In my younger years, like many, I nursed a desire to become an actor when I became of age.
Daydreams would have me insisting that ‘being nominated was all that mattered’ to Parkinson or calmly telling paparazzi to ‘just give it a rest today.’ When it came to reality, my ambitions resulted in the combination of after-school drama classes and spending my Tuesday night with an ageless woman called Miss Brown, who would teach me the rules of pronunciation above all else.
What I soon discovered, however, was that as I aged, the less comfortable I was performing in front of others. Something which was somewhat detrimental to my acting dreams. It was reminiscent of my urge to collect clocks at a young age. After arranging them all in my room, I found that I was a terribly light sleeper and couldn’t rest with the sound of ticking.
So as I became more aware of myself, I could no longer mime being on a water-ski without worrying how I looked or what others thought of me.
The dream had died.
Years later, I enrolled at the New York Film Academy (something I wouldn’t recommend others to do) for a year’s course in screenwriting. A writer’s life was much more suited to me. I could nestle in the shadows, watching others perform my words. Admittedly, I still wanted to be at the forefront of the shadows. Like William Goldman or Joe Eszterhas.
The major downside of this course however was the once weekly ‘Acting for Screenwriters’ class which dominated my Friday nights in New York. Fresh off the boat and knowing no one in the country but myself, I was ill-equipped for such displays of naked confidence.
The first day of lessons culminated in the dreaded acting class. Still unfamiliar with each other, my fellow classmates and I were all nervously quipping about how we were ‘writers’ not actors as we made our way up the stairs to face our fears.
Our teacher was a woman in her 40s who’s career highlight was a whore in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York. A film you’d have to re-watch to remember when a whore would even fit into the story.
She was typically egregious and keen to strip us of our inhibitions. This meant I hated her from the very beginning.
Our first task was an ‘overall body sensation,’ a term which seemed more suited to a shampoo commercial than an acting class. It involved us closing our eyes, seated, and making a humming noise as we ‘searched’ our bodies for tension. We would move our heads from side to side, lift our arms up and down and most embarrassingly, thrust our pelvises in a circular motion. It would then climax in a loud grunting sound.
Being the immature child that I am, I was unable to keep a straight face through most of this. She spotted it immediately and told me it was ‘okay’ to laugh as it meant that I was expressing myself. This somehow made it less amusing.
The body sensation soon turned into a ridiculous repetition exercise which had two of us sitting in opposing chairs and stating ‘searing’ observations back and forth. A sample interrogation would sound like this:
‘You are tapping your foot’
‘I’m tapping my foot’
‘You are tapping your foot’
‘I’m tapping my foot’
‘You are tapping your foot’
‘I am tapping my foot’
In other words it was an utter waste of anyone’s time. When my turn came in front of the class, my partner didn’t ‘delve deep enough’ so the teacher decided to take her place. She said there was something in me she needed to unlock. I wanted to punch her in the face for doing this to me.
She managed to ‘uncover’ that I was nervous. Something a blind, deaf mute could ascertain.
As the classes progressed and as my classmates and I became more at ease with each other, the boundaries started to disintegrate. Although in reality this meant that we were more willing to mess around than shy away from the spotlight. Each week we competed with our grunting to see who could make the loudest noise. Our repetitive observations became deliberately more inane.
‘You are wearing a blue t-shirt’
‘I am wearing a blue t-shirt’
The purpose of the class was to put us in the mindset of the actors we could be writing for to help us to better understand their process. If this was the case then we were sure that actors had it easy. While we toiled away at our laptops, carefully constructing plots and nurturing characters, the actors were having a whale of a time, grunting competitively and generally pissing around.
We moved onto the art of performance and I was forced into acting out a scene set in a strip club from Bachelor Party (Paddy Chayefsky not Tom Hanks) with a fellow Englishman from my class. Our teacher once complained that I wasn’t acting as if I was believably in a strip club. ‘Imagine my finger is a stripper and watch her dance,’ she said at the height of her stupidity as she waved her hand around.
The acting classes, as deeply embarrassing as they often were, helped me in one important way. While my childhood dreams of acting had dissipated, I still, deep down, told myself that maybe they would surface again one day and I would rightfully take my place at the top of the A-List.
What I discovered was that my desire to act was nothing more than a childish whim, based on my youthful need for attention and love of film, but nothing else. I could finally store it away alongside my dream of talking to animals or my ambition to become a different race for a day.
So these days, while in the thick of a daydream the interview still goes on but this time it's less Leno and more DVD special features.
