by Bel | Jul 31, 2013 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
Susan Elkin, The Stage’s Education and Training Editor, was asked so often whether drama school was a necessity that she wrote an article arguing why the widely-held misconception of “if you can act or sing, surely you can just stand up and do it” was palpably misguided.
“Debunking attitudes like that is probably one of the most important things I do as The Stage’s Education and Training Editor. After all, however great your footballing potential, you wouldn’t expect to walk in off the streets and immediately play for Manchester United. It takes years of training to achieve the right skills. And you never stop learning. Exactly the same principle applies to performing on stage or screen.”
She goes onto mention how young people often cite actors such as Sheridan Smith as examples of actresses who have been successful without training. However, as Elkin states: “Smith studied singing, dancing and acting part time for many years in her native Lincolnshire and trained extensively in her teens with National Youth Music Theatre. Untrained she clearly was not.”
There are indeed respected actors who haven’t gone to an established drama school. However, many started early and were trained on the job. This was often supplemented by sessions on set with acting coaches. Elkin invites her readers to “take the three leads in the Harry Potter films: Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson. For nearly 10 years and seven films, starting when they were barely out of primary school, they were trained on set which included many systematic, carefully thought out classes to develop the necessary voice, movement and acting skills. And the same applied to the many other children involved. Those films were, effectively, their training provider.”
Attending a drama school is not the only form of training potential actors can receive. There are amdram productions, schemes such as the National Youth Theatre, joining a theatre company and also training privately with professionals established in the acting profession. Audition Doctor is one such example. Audition Doctor works with many students too young for drama school entry (minimum age is 18). This is an increasingly popular method of giving younger people access to focused quality training.
Elkin is one well-schooled in the requirements of the profession, writing extensively on the ever- changing landscape of drama schools and the wider industry. As she so staunchly says: “No one…makes it in this competitive industry without training at all”, which is an indicator that it makes no sense to hang onto delusions that you will be the exception any longer. It is in your best interests to ensure that you have the tools to not just survive, but also achieve the ambitions you have for yourself as an actor. However pretentious it sounds, this does require a commitment to the art of acting. Like all forms of art, talent only reaches its full potential with the back-up of hard graft and practice. Audition Doctor is an ideal place to begin.
by Bel | Jul 25, 2013 | Uncategorized
Although Michael Simkins’ article in the Guardian was hardly a paean to the acting profession, it was an honest account of the fickle nature of the business with all its highs and lows. In “Is Acting Today Just Too Tough?” he talks of the harsh demands of cash-strapped producers, the paltry salary of theatre work and the fact that the defining difference between professional and amateur actors is not talent but “whether you have the stomach for the lifestyle – one in which rejection, disappointment and despair are part of your daily routine.”
The buoying narrative doesn’t stop there as he asserts: “The cruellest aspect of the acting business is not that it’s unfair, but that it’s merely indifferent. It gives everything to some and nothing to others; talent, ambition and virtue have little to do with it. What’s more, with no qualifications or tests to assess how good (or bad) you are, the only benchmark is success.”
Despite all of this, there are still several thousand applicants to drama schools each year and all of them will no doubt have heard all of this before. While the adage “all art is subjective” is largely true, getting into drama school is a way of testing how good or bad you are – albeit an unreliable one. Although success in the profession is in no way guaranteed, it is interesting to see that actors who have found success very early on in their careers have chosen to take a break from the profession to go to drama school. It’s an acknowledgement that drama schools don’t just churn out graduates that are industry fodder; they prepare students for the demands of the profession.
In an article entitled “Life After Potter – Where Are All Hogwarts’ Graduates Now?”, it was interesting to note that many of the young actors were graduating from drama schools such as The Royal Welsh Conservatoire of Music and Drama, LAMDA and RADA despite having spent the ages of 10-21 on a set. Harry Melling said: “I went to LAMDA. The films were a great learning experience, but I wanted to do theatre, get better, to have a process.” While Frank Dillane declared: “Arriving in an establishment (RADA) where everyone is better than you, you can’t uphold any kind of arrogance for very long.”
