skills, and yet actors attempt to (and are often encouraged to) take on multiple risks simultaneously, and are then left scratching their heads as to why they failed at every single one of them.Regardless of how quickly youmasterphysical skills, it is highly unlikely that you have ever taken two ormoregenuine risks simultaneously and immediately succeeded at bothnot without a great deal of luck. But luck isnt technique, and although random chance occasionally produces pleasing results, only practiced technique is consistently reliable. Enter, my +1theoryof risk.By risk, I dont mean taking several tweaks or adjustments to your performance, like Pick up the cues or Be angrier in that moment. I mean actualrisk. Risk with the potential of hurting, embarrassing, or losing something you hold dear, such as your physical safety, that great acting job, or simply your pride. Remember how risky it felt as a teenager to ask someone out on a date? Imagine doing that with English as your second language, and in front of the high school bully and his gang.Doubling or trebling the risk doesnt increase your chances of success; it actually makes failure and humiliation that muchmorelikely across the board.It is a growing trend for acting tutors to advise their students to eschew learning lines perfectly because when they try to it makes everything else that muchmoredifficult. But would anyone tell a high-wire performer in Cirque du Soleil to pull back on a triple somersault because its too hard?This is the difference between the Good and theGreat. Masterthe risks, and then make it look easy. Dont just make it easy by lowering your standards.Extremely wordy procedural or scientific dialogue and legalese, complicated blocking and prop use, or even detailed character transformation work and unfamiliar emotional turns are all comparable to the difficulty levels of performing circus skills. To some, learning lines is a risk, and to many, standing in front of network heads for a final callback or chemistry test is definitely a risk. Since the combination of risks increases the likelihood of failure at each, stick to one at a time, and then add another one when youve mastered the initial challenge.I once shot a TV commercial in Australia that was to be broken down into several 15-second bits, with my lines comprising only 10 seconds of each to be sandwiched between title cards and voiceovers. The dialogue was tricky and dense, so I rehearsed it like a demon. During the first on-set rehearsal I churned the dialogue out perfectly, and in record time, only to see the director literally click his stopwatch and ask me to shift two of the lines around, truncate the middle section, and cut four seconds off my overall read time.Not three, not five. Four.Adding to the degree of difficulty, the direction was intricate and counter-intuitive to me. I had to squat down on a particular line, pick up a UV light, and wave it over stains on the ground. I was to hit the ground on line A, then I needed to pass the light over the low-angle camera in time with line C, with my head moving in the opposite direction to the light (to suit the DPs penchant for visual opposition in the frame). All the while, delivering rapid-fire procedural dialogue, hitting an imaginary three-dimensional mark for the focus-puller, and splitting my (re-ordered) lines on both sides of the camera in order for the boom-swinger to reposition between them; whilst balancing on the balls of my feet and not falling over. In 10 seconds.BreatheHappy with the technical side after four or five takes, the director asked why the freshness had gone from my performance. Not feeling it was the time to school him in the intricacies of my +1theoryof risk, I kept quiet and focused on the task at hand. With the technical aspects down pat I could now focus on the performance.I requested a couplemoretakes, gave the director different options, finished the shoot in half the scheduled time, skipped the catering, and wenthomeearly. The TVC ended up netting me over $50,000 for less than five hours work, including time spent sitting around.I could never have done this had I not at first mastered the dialogue.For me there werethreerisksin this process:1. Learning tricky, rapid-fire procedural dialogue (and changing it on a whim).2. Mastering specific blocking and prop-handling (to multiple departments satisfaction).3. Dealing with a whole new crew (each member with their own time and budget pressures and egos).Suggesting that technical skills in acting are less demanding because they arent stunts or high-wire work would be to say that playing Rachmaninoffs Piano Concerto No. 3 isnt as demanding because failure at it is less likely to result in death. The fact is, risk is relative, and a child riding a bike for the first time would be as risky as Jimi Hendrix playing The Star-Spangled Banner on aright-handed guitar.There aretwo main reasonswhy I warn against multiple simultaneous risks in rehearsal, auditions, or performance:1. Without practicing one risk to the level of proficiency, its highly likely thatallattempted