Daydreams would have me insisting that ‘being nominated was all that mattered’ to Parkinson or calmly telling paparazzi to ‘just give it a rest today.’ When it came to reality, my ambitions resulted in the combination of after-school drama classes and spending my Tuesday night with an ageless woman called Miss Brown, who would teach me the rules of pronunciation above all else.
What I soon discovered, however, was that as I aged, the less comfortable I was performing in front of others. Something which was somewhat detrimental to my acting dreams. It was reminiscent of my urge to collect clocks at a young age. After arranging them all in my room, I found that I was a terribly light sleeper and couldn’t rest with the sound of ticking.
So as I became more aware of myself, I could no longer mime being on a water-ski without worrying how I looked or what others thought of me.
The dream had died.
Years later, I enrolled at the New York Film Academy (something I wouldn’t recommend others to do) for a year’s course in screenwriting. A writer’s life was much more suited to me. I could nestle in the shadows, watching others perform my words. Admittedly, I still wanted to be at the forefront of the shadows. Like William Goldman or Joe Eszterhas.
The major downside of this course however was the once weekly ‘Acting for Screenwriters’ class which dominated my Friday nights in New York. Fresh off the boat and knowing no one in the country but myself, I was ill-equipped for such displays of naked confidence.
The first day of lessons culminated in the dreaded acting class. Still unfamiliar with each other, my fellow classmates and I were all nervously quipping about how we were ‘writers’ not actors as we made our way up the stairs to face our fears.
Our teacher was a woman in her 40s who’s career highlight was a whore in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York. A film you’d have to re-watch to remember when a whore would even fit into the story.
She was typically egregious and keen to strip us of our inhibitions. This meant I hated her from the very beginning.
Our first task was an ‘overall body sensation,’ a term which seemed more suited to a shampoo commercial than an acting class. It involved us closing our eyes, seated, and making a humming noise as we ‘searched’ our bodies for tension. We would move our heads from side to side, lift our arms up and down and most embarrassingly, thrust our pelvises in a circular motion. It would then climax in a loud grunting sound.
Being the immature child that I am, I was unable to keep a straight face through most of this. She spotted it immediately and told me it was ‘okay’ to laugh as it meant that I was expressing myself. This somehow made it less amusing.
The body sensation soon turned into a ridiculous repetition exercise which had two of us sitting in opposing chairs and stating ‘searing’ observations back and forth. A sample interrogation would sound like this:
‘You are tapping your foot’
‘I’m tapping my foot’
‘You are tapping your foot’
‘I’m tapping my foot’
‘You are tapping your foot’
‘I am tapping my foot’
In other words it was an utter waste of anyone’s time. When my turn came in front of the class, my partner didn’t ‘delve deep enough’ so the teacher decided to take her place. She said there was something in me she needed to unlock. I wanted to punch her in the face for doing this to me.
She managed to ‘uncover’ that I was nervous. Something a blind, deaf mute could ascertain.
As the classes progressed and as my classmates and I became more at ease with each other, the boundaries started to disintegrate. Although in reality this meant that we were more willing to mess around than shy away from the spotlight. Each week we competed with our grunting to see who could make the loudest noise. Our repetitive observations became deliberately more inane.
‘You are wearing a blue t-shirt’
‘I am wearing a blue t-shirt’
The purpose of the class was to put us in the mindset of the actors we could be writing for to help us to better understand their process. If this was the case then we were sure that actors had it easy. While we toiled away at our laptops, carefully constructing plots and nurturing characters, the actors were having a whale of a time, grunting competitively and generally pissing around.
We moved onto the art of performance and I was forced into acting out a scene set in a strip club from Bachelor Party (Paddy Chayefsky not Tom Hanks) with a fellow Englishman from my class. Our teacher once complained that I wasn’t acting as if I was believably in a strip club. ‘Imagine my finger is a stripper and watch her dance,’ she said at the height of her stupidity as she waved her hand around.
The acting classes, as deeply embarrassing as they often were, helped me in one important way. While my childhood dreams of acting had dissipated, I still, deep down, told myself that maybe they would surface again one day and I would rightfully take my place at the top of the A-List.
What I discovered was that my desire to act was nothing more than a childish whim, based on my youthful need for attention and love of film, but nothing else. I could finally store it away alongside my dream of talking to animals or my ambition to become a different race for a day.
So these days, while in the thick of a daydream the interview still goes on but this time it's less Leno and more DVD special features.
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