Drama school may not be a necessity for success, but chancing it in a profession that is routinely prefixed with the word “unstable” is a caveat to all its potential practitioners to be as prepared as possible. A 3 year training does exactly that. With more students coming to Audition Doctor, it is clear that in spite of the warnings, drama schools are more popular than ever. Making yourself distinguishable from the throng has become even more necessary. You are watched at every single stage of an audition; while this makes the process sound rather like a stint in a high-security prison, it is the truth. This means sessions at Audition Doctor are an integral part of ensuring that you are on form every single time you are in front of a panel. There is (literally) no time to mess up, with many panels timing the length of your speeches with a stopwatch.
Although the 26 selected for entrance into each drama school are entering a profession in which 92% are out of work at any given time, the students that come to Audition Doctor are undeterred. Why? Michael Simkins acknowledges that “The answer is that it’s a drug – and once it gets in your system, it’s difficult to break the habit. In any case, despite the withering odds, if you’re an actor, you’re a dreamer. As David Mamet put it: “Narrative always wins out over statistics.”
by Bel | Jul 12, 2013 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
Today, Lyn Gardner asked the question: “Would you do your job – the one you’ve been trained to do – for free?” She was referring to the unfair yet widespread practice of professional actors working for free on the London Fringe and other events such as Edinburgh. Having fought off three thousand other candidates to get into drama school, undergone rigorous vocational training, many come out the other end performing for free. One could argue that this is a “work experience” of sorts and the chance to continue to develop the skills that you were taught at drama school. It’s an opportunity to perform roles that you might not have been cast as at drama school and there is always the possibility that influential casting directors will attend, be floored by your performance and catapult you into the world of award-winning feature films.
However, the stiffness of the competition to work for absolutely nothing is both mad and maddening. A current profit-share production of Measure for Measure at the Union Theatre auditioned over 1,000 actors for 10 roles despite the lack of a salary if cast. Gardner cited the reason for this was “because whereas once a small number of drama schools produced a limited number of actors each year, now there are vast numbers of university courses producing graduates who are ready to go straight into the profession. Many, furthermore, are weighed down by student debt.”
There is a sense that the thousands of students coming out of drama-based university courses every year are industry fodder – there aren’t enough parts for everyone who has spent 3 concentrated years receiving focused conservatoire training at drama schools, let alone people who have “studied” acting at university. However, neither is a drama school training a guarantee of skilled artistry. Mark Rylance mentioned that when auditioning actors, “sometimes, people will have had bad training, and I’ll think: I’m going to have to unravel a lot here.”
Whether you are trying to get into drama school or just out of it, you have to be at the top of your game to get anywhere and Audition Doctor ensures that you are match-fit for any audition. Rylance compares auditioning actors to “rather like looking at football players. You have to build the team, the company.” Working for free may be far from ideal but it’s better to be active and build up a range of roles. Working with Audition Doctor means that you don’t feel like the craft that you have spent 3 years honing is put on the back burner and that you are continually stretching your acting chops so you are ready for any audition opportunity that comes your way.
by Bel | Jul 11, 2013 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, tilly blackwood
If only The Observer’s account of Mark Rylance’s method of auditioning was the norm for all drama school auditions. While they are rarely the “shouty, humiliating exercises, usually of no more than two minutes duration” that the journalist describes, at the initial stages at least, they don’t usually “last up to 30 minutes each”. Furthermore, although most audition panels would argue that, like Rylance, they “are designed to be encouraging rather than demoralising”, everyone will experience the latter at some point throughout the process.
Although Rylance is auditioning professional actors for his upcoming production of Much Ado About Nothing, his way of appraisal and observation of each actor is very similar to that of drama school auditions. There is the acting obviously, but also voice work and movement sessions that are also part and parcel of all drama school auditions.
