The Science of On-Camera Acting

by Andréa Morris

  Study on positive self-talk

  A recent study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology found that subjects who performed positive self-talk in the third person could “influence their ability to regulate their thoughts, feelings, and behavior under social stress, even for vulnerable individuals.”17 The study concludes that self-talk in the third person is more effective than self-talk in first person. That is, “I am a good actor,” isn’t nearly as effective as the same statement expressed in the third person: “(Your name) is a good actor.”

  Earbuds and waiting rooms

  Music is a wonderful tool for actors in audition waiting rooms. Many actors prefer music without lyrics and download orchestral soundtracks befitting the score for the type of role and the project, and listen via earbuds in the waiting room before their audition. Audition waiting rooms are often anxiety inducing, even if actors claim they don’t get nervous at auditions. Aside from your own possible twinge of performance anxiety, and hearing the casting director and other actors through the wall, many other actors waiting are quietly nervous, reading their lines and nervous, or chatting nervously. Feelings are contagious. It’s a lot like talking to someone who is sniffling, coughing, their nose is running, their face is sunken and pale, they keep insisting they’re fine—and you know you’re going to catch it. The best defense against catching nerves is to tune everyone out with your earbuds with music that can set the mood for your character and story.

  Enjoy the process except when you don’t

  It’s important for the mental health and creativity of any artist to allow and accept what you are feeling, even and especially if it’s considered wrong. The main difference between being a professional artist versus making art as a hobby is that, as a professional, you can’t quit when your art gets painful and uncomfortable. When art is your profession you have to deliver to survive. Getting outside your comfort zone, pushing yourself beyond where you’d like to quit, is how you learn and grow. Not every moment is a cakewalk.

  If making art is making you chronically miserable, that’s another matter. Enjoying the process is important but is often oversimplified with shoulds in the form of aphorisms that imply any degree of unhappiness means you’re not doing it right. Parents talk about how much they love their children and the meaning being a parent brings to their lives. That doesn’t mean that every day of parenting is enjoyable. Enjoy the process and allow for times when you don’t.

  Chapter Endnotes

  1 Durant, Will, The Story of Philosophy: the Lives and Opinions of the Greater Philosophers (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1926).

  2 Duhigg, Charles, The Power of Habit, April 17, 2012, charlesduhigg.com/flowchart-for-changing-habits/, accessed March 9, 2014.

  3 Duhigg, Charles, The Power of Habit: Why We Do what We Do in Life and Business (New York: Random House, 2012).

  4 Bois, Jon, “Tony Gwynn, Baseball Scientist, has Died,” SB Nation, June 16, 2014, www.sbnation.com/mlb/2014/6/16/5814622/tony-gwynn-died-hall-of-fame-padres, accessed June 16, 2014.

  5 Ibid.

  6 Lerner, Harriet, “Fear vs. Anxiety, the Dance of Connection,” Psychology Today, www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-dance-connection/200910/fear-vs-anxiety, accessed July 7, 2014.

  7 Randerson, James, “You Really Can Smell Fear, Say Scientists,” the Guardian, www.theguardian.com/science/2008/dec/04/smell-fear-research-pheromone, accessed July 7, 2014.

  8 Conway, Martin A., “Memory and the Self,” Journal of Memory and Language, October 2005, www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0749596X05000987, accessed July 7, 2014.

  9 Marano, Hara Estroff, “Our Brain’s Negative Bias,” Psychology Today, www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200306/our-brains-negative-bias, accessed July 7, 2014.

  10 Alter, Adam, “The Powerlessness of Positive Thinking,” the New Yorker, www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/currency/2014/02/the-powerlessness-of-positive-thinking.html, accessed July 7, 2014.

  11 Sevincer, A.T., G. Wagner, J. Kalvelage, and G. Oettingen, “Positive Thinking about the Future in Newspaper Reports and Presidential Addresses Predicts Economic Downturn,” Journal of the Association for Psychological Science, November 26, 2013, pss.sagepub.com/content/early/2014/02/04/0956797613518350.abstract, accessed March 9, 2014.

  12 Baum, Kenneth, The Mental Edge: Maximize your Sports Potential with the Mind-Body Connection (New York: Berkley Publishing Group, 1999).

  13 Wegner, Daniel M., and David J. Schneider, “Paradoxical Effects of Thought Suppression,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, psycnet.apa.org/index.cfm?fa=buy.optionToBuy&id=1987-33493-001, accessed July 7, 2014.

  14 Moss, Simon, “Ironic Rebound Effect,” Psychlopedia, Oct 10, 2008, www.psych-it.com.au/Psychlopedia/article.asp?id=133, accessed June 20, 2014.

  15 McGonigal, Kelly, The Willpower Instinct: how Self-Control Works, Why it Matters, and What You can do to Get More of It (New York: Avery, 2012).

  16 Jeremy, Dean, “Why Thought Suppression is Counter-Productive,” PsychBlog, May 22, 2009, www.spring.org.uk/2009/05/why-thought-suppression-is-counter-productive.php, accessed July 7, 2014.

