How Should Actors Slate?

The audition starts the moment you enter the room and not, as many would think, when you start acting. Some of the industry’s biggest production teams and casting directors will actually interview you as a person before they audition you the actor. The slate is often the first time the producer, writer, or director will encounter you, as they are not typically in the room during pre-reads with casting. The slate marks the start of your audition.

I advise my clients to make a genuine connection with the production team by bringing their empowered and aware selves to the slate—their best selves in the moment. Any attempt to impress or force yourself into an emotional state can, and often will, put an abrupt end to your audition before you start acting. Slating with confidence, presence, and awareness—your version of it—can win you the role before the scene starts.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

What Should Actors Wear to Auditions?

Actors should present a “clean canvas” when auditioning. Trying to impress or glamming it up reeks of desperation and trying too hard, and should be avoided as it can shut you out of contention the moment you walk into the room. Never forget the first rule of the audition: Don’t try to guess what they are looking for, assume you are who they’re looking for, and bring yourself to the role with brave and fun choices.

Reading all audition instructions is paramount. If it doesn’t say to dress like a cop, don’t dress like a cop—be a cop! My recommendation is to dress for confidence, like you’re going out on an exciting date with the intention of trying not to over impress. Bottom line: Your audition wardrobe should be an attempt to magnify your inner beauty and charisma,    not distract from it.                                                                                                                                                                                  

This article was originally posted on Backstage

4 Tips for Making the Winning Audition Choice

Most ‘experts’ who talk about actors “making choices” haven’t a clue what a “choice” actually is, nor how to properly compose and execute one. This is true both in the audition room and on set. Casting directors and film/TV directors will often tell actors to “make a stronger choice” not really knowing what exactly they mean by that. Essentially they’re saying, “show me something I like better.” I often see this in instructions for actors for submitting a taped audition. It’s one of those hot button terms—“making a choice”—but ask that ‘expert’ to demonstrate what the hell they’re talking about, and watch most them start to squirm and filibuster their way through an answer.

Rule #1 Is Always the Same

Don’t guess what THEY are looking for! Assume YOU are who they’re looking for, and bring yourself to the role with a brave, fun, and impactful choice. Which means, it is your right and responsibility to always do “your version” of the character—how you see it. It means relentlessly looking for ways to find what being this character means to you. This does not mean that you’re playing yourself! It means that your winning performance—once all work has been absorbed into your bloodstream—should feel as easy and loose as if you were playing yourself.

Winning Choices Are Not Found Within the Text

Proper textual analysis must be done with the same specificity and expertise that a member of the LA Philharmonic would prepare Mahler’s Third. The text must ultimately serve as a springboard for your deeply imaginative and improvisational process of connecting what it all means to you.

Margot Robbie on how she won the role in “The Wolf of Wall Street”:

"So I walk up really close to his face and then I'm like, 'Maybe I should kiss him. When else am I ever going to get a chance to kiss Leo DiCaprio, ever?' But another part of my brain clicks and I just go, 'Whack!' I hit him in the face. And then I scream, 'F--- you!' And that's not in the script at all. The room just went dead silent and I froze." (cinemablend)

Doing this kind of stuff is scary. It’s risky. Margot Robbie instantly thought they were going to call the cops on her or sue her for hitting one of the most bankable stars on the planet. She was wrong: they offered her the part, and the rest is history. And hell, isn’t this why you became an actor? To scare people, scare yourself and to take risks? Did you really leave your hometown and everything you knew to go into rooms, play it safe, and show the casting and producing team a slightly different version of the same boring character they’ve seen all day? How has that been working for you?

Stop Obeying Character Descriptions

Most actors make the rookie mistake—especially in auditions—of thinking they must obey and act all character descriptions and stage directions. Be assured that this will be what every other actor does as it represents the obvious choice—its goal is to please the casting director. Show the producing team that you understand the character and the entire project well enough to invent a gesture or movement that is not in the script but which demonstrates that you get it—and you’re confident enough to create something more nuanced right before their very eyes.

Remember the casting directors are not the ones who call the final shots. Some of my readership are often surprised upon learning that the final casting decisions are made by the directors, producers or writers, and not the casting directors.    

Winning Choices Must Be Visually Obvious Choices

If a director, writer, producer, or casting director cannot check a box that says “Visually obvious choice made,” then you haven’t made a choice that works—or at least not one that will win the role or get you that nomination. Actors forget that their choices need to read on camera, even if the sound is off. Their performance should be able to be watched with the mute button on, and still read as driven and emotionally loaded. Unlike on set work, auditions are when you must achieve this immediately to be successful—oftentimes within the first 10 seconds.

Using a strong hook to launch you into your scene can trigger that visually obvious choice—the kind of choice Margot Robbie made.  

With the highest actor booking rate in the industry, we help actors make the confident and brave choices to stand out and win the role.

This article was originally posted on Backstage


 

A Sign of an Acting Scam

One of the biggest acting scams in the industry are those unsavory bandits who try to sell actors on the losing proposition of finding their “niche” or “type.” It’s like attempting to steal your personality and sell you back a second-rate version of yourself. The pursuit of niche/type is the occupation of the Sunday driver actor, as it revolves around trying to find what pre-prescribed stale box(es) you could neatly package yourself into—all for the purpose of pleasing! It’s herd mentality crap, and it’s sold to the stampede of actors who believe there’s one pre-prescribed path to industry success.

The higher art form is to do what's taught at Harvard Business School and distill your "singularity," or "value proposition"—it's your wow factor and the DNA of your branding! It's the unique combination of attitudes and behaviors that make you an original and set you apart from the herd. It's showing the industry what they never saw before and desperately must have because no one else can do it. I help actors discover their unique singularity, and help them use it to launch their careers, on their own terms.

This article was originally posted on Backstage

Why You Must Always Be at Your Olympic Best

The brutally competitive L.A. and NYC film and TV markets represent the Olympic level of the game for actors. It’s a very small industry, in that actors who audition for major film and TV roles end up meeting most of the top casting directors in any given year. If you’re not at your Olympic best—in shape and on your A game like an elite athlete—then you run the very real risk of closing more doors than you open in this industry. This is the equivalent of waking up one morning and deciding you love the tuba more than life itself, and after taking lessons for six months, decide it’s time to get on stage at Walt Disney Concert Hall to audition for the conductor of the L.A. Philharmonic.

In my work with actors, I help them reach their Olympic best every session, so they’re ready to go into the audition room, mark their territory, and either book the role or the room!

The Biggest Fear Every Working Actor Must Overcome

To be a successful actor you must overcome the fear of boundless rejection: not being good enough, beautiful enough, talented enough, etc. At the actor’s emotional core is the profound human need to be seen and loved. Part of paying your dues in this business—both Oscar winner and beginner—is the reality of constant rejection throughout your career. The look on Leonardo DiCaprio’s face at the 86th Academy Awards after his fifth Oscar nomination for “The Wolf of Wall Street” resulted in a loss shows you that no one is immune to rejection. Not everyone is built to endure this, nor do they have the stamina to last for the long game. I believe this fear of rejection—both in the audition and on set—can be defeated when you’re on the support of a brave and impactful choice. Not being afraid to look like an asshole or a freak and adopting the attitude, “Anyone who doesn’t like me can kiss my ass!” can also fortify you with enough confidence to burn through the fog of fear.

This article was originally posted on Backstage