“I try to move them one way or another depending on how much they’re coming out to me, or into themselves,” he says. “Often, their nerves and desire to get the job makes them overly expressive – not bad, but they express more than they need to – so I’ll give them some kind of an obstacle to stop them being so sure-footed. Then I’ll see how they take that note, and I’ll listen to their voice, try to tell whether or not it’s locked in a particular place, and I’ll look at their movement.”
Nerves will inevitably play a huge part in how you perform. If you have only ever done your speeches alone in your living room, auditions in which you have to stand in a vast echoey studio in front of fifteen other candidates as well as the panel, will come as a huge shock. Although all drama schools do send out “What To Expect On Your Audition Day” emails, they don’t specify certain aspects for whatever reason. With extensive experience in drama school auditions, Audition Doctor will be able to tell you what to expect at various stages of the process at specific schools. Some schools require you to perform in front of fellow auditionees, some will be ask that one of your speeches is done to camera. If you are remotely self-conscious or uneasy, there is less likelihood of you inhabiting your character and delivering the performance you want. As Andrew Scott says “an audience can smell authenticity”and you can guarantee that an audition panel will be comprised of human Bloodhounds.
What Audition Doctor ensures is that your nerves are used to your advantage. Each speech is analysed with a fine tooth-comb and Tilly ensures that every intention behind every beat is absolutely understood. As Mark Rylance mentioned: “With Shakespeare, the audience has so many fears and anxieties, so many preconceptions; you have to draw them into the present, to give them an experience rather than a lecture. It should be like a great tennis match: who’s going to win?”
The Shakespeare speech is often the one that scares candidates and what Audition Doctor does so brilliantly is making it “present”, alive, genuine, and almost unbelievably, fun. Rylance cites directors such as Ian Rickson and Tim Caroll who “make their productions to last, and not so brittle that they’ll break. They encourage actors to surprise each other, to keep it fresh, to bring the sense of discovery and fun from the rehearsal room into the performance. You have to move into chaos.”
This is what Audition Doctor encourages students to do during lessons – to be flexible and bold in their choices and to embrace the uncertainty of the process- because often the most radical and exciting performances come out of it.
by Bel | Jul 4, 2013 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting
It’s easy to forget when you’re at a drama school audition that your chances of being selected hinge as much on your ability to collaborate and work well within a group, as your individual abilities. This is why the further you get in the audition process, the longer the movement and voice sessions become. Your speeches may be stunningly poignant and render the panel irrevocably moved, however, if you don’t appear to support and use your fellow applicants’ choices as a springboard to go further in your decisions, chances are you won’t be considered. Drama schools are looking to build a company – a group of actors who are independently strong performers but when working together are capable of surpassing their own limitations to create work that is both bold and honest.
In these workshop sessions, they urge you not to “feel like you have to perform. Just do what comes naturally.” Despite this, many candidates choose to overlook this advice and act like they’re in a full-scale West End production of Mamma Mia! the musical.
The Guardian’s Secret Actor contemplated the “look at me “ quality that he thinks all performers possess and declared it a necessary characteristic for all actors – without it “they’d be dentists.” However, there is a fine line between “pure peacockery” and using this attribute as a way to be better in your acting.
“What separates the peacocks from the good guys is the finesse they employ when displaying this element of “look at me”. It’s what separates the self-important Russell Crowes from, say, the self-effacing Bill Patersons.” It’s having to strike the balance between doing enough to be seen by the panel yet not forcing them to look at you because you’re an insufferable show-off.
What Audition Doctor preps you for is not to be that person. There is always one and sometimes horrifyingly, more than one, which inevitably leads to a competition for attention from the panel members. It is mortifying to witness but because of Audition Doctor’s guidance and advice about these workshops, you can go to your audition understanding that interesting and brave choices aren’t necessarily those that cause the most clamour and pandemonium. Audition Doctor is about daring to fail – either loudly or quietly – but always with the intention of pushing artistic limits and striving to reach the seemingly impossible.
by Bel | Jun 26, 2013 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting
The Guardian’s ‘Secret Actor’ column – while entertaining – is sometimes a dispiriting read for someone who wants to enter the profession.