  17 Kross, Bremner, et al. “Self-Talk as a Regulatory Mechanism: How You Do it Matters,” American Psychological Association, February 2014, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24467424, accessed March 9, 2014.

  Belief and Performance

  If the idea of building a strong self-image does not appeal to you, I suggest looking into certain philosophies that can help steel you against the pressures inherent in this industry and a life full of strife in general. Taoism, Buddhism, and Stoicism are some prominent ancient philosophies that offer modes of being in the world that subdue the volume of the ego, self-image, and nattering inner critic. In fact, a comprehensive overview of peak performance would be remiss without addressing certain benefits associated with faith.1 I do not want to presume or discount the existence of a deity in bringing up this topic. The neurobiology of religious experience is not about the existence of God, but rather about the effect faith has on us. I think it’s worth scientific and personal exploration to determine whether a strong feeling of majesty may be a key to tapping into something powerful just outside your self-awareness center. Feelings of awe, faith, and inspiration, and experiences associated with a higher plane of reality may allow us direct access to resources buried within the mysterious back channels of our minds.

  A shortage of these emotional experiences may leave us at risk of overidentifying with an analytic, conceptual, thinking identity, borne of and trapped in a remarkable yet limited region of the brain. Neuroscientist Dr. Andrew Newberg, a pioneer in the study of the neurobiology of spiritual and religious experience, recently shared with the Telegraph insights on brain scans of the limbic system, an area of the brain that regulates emotion. This area showed an increase in activity when people were engaged in meditation and prayer. But there was also a decrease in the parietal lobe, the area of the brain that orients you in space and time. Newberg states, “When this happens, you lose your sense of self.”2

  * * *

  “The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom the emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand wrapped in awe, is as good as dead. His eyes are closed.”

  Albert Einstein3

  * * *

  Ritual

  Unlike routines, which are purely functional and often carried out on autopilot, rituals are associated with something meaningful and emotionally galvanizing. Ritual connects you to something outside the mundane. In an article in Scientific American, authors Francesca Gino and Michael I. Norton write, “Recent research suggests that rituals may be more rational than they appear. Why? Because even simple rituals can be extremely effective…What’s more, rituals appear to benefit even people who claim not to believe that rituals work.”4 Actors have historically been ridiculed for simple-minded rituals and superstitions. This is sad, because actors have
instinctively tapped into a largely unacknowledged and potentially limitless brilliance, though not the same kind of brainpower deemed of worth by modern Western society.

  Chapter Endnotes

  1 Syed, Matthew, Bounce: Mozart, Federer, Picasso, Beckham, and the Science of Success (New York: Harper, 2010).

  2 Smith, Julia Llewellyn, “What God Does to Your Brain,” Telegraph Media Group, June 20, 2014, www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/10914137/What-God-does-to-your-brain.html, accessed June 24, 2014.

  3 Einstein, Albert, Ideas and Opinions, based on Mein Weltbild, edited by Carl Seelig (New York: Bonzana Books, 1954).

  4 Gino, Francesca, and Norton, Michael I., “Why Rituals Work,” Scientific American, May 14, 2013, www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=why-rituals-work, accessed March 9, 2014.

  There are Only Three Possible Mistakes

  * * *

  “With every mistake we must surely be learning.”

  George Harrison1

  * * *

  Mistakes are necessary. Embrace them, laugh at them, and be grateful for them. They are your number one beacons of progress.

  1. It’s only a mistake if you don’t acknowledge your mistake

  Confusing our words happens as a natural part of human conversation. In fact, slipups in auditions and performances can shake you out of autopilot and inject fresh impulse and spontaneity into the scene. This even works for comedy if you’re rooted in a strong comedic character reacting spontaneously to what comes up in the moment. Periodically a so-called mistake will help you win a role. But these are happy accidents, not real mistakes. Real mistakes are not acknowledging a mistake. Don’t bet that nobody noticed, or that everyone probably understands what you really meant, or that the lines don’t matter. It makes it look like you’re reading lines without trying to convey meaning—something that never happens in real life. We are constantly checking ourselves and those with whom we are speaking to make sure we conveyed our meaning effectively. I am not advising you break character, abashedly stopping the scene, and asking to start over. Remain in character and acknowledge your mistake as your character would. It doesn’t take more than a beat or two to say what you meant.

  Of course, every once in a while it’s simply necessary to stop the verbal diarrhea and start over. Breaking character by laughing at yourself relieves the asymmetry of fear that creeps into your face when you realize everything’s going south fast and you can’t figure out how to save it. Authentic laughter, not nervous laughter, is key here. One LI actress I know never worries about being perfect in auditions and regularly has everyone laughing along with her when she screws up. Her ease and joy is infectious. She’s got a great attitude and works all the time. Laughing it off defuses any tension in your body and in the room. It also suggests to others that you are easygoing and fun to work with.