risks will fail, and2.If multiple risks are employed and the result is a success, how is one to knowwhich riskactually made the difference?Master one risk at a time, and then add onemore(+1). If it fails, try again. If it succeeds, add onemore.If you are playing a character with a different accent to you, a different physicality to you, and tricky technical dialogue, blocking, or prop handling,commit to one risk until you reach proficiency(or at least verycloseto), and then add just one more until you reach proficiency at both. Keep doing this until you are able to maintain several simultaneously.The+1 theory of riskis not to prevent you from dying. Hopefully no actor will need to be in the position where that kind of risk is required. But with multiple simultaneous risks the likelihood of failure by far outweighs the slim chance of success.One risk at a time succeeds.Youll see, with enough dedication and focus, you will be juggling flaming balls on a tightrope over the Grand Canyon in no time, and your only concern will be the wobbly wheelAudicion sin Nervios

So much has been written on the subject of what to do about nerves, as if nerves were somemonsterthat comes out of nowhere and attacks you. In fact, nerves are never random and are simply a reaction to a specific set of circumstances. In that way, the physical and mental/emotional state of being nervous is no different than any other. If you have a way of deconstructing nerves to see what theyre made of, theyre not so ominous. Everything is manageable in its parts.Say youre in the waiting room about 20 minutes away from your audition. You were feeling great in the car, but now your stomach is starting to flutter, your breath is getting short and your palms are clammy. Instead of going into denial and trying to run from the discomfort, I encourage you to lean into the moment and examine exactly whats going on using these three simple steps:1. Review your work.Nerves often spring from doubt. In fact, the paradigm ofanxietyin psychology is one of the simplest: doubt, fear,anxiety. The way a paradigm works is that if you take away the first step, it falls apart. Put another way, if you have nothing to doubt, you have nothing to fear and nothing to be nervous about.If you prepared your audition using a strong, reliable step-by-step technique that brings out the best in you, you have a safe and sane, step-by-step way to take one last look at your decisions while youre waiting. You can then see how strong and connected these decisions are and gain the reassurance you need to go in the room and commit, connect, and score.Youve now eliminated your work as something to be nervous about. Everything checked out, youre breathing easier and feeling a littlemorerelaxed. Good. Now lets continue exploring and remove somemoredoubt.2. See the comparing mind for what it is.Our comparing mind can get activated in a big way in the waiting room, creating all kinds of doubt andanxiety. Again, maybe you were feeling amazing on the way to the audition, but now that you look around that person looks taller and they might want tall, that one looks prettier and they might want really pretty, the one next to you looks totally wrong for this!At this point its important to come back to reality and realize that all of these people are just who they are. The fact that they are taller, prettier, or plainer than you is not a part of their identityits who they are in comparison to you, and that is nothingmorethan a fabrication of your comparing mind. So, relax and let them be whotheyare. Your job is to accept your entire self for whoyouare in that moment because thats who youre bringing into the room.As you see the comparing mind as offering nothingmorethan old stories and meaningless opinions, youll relax even further and breathe even deeper. Doubt is dissolving even further as nerves havelessandlessto stick to.Now, one last piece to look at....3. Accept the human nerves.The fight/flight/freeze instincts hard wired into our reptilian brain are there for our survival. The audition process, which requires being in a new environment with a group of strangers, can feel dangerous enough for the flight mechanism to activate. One way to feel safer is to prepare to the highest bar, which means preparing in a way that is so strong that you feel as if your work belongs in that room and you belong in that project. If you feel as if you belong, your brain doesnt feel the threatening sense of separation: theres no me and them, theres just us, which calms the flight mechanism considerably.But, even if you have done everything right, there will still remain a bit ofanxietyat being in a strange, new environment. Thats OK. Accept those nerves as part of being human and they will stay small enough to be manageableand even energizing.To examine the components of nervousness is to be in control of it. You see it for what it is: just a passing reaction to your immediate circumstance, a state of being that can be teased apart and examined. Not a dragon you need to slay, just another part of you to look at and get to know.