This week featured a self-important “Bardmeister” who vaingloriously lectures younger actors in a rehearsal for a Shakespeare production on the definitive way to perform a speech: “Some of you younger actors may not be familiar with the rhythm required to perform Shakespeare as it should be performed, so this is how it should sound …” At this point, he extends his arm masterfully and clicks his thumb and fingers rhythmically, all the while saying (and I’m trying to get this right): “Ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka.”
Although the Secret Actor is clearly ridiculing his buffoonery, it does momentarily strike fear into the drama school candidate that this style of Shakespearean delivery is the rule – with Hitlerian adherence to iambic pentameter and said in the clipped and constipated style of a 1950s newsreader.
However, this is clearly not what an audition panel at drama school are looking for; they don’t want to see a recitation but a living, breathing and believable human being. If Rory Kinnear followed said Bardmeister’s advice, I sincerely doubt Othello would have got the rave reviews it did. The first thing that people say about the production is how accessible the actors made the language and how “it didn’t feel like [they] were listening to Shakespeare at all.”
Audition Doctor sessions do not focus on which beats are stressed or unstressed and Tilly would never instruct you on how any speech should sound – they focus instead on truly understanding the meaning of the speech. The words that end up stressed are those that you have picked organically that best serve your character’s intentions. There is no categorical law on how to say Shakespeare at Audition Doctor; Tilly focuses on finding the emotion and thinking behind the words and working out the technical beats only happens if a line isn’t sitting well with you. But there is no rule.
Last week Rebecca Front commented: “When I look at other people acting I don’t like to see the cogs whirring. That annoys me. I want to see a real person in a real situation.” Although in Audition Doctor lessons , Tilly will sometimes point out technical aspects of your acting (such as voice or breathing problems that you may be having), they aren’t about examining the techniques that Shakespeare uses in the manner of a detached intellectual. Audition Doctor sessions are about being real in a real situation, which is the only thing that drama schools are looking for.
by Bel | Jun 20, 2013 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
When approaching a part, most actors will say that their definitive starting point is the play itself. As Honeysuckle Weeks stated in an article on Ideastap: “A lot of getting into character is about the rhythm of the speech. Look at the grammar and the syntax of how this person speaks. Also, how other characters react. I learned a lot about my character quite late on in the play; don’t make assumptions about a character until you’ve read all the way through.”
In my experience, many drama school applicants have studied English either to A Level or even degree level. While this is an inevitably natural and often successful route into the Industry, it’s worth remembering that drama schools aren’t looking for candidates who approach the creation of a character in a scholarly manner. As one member of a drama school audition panel put it: “Education in this country focuses on here (pointing to his head), acting focuses on here (pointing at his gut).” While noting diphthongs, caesuras and soft endings are useful in an English essay, as Weeks noted: “I certainly think [studying English at Oxford] was helpful, although I learnt more about Shakespeare from performing the plays. Academia is not what theatre is about; it’s about performance, rhythm and sound.”
Recently, Anne-Marie Duff credits getting to grips with the character of Nina in O’Neill’s Strange Interlude at the National as “rising above literalness and “get the smell of it, breathe it in, see if you can exhale it – that is all you can do”.
This is what sessions at Audition Doctor give you the opportunity to do. Initially sessions are about understanding exactly what you are saying; Shakespeare speeches are dissected and discussed. This is generally done prior to line learning because Tilly always stresses that not understanding a line means that you, as an actor, will undoubtedly fail to communicate a line with the intention and conviction required to make any character truthful.
This week, Andrew Scott spoke about how the ease of line learning was often connected to how well you understand the text. “Line learning I always think is about wanting to say the lines. There are lines where you go “God, I know that, that’s really weird, that’s really easy to learn that and there are always lines where you can never remember the line. I always think that’s because you don’t like saying the line. Maybe because you don’t understand it or there’s something that you’re not connecting with.”
