I don't usually (and I'm generally content to be an observer to the weirdnesses of the world) but I have a soapbox. I have a rant. And--perhaps worst of all--it involves ART.
So I'm talking to my roommate who happens to be in the kitchen watching that between-movies crap on HBO and playing with the remaining spaghetti on his plate. And he asks me random bullshit about my life as we're roommates but not actually friends and don't see each other very often. And it turns to the fact that I'm never home, which is true, and he asks me about my classes. He asks me how long my "energy field" class will last. And I say, "My movement class? Until probably May." And then I volunteer that my acting class is quite hard and kicking my ass.
And he starts into some hypothesis about how many of the actors worth watching really got anything from taking classes. And how it's really a matter of talent and if you don't have it oozing out of you you might as well go home. Hypothetically, of course. Talking about Brando, not me. And he starts talking about how acting for film is so difficult. (For the record, I'm not saying it's not. The last time I did any film acting it was a joke: a short about a killer garden gnome when I was a freshman in college.) But it's so difficult because you have closeups. And I counter with the challenge of being real and in the moment onstage the whole time you're onstage, whether it's realism or not.
The actor is a creative agent onstage but only a medium in film, just because the actor is the last person in the chain of artistic effort onstage and a middle component on the film. The final product of film is the edit, but the final products of a stage play are acting and a live experience. This is not to say that one is better than the other, just that they are totally different art forms in themselves and in their relationship to acting. And they should not be discussed as though they are interchangeable.
He interprets this as my attempt to say theatre is superior to film. I never said that, but I will admit I care about theatre in ways I do not anticipate ever caring about film. He goes off on some blah blah blah about how people are always trying to rank one art above the others. And I wanted to say, "Like you were?"
I have better things to to with my time than be a movie actress. It's just not one of my goals.
And when I assert that I am interested in theatre itself, people always think I want to be in a Broadway musical. Not so, all you well-wishers.
It has nothing to do with seeing my name in lights. I just want to see my art living in front of me. Give me a small house and collaborators I trust and let me see what I can make.
And talent versus craft--both are desparately necessary. Talent doesn't make artists. Artists have to make themselves out of their own talent.
So I'm talking to my roommate who happens to be in the kitchen watching that between-movies crap on HBO and playing with the remaining spaghetti on his plate. And he asks me random bullshit about my life as we're roommates but not actually friends and don't see each other very often. And it turns to the fact that I'm never home, which is true, and he asks me about my classes. He asks me how long my "energy field" class will last. And I say, "My movement class? Until probably May." And then I volunteer that my acting class is quite hard and kicking my ass.
And he starts into some hypothesis about how many of the actors worth watching really got anything from taking classes. And how it's really a matter of talent and if you don't have it oozing out of you you might as well go home. Hypothetically, of course. Talking about Brando, not me. And he starts talking about how acting for film is so difficult. (For the record, I'm not saying it's not. The last time I did any film acting it was a joke: a short about a killer garden gnome when I was a freshman in college.) But it's so difficult because you have closeups. And I counter with the challenge of being real and in the moment onstage the whole time you're onstage, whether it's realism or not.
The actor is a creative agent onstage but only a medium in film, just because the actor is the last person in the chain of artistic effort onstage and a middle component on the film. The final product of film is the edit, but the final products of a stage play are acting and a live experience. This is not to say that one is better than the other, just that they are totally different art forms in themselves and in their relationship to acting. And they should not be discussed as though they are interchangeable.
He interprets this as my attempt to say theatre is superior to film. I never said that, but I will admit I care about theatre in ways I do not anticipate ever caring about film. He goes off on some blah blah blah about how people are always trying to rank one art above the others. And I wanted to say, "Like you were?"
I have better things to to with my time than be a movie actress. It's just not one of my goals.
And when I assert that I am interested in theatre itself, people always think I want to be in a Broadway musical. Not so, all you well-wishers.
It has nothing to do with seeing my name in lights. I just want to see my art living in front of me. Give me a small house and collaborators I trust and let me see what I can make.
And talent versus craft--both are desparately necessary. Talent doesn't make artists. Artists have to make themselves out of their own talent.
VIEW 3 of 3 COMMENTS
"Acting" is both a skill and a talent.
The true greats are those that are both blessed "by the hand of God" (as Professor Zerbe said it) with sheer talent, and who work hard to develop skill and technique.
Most actors are one or the other. Someone blessed with talent and who knows it, but does nothing to develop their skills beyond what they naturally posses vs. someone who works hard to develop skills, but lacks that spark of the divine.
Play group. Next month. Seriously.