How to Act, Acting Talent, Theory, Method

What is Acting?

Acting is the performing art of psycho-physically enacting a fictional-imaginary character in a fictional-imaginary world
(situation, relationships, scenarios, etc.) in real space and time for a knowing audience.

What is Acting - Key Points of Theory

I believe that the world of acting is in for both a personal and professional catharsis once a few key facts are adequately understood. This site is an ongoing project to help illuminate the art of acting in light of contemporary research, knowledge and experience. Below are a few key points of the theory that will shape acting in the 21st Century.

Acting is a performing art.
Actors utilize a specific skill in the performance of their art known as affective prosody.
The best actors, in the best performances, activate their core skill in a very specific way: indirectly by means of the propositional imagination.
When an actor's skills of expression (affective prosody) are activated indirectly (by means of the propositional imagination) his performance becomes opaque; that is, we as audience cannot "see through" it, even if we would try. Anything less or different, and an actor's performance is transparent. That is, we can see through it, see the actor, see the "acting."
There was no serious study of either of these essential human skills - affective prosody and the propositional imagination - until just 30-40 years ago and to this day the valuable study remains on the outskirts of academia and completely off the radar of mainstream cultural knowledge.
The lack of serious study of both of these core acting / essential human skills has been a major contributing factor to the universal lack of any sound, comprehensive, agreed upon and credible acting theory.
With core skills of affective prosody, activated by the propositional imagination, what actors do is: psycho-physically enact fictional-imaginary characters in fictional-imaginary worlds (situations, relationships, scenarios, etc.) in real space and time for a knowing audience.
Psycho-physical means that there is both a psychological (mental, emotional, thought/feeling) and a physical (body, expressive) aspect to an actor's performance at one and the same time. Not separate. Not at different times. To use other common terms it means that there is both an "internal" and an "external" or an interior and exterior aspect at one and the same time. (This, yes, makes no reference to costumes.) Understanding affective prosody demonstrates how and why this is so.
Dramatic Art is: fictional art psycho-physically enacted in real space and time for a knowing audience.
Both for an audience and for a knowing audience are as important a part of that definition as any other.
All fictional art is in part defined by its relationship to an audience and its relationship to a knowing audience. (It is the presence of a knowing audience - and the creator/performer's consciousness of that knowing audience, and conscious intention to reach it, communicate with it, share with it, "experience" with it - that ultimately separates fictional art from private, personal fantasy and children's pretend play.)
While skills of expression (affective prosody) define the actor, it is the presence of fiction that defines acting.
It is the defining presence of fiction that separates actor's performances from the performances of charismatic speakers, passionate orators, sports announcers, stand-up comedians, impressionists, revival preachers and others that utilize affective prosody and related sub-sets as a core skill or talent.
Acute and developed skills of fiction - or fiction intelligence - is thus just as important for actors as skills of expression.
Dramatic intelligence is an acute sense of affective prosody combined with an acute sense of fiction, or developed skills of the propositional imagination.
The most thorough exploration to date of the principals of the art of fiction is actually found in the work of Konstantin Stanisklasky.
The "magic if" is actually more than just an idea for actors. It is the initial proposition that ignites the human imagination to the creation, development and success of all fiction, in whatever form, from stage to screen to television to novels, and largely defines its criticism and judgement on the part of audiences.
An actor psycho-physically enacts a character in performances by generating a unique perspective that should be called first-person fictional.
There is a "dual consciousness" in the actor during performance that is comprised of first-person fictional and first-person actual. Both perspectives co-exist simultaneously or at one and the same time, with the latter (first-person actual - the actor) generating the former (first-person fictional - the character).
The cognitive mechanisms that make this "dual consciousness" possible are the same cognitive mechanisms that make it impossible for actors ever to mistake the fiction they are creating for the reality they are living - no matter how "into" a role they may ever be, may ever try to be, may ever actually succeed at being.
This isn't what takes the fun and the emotion away. This is what frees it completely.
There is actually a "dual consciousness" in anyone who has ever sat down to enjoy movie, tv show or play or read a decent fiction novel or comic book. In the case of an audience, the "dual consciousness" is generally comprised of the perspectives of third-person actual (e.g. that's a movie screen, those people wont stop talking, this popcorn is very buttery) and third-person fictional (e.g. oh my god, he's going to kill her!).
There is no such thing as a fictional emotion. There are, however, real emotions evoked by fictional-imaginary propositions and circumstances. This is what the actor must pursue.
The ability to create and maintain, in an unbroken manner, the first-person fictional perspective during the performance of a role, whether on stage or screen, is what is commonly called an actor's concentration. It might also have a great deal to do with what is known as an actor's presence.
There are actually two dualities in relation to the performing art of acting; one of which needs to be trashed completely (the duality of internal and external) and the other which needs to be embraced emphatically (the duality of actor and character). Confusion between the two has plagued the art for millenniums and at the end of the day stumped even some of the world's greatest philosophers, scholars, psychologists, sages and saints.
This is why studies like this have some importance.
The quality of being opaque is what makes the perspective of audience a terrible place from which try and figure out what an actor is doing - even for "great minds" and other professionals.
Trashing the one duality completely (internal / external, emotion / performance) and embracing the other duality emphatically (actor / character, reality / fiction) is actually the road to the most inspired performances, and the greatest unleashing of an actor's talent.
Understand this, and nothing can stop you.
Understand this and discover why all those confusing, nonsensical things they taught you about acting were exactly that, confusing and nonsensical. If not completely wrong.
The most comprehensive theory of acting and dramatic art to date was set forth by Konstantin Stanislavsky - and he nailed it. But the knowledge available in his day, necessary to support and clarify his intuitions, was wholly insufficient and simply not up to the task. This, in addition to many other important issues that would cause widespread confusion, forced Stanislavsky to either draw upon sources that provided similar but still inadequate approximations or develop the best terms and ideas he could on his own. Language is, and remains, an issue. Clarity of terms is a priority. This is why I am placing so many key terms and idea in bold.
Acute skills of affective prosody (talent) allow actors to do more than simply express, feel and enact the emotions and thoughts of the fictional-imaginary characters they play. Their talent allows them to create an affective prosodic bond between their performance and an audience that not only keeps audiences captivated but allows them to feel and experience things they would not otherwise in any other situation ( - including a real life version of what is being enacted). The prosodic bond is one of the most critical aesthetic elements offered by the actor's performing art, if not the definitive aesthetic element itself.
"Experiencing" is Stanislavsky's lost term, central to his system for acting and only revealed outside of Russia in the late 1990s by Sharon M. Carnicke. Carnicke defines it as "flow" but we needn't even go that far.
"Experiencing" is not something exclusive and applicable only to actors and how they succeed in their roles. "Experiencing" is the benchmark for the success of all fiction in whatever form, from stage to screen to television to novels, or its highest possible aesthetic. (e.g. "Experience the magic." "Live the adventure."The repeated invitation from a hundred thousand movie trailers.)
"Experiencing" is when we begin to react psychologically and emotionally to a fictional-imaginary proposition as if it were real despite the fact that we remain consciously aware that it isn't. e.g. "experiencing" is when we cry when the hero dies, get angry at the villain's wrong-doings, root for the underdog to succeed, long for the lovers to unite . . . "Experiencing" is the benchmark for success in fiction, what keeps us interested, what keeps us coming back for more.
"Experiencing" is what inspired you to act in the first place.
There is no unique or particularly special relationship between acting and psychotherapy. The notion arose out of the vacuum that existed in place of any sound, comprehensive and credible acting and dramatic arts theory.
There is no unique or particularly special relationship between acting and spirituality or spiritual realization. The notion arose out of the vacuum that existed in place of any sound, comprehensive and credible acting and dramatic arts theory.
The notion of theatre's ritual and shamanic roots is absurd, and arose only within the vacuum left in place of any sound and credible acting and dramatic arts theory.
Stanislavsky's "subconscious" is not actually the psychotherapy-related subconscious region of the mind that is accessible by consciousness (e.g. Freud), nor a nebulous idea we need to explore Russian culture of the early 20th century or today to try and understand. Rather, it is the cognitive un-conscious illuminated 50 years later by the field of cognitive science. Once this critical fact is properly understood, the man's pioneering and ahead-of-its-time work takes on entirely new meaning. This is one of the key aspects of the personal and professional catharsis of which I speak.
Any blows to the subconscious aside, Lee Strasberg made two genuinely novel contributions to the art of acting following its path, and in this sense, when all is said and done, really did continue forward upon the work of Stanislavsky.