However, Audition Doctor sessions are so much more than just getting to grips with the meaning of a play. In her preparation for Strange Interlude, Duff stressed that “The real challenge is to become more yourself as an actor, visiting every corner.” Audition Doctor allows you to realise that your limitations are in no way circumscribed and that exploration and experimentation are key to creating what Duff described as “a panorama of character.” She describes trying to find “the extraordinary colours that [she is] trying to find every day in rehearsal” which is precisely what Audition Doctor is all about.
by Bel | Jun 13, 2013 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
Financial constraints aside, it’s astonishing how many people who want to become actors neither want to train nor go to the theatre, which you would presume are prerequisites to becoming a serious professional. Whether it’s down to arrogance or a misplaced belief that it’s better to “get out there” as soon as possible, it is not giving yourself the opportunity to develop your craft as an artist.
Drama school is where you have the time to probe deeper into your mental landscape and explore the recesses of your psyche which is the starting point for any character you play.
Last week Simon Callow mentioned how drama school was the place where he experienced his own Eureka moment: “I was almost a total write-off at drama school in my first year. I was struggling against a terrible internal block, which refused to allow me any sort of free expression: everything I did was controlled to the last degree. I seemed hell-bent on impressing some invisible admirer. But I knew my work was rubbish — knew, not least, because my teachers, with varying degrees of tact, told me so, over and over again. It took [a] liberating experience to unlock me from the prison. The… shock was administered by the great acting teacher Doreen Cannon, who goaded me to combustion point during an “extreme emotion” exercise. It was the first time, I suspect, ever in my life till that point, that I had dared to give in to an emotion.”
But on a more practical level, drama schools are still the first places that agents go to look for new talent. Ultimately, drama school is the vital starting point to your career; it sends a clear signal to other members of the Industry that your talent and potential has not only been validated but pushed further. Additionally, in an article in the Guardian on “the secretive world of casting directors”, respected casting agents such as Andy Pryor and Stephen Crockett said: “Agents pop up like weeds, frankly. There are only around 50 agencies [that I take] seriously. Essentially, from a casting point of view, you’re going to go with somebody you trust.”
If you want to be put up for great parts, you have to be with a credible agency which will have most probably taken you on based on your third-year showcase at drama school. As one actor asserted: “Casting directors are the gatekeepers. If they don’t know who you are, it can feel impossible to get a decent part.” To underestimate the potency of concentrated focus under the best professionals who understand what the Industry desires is to show yourself to be at best ignorant and at worst conceited.
Despite the paucity of parts and opportunities that are frequently being commented on as a result of funding cuts, there are more applicants to drama school than ever. Some drama schools have had to add further audition stages to make the process even more selective than it already is. Audition Doctor sessions are a guarantee that you do not waste anyone’s time – either yours or the audition panel’s. They see thousands of people and Audition Doctor sessions have proven time and time again that you are actually watched as opposed to merely seen. The idea that you can just learn a speech the night before and do it the next day is laughable. It’s true that they don’t want to see that you’ve been coached to say lines in a certain way but Audition Doctor is in no way, shape or form about that. Lessons are a true delving into what makes you tick as well as the character. Drama schools are looking for someone who is open to exploration and Audition Doctor is absolutely all about that.
by Bel | Jun 6, 2013 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
It’s surprising how often drama school applicants commiserate with each other when they find out that other people are doing the same Shakespeare speeches as them at an audition. The chances of any new material from a man who has been dead for nearly 400 years is slim, so the likelihood of someone doing the same speech as you is statistically quite high. Securing a place isn’t based on the originality of your choice of speeches but your originality of thought and approach.
When interviewed in Fourth Wall magazine, Oliver Ford Davis talked of how there was no fixed way of performing Shakespeare and gave advice that would stand any drama school applicant in excellent stead: “One of the difficult things is we approach it with preconceptions and labels…I think with the big Shakespeare parts, don’t try and fit into a mould, don’t say, ‘This is how Cleopatra should be, how Rosalind should be.’ The audience don’t come to see Shakespeare’s Rosalind, they come to see your Rosalind. You might as well go for broke and say ‘I’ve got to find as much of Rosalind as I can in me and then I will do my Rosalind, and it will be like nobody else’s. Don’t be frightened of it. It’s a magnificent, magnificent thing to drive, to gain control of but you must bring yourself to it. I think Shakespeare, because he was an actor and because he knew his acting company so well, he actually leaves quite a lot of it to you, sort of saying, ‘I haven’t proscribed how this character should be played.’”