  2. It’s only a mistake if you don’t learn from your mistakes

  If you leave an audition feeling like you’ve truly messed up, set aside some quality time to spend with your mistake. When the pressure is off, identify the exact nature of the blunder. Was it nerves? Sloppy speech? A lack of commitment to character? Overlook no details. Extract what insights you can from it. Perform a visualization of a future situation where you have used the lessons from the mistake to achieve a desirable outcome. Once you’ve learned all you can from it and have corrected your course, you must discard the mistake. Think of a thoroughly culled mistake as a slice of orange that you’ve nursed all the juice from, and what’s left is rind and grit. At this stage, it is no longer a mistake. It’s the excrement of progress waiting to be discarded. Old, empty mistakes are mind waste. There are two common and valid reasons for recalling or reliving a past mistake. First, take a moment to determine if there are any useful insights trying to make themselves known to you. Sometimes we get so scared to face our mistakes we don’t make the most of them. If there’s any useful remnant, acknowledge it, and practice making the corresponding adjustment on-camera.

  When past mistakes have outlived their usefulness yet keep surfacing, you may be experiencing the first stages of the phenomenon of choking. It reflects your working memory on overdrive, panicking, making it almost impossible to glean insights from your mistakes and move past them effectively. Start working with the methods outlined in this book to give your working memory a rest.

  3. It’s only a mistake if you don’t make any

  Mistakes are the most valuable learning currency you have. If you are making a bunch of them consider it a time of great opportunity. If you find yourself in a cycle where you can’t seem to break out of doing terrible work, know how frequently this happens to actors on the cusp of a creative breakthrough. One of the things that frustrated me about acting classes was how little tolerance is given to those wading in creative muddy waters. I witnessed repeatedly how teachers would distance themselves from a dedicated actor doing really bad work for periods extending into months. I understand that a student who is continually producing weak work can threaten the teacher who may feel the student’s bad work reflects their teaching. But this usually leads to a dedicated student feeling as though they either failed, or the particular course of study failed them—when it is quite possibly neither of these.

  Your brain is working things out in ways that aren’t making themselves obvious to you. Keep disciplined, keep experimenting, don’t let yourself get too frustrated, and don’t be afraid of producing stunted work for a while. It’s a necessary stage when making creative progress.

  ***

  * * *

  “Sometimes a smooth process heralds the approach of atrophy or death.”

  Neil Young2

  * * *

  Chapter Endnotes

  1 Lennon, John, G. Harrison, and P. McCartney, “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” The White Album, November 22, 1968, Apple Records.

  2 Young, Neil, Waging Heavy Peace: a Hippie Dream (New York: Blue Rider Press, 2012).

  Dialogue

  To memorize or not to memorize

  When actors have memorized their lines, it’s called being off book. When actors haven’t memorized, it’s called being cold. Among the handful of contentious debates concerning acting, a most notable one is whether or not an actor should be off book and memorized in auditions. Casting directors, directors, and teachers fall on different sides of this issue. Some insist it’s detrimental to an actor’s performance to try to be off book in auditions, while others go so far as to insist that the actor’s job is to memorize.

  The answer is whatever works. The yardstick for whatever works is whatever yields your strongest on-camera performance.

  When working with actors preparing for auditions, or roles in upcoming projects, or filming auditions to submit to casting, I started to see a pattern. The first few cold reads were interesting and fairly strong even if the actor was tripping over some lines here and there (without denying the mistake—see last chapter).

  Being cold means you aren’t anticipating or planning anything. Everything you are doing is fresh and interesting, even if it’s not clean. When actors came back a day or two later memorized to get a clean take, the work was often considerably worse than the work they were doing when they were cold.

  What all too frequently happens when you work at memorizing your lines and try to retrieve these lines in an audition is that you may look like you are delivering lines devoid of all meaning. At worst, you may deliver your dialogue emphasizing the wrong word, with a strange inflection, or screwing up the tenses, and speaking in ways you would never in real life. This is so common Michael Cera satirizes it in his web series Clark and Michael.1 The scene begins at 0:40 of episode 10. You can see it in the reference section at www.TheScienceOfOnCameraActing.com.

  Although this can happen to actors at any level, for more experienced actors the effect often isn’t as obvious, which can be a trap for working actors who are really good at memorizing. The lines may be delivered perfectly and the read might be really good, but it�
�s just not great. It’s missing something. What’s missing are the subtle impulses that come to you when you’re not trying to reach for dialogue, when you are in character and the dialogue is effortlessly coming to you, and all you’re doing is reacting in the moment.

  When editing the work of actors who have tried to commit their lines to memory in the short period of time before an audition, you can see what’s happening frame by frame. You might see in one frame the eye suddenly widen and you can see all the white around the iris. In that one single frame, a split second before the actor hits on the line, the actor leaks fear. But it’s so subtle it’s often only exposed by a micro expression. Most people don’t detect the detail. They just offer their overall impression that the performance is good but not great.

  I was working with an actress who picks up her lines very quickly, but she has this tell that gives her away. For a fraction of a second her eyes—not her eyelids but her actual eyes—flick slightly upward when she’s trying to retrieve a line. She’s not aware of it while it’s happening, and it may happen a few times throughout a scene. I can only catch the subtle action while editing, because it’s only in one frame. Even in that one frame, it’s very slight. I wasn’t convinced of what it was until we watched it together and she confirmed that she was trying to retrieve a line.