About This Project

In early 2006 a conversation with my brother about how my knowledge of theatre could lend insight into his own endeavor to write a fiction novel inspired me to the idea of a writing project that would outline a theory of acting based on Ken Wilber's Integral (AQAL) meta-theory. This idea rapidly proved much more difficult than I ever could have imagined. Not because the task was far too complex or the research too vast. Rather, the main problem was that the more research I did the more I came to realize that there was no such thing in existence as a sound, credible acting theory upon which one could even build. Everywhere I looked, even with regard to some of the most rudimentary ideas, there was either a wholesale vacuum of research and validation or deep and ever deeper and deeper confusion. This is a problem.
Over a decade into the 21st century we are still as intellectually in the dark about actors, acting and the dramatic/comedic art as a whole as Plato, Aristotle and the Greek lawmaker Solon were 2,300 years ago . . . . despite the fact that we spend and invest billions into this art every year and consume it regularly, each and every day. And for myself as an artist - and teacher - I was nothing short of amazed at two things. First, how little I was able to actually explain anything I knew about acting in simple, coherent terms and ideas when put to honest question, despite my mastery of the art itself and ability to teach it to others. Second, however, and much more deeply, I grew more and more flabbergasted over the fact that every idea I thought I knew - many commonly espoused, many shared by teachers and many arrived at through my own development - absolutely fell apart when put to genuine scrutiny. I realized eventually, and to my amazement, that what we really needed to do was start at the very beginning and ask the fundamental question: what is acting?
The whole point of theory in the arts is to outline with clarity what the art form is, the materials that are used to create it, the various methods and best practices that are and can be used to create it, and the natural, inevitable principals that impress both limitations and possibilities upon it. The benefit of theory in the arts? Better artists and higher quality art. The passing of sound knowledge and fundamentals on to succeeding generations. And another benefit, perhaps especially important for actors, is artists who possess healthy mental clarity about who they are as artists and what exactly they are doing, how and why.
Following upon this idea, it was when I read Howard Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences that I realized that the question, what is acting?, would be best answered by first answering the question, what is acting talent? Or rather, what is Dramatic Intelligence? This would prove to be the key to cracking the code as well as opening up insights into important questions I hadn't yet even begun asking.
This website is a project aimed at illuminating and sharing these ideas.

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