Another common plaintive cry is “I just wish I knew what they were looking for.” In recalls, the audition panel don’t just want to see how you take direction but also how receptive you are to your fellow actors. The improvisation exercises and other games that are played aren’t just what one panel flippantly called “a bit of fun for you all”, but an opportunity for them to scrutinise whether you are capable of doing what Alison Steadman advised all actors this week – “ To look and listen. As an actor, all we are doing is pretending to be other people. Look and listen: always listen. Listen, listen, listen all the time.”
At Audition Doctor, there is thankfully never any opportunity to play someone else’s interpretation of a Shakespeare character as Tilly is meticulous in questioning every single choice you make in your speech. Sessions at Audition Doctor will often entail making sure that your intentions behind every thought is clear by “listening” to the text, which ensures that your performance is truthful. The focus that Audition Doctor places on how your character is trying to affect the person he/she is talking to is invaluable. If you are unsure as to how you are trying to affect a fictional character, the real human beings sitting on the panel will undoubtedly also be left unconvinced.
by Bel | May 30, 2013 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting
The Times recently dispatched one of its journalists – Richard Morrison – to attend and report back on the increasingly popular intensive courses that RADA offer for people in business. The article was entitled “How RADA helped me find my inner Gordon Gekko”, which leads me to believe that the infamous decision to send a Tower Hamlets councillor on one of the £625 a day courses was made in the spirit of shrewd business acumen, intended on swelling the council’s empty coffers in the face of government cuts instead of what some perceived as gratuitous profligacy.
The commercial courses that this drama school offers attract people from all job sectors – The City, the NHS, the Civil Service, event management, the Home Office and the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills. The skills that actors require such as the ability to be clearly heard, to hold the attention of an audience and to stand up in front of a group of people while “exuding such an air of friendly but confident ease that all present will feel the impact of [your] charisma” are not exclusive to a career on the stage but also in the boardroom. Edward Kemp, artistic director of RADA, explained the reason for the courses’ success was its focus on voice work coupled with a focus on “status transactions, which we use a lot in drama training.”
“We used to think of status purely in terms of one’s social standing,” Kemp explains. “But there are many other sorts of status. Experts can adjust their status so they are slightly above the person they are hoping to influence, but not so far above as to be frightening. Effective status transactions can be taught, and the skill can be hugely valuable — for lawyers, for example.”
Throughout the course, Morrison is instructed to participate in various exercises designed to boost confidence such as finding your centre of gravity, delivering an anecdote without any “ums” and “ahs” and passing round a Shakespeare sonnet around a circle one iambic pentameter at a time. You get the feeling here that Morrison should stick to his job writing instead of public speaking when he turns to the hapless person on his left and delivers the line “borne on the bier with white and bristly beard” with what he hopes is “a Hammer House of Horror quiver in [his] voice.”
Audition Doctor offers help with effective communication in public speaking without the eye-watering price tag. People from a range of professions have attended Audition Doctor courses and have found that sessions have got rid of the barriers that prevented them from delivering their speeches confidently. Shakespeare monologues or other speeches at Audition Doctor are used as vehicles through which the speaker’s breath and voice are explored and developed.
Why are actors – professionals concerned with the arts – increasingly looked to as the go-to group to improve things in the commercial arena? As Edward Kemp says: “It’s about effective communication. And don’t forget that as actors we are chiefly concerned with conveying truth.” Furthermore, with the skills that you learn at Audition Doctor, delivering your presentation or speech to a room of besuited colleagues will not feel, as Morrison concedes, like a “recurring teenage nightmare”.
