by Bel | Dec 16, 2014 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
In an interview on acting for BAFTA, David Morrissey recounted how he ended up at drama school. “I did a TV drama when I was 17. I was very lucky and it was about two Scouse lads who had run away to Wales and funnily enough I was a Scouse lad myself who had been to Wales so I had a lot of research already on my plate. There were adult actors on that show who advised me not to go to drama school. But there one actor called James Hazeldine, who became a mentor to me, told me to go to drama school because it will give you a career or you can play Scouse lads for the rest of your life if you want to but this will give you an ability to do other things, theatre, different accents, work on your posture, all those things. I went to RADA and found drama school really valuable.”
Aside from professional actors, Audition Doctor has a large number of students applying to drama school. With drama schools receiving such a high volume of applications, the need to show yourself to be a candidate who is emotionally literate, open to direction and willing to take risks has never been greater.
Tom Hanks said of his early acting: “I operated on instinct and energy. I was just loud, I was just fast. I would just swamp the process with this blind accelerated pace – that was the only speed I knew how to operate even after I came out of repertory. I could have learned earlier on how to take your time and do the interior work that you can do alone just by studying the text. Before that I would just learn the text and then do it as opposed to planning out a mode of attack.”
Students who have been to Audition Doctor never enter an audition room and rush through their speeches – as is so often the case. An audition speech is regarded as the apparatus with which to show off your abilities. The extensive interior work done at Audition Doctor means that you give the audition panel an authentic character, as opposed to a nervous speed read. Audition Doctor sessions effectively give students the time to strategise and make bold and interesting choices with their character. Preparation at Audition Doctor means that the performance students give in auditions is most often impressive and considered.
One reason for Audition Doctor’s popularity is people’s fear of Shakespearean language. Anthony Sher’s web chat in the Guardian this week said: “I, like many other actors who have joined the RSC, used to believe that there is a prescribed way of playing Shakespeare. There isn’t. Each generation devises their own way dependent on how audiences want to receive Shakespeare. Earlier generations of audiences were happy to hear him almost sung or performed in a very grand operatic manner. Modern audiences want him to be done more realistically, they want to recognise the characters on stage as people they know in their lives. So it will keep changing, but there are some basic rules about playing Shakespeare that it is best for actors to know about even if they then choose to discard them. Playing Shakespeare in a totally naturalistic way with the mumbling of modern speech, the tendency to fall away towards the end of a sentence, this simply wouldn’t work when speaking Shakespeare verse.”
Audition Doctor’s high demand rests on the fact Tilly ensures that every applicant performs their Shakespeare speech with exactly the same vitality, authenticity and conviction as their modern speech. The basic rules are taught but what is the most important is that the language is never thrown away and always harnessed to communicate emotional honesty. Audition Doctor sessions make Shakespeare less of an obstacle to be overcome and more of an ally, which is why more often than not, Audition Doctor students gain places at drama school.
by Bel | Dec 10, 2014 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
In the Telegraph this week, Judi Dench questioned the at times bleak nature of the acting industry towards its newest recruits: ”There are no reps anywhere any more. There’s very little work, young actors have to get something and hope that it’s a success. They go to an audition and now nobody ever writes afterwards to say, ‘It was a terrific meeting, I’m so sorry it hasn’t worked out this time.’ There’s a complete silence. What is your encouragement as a young actor? Where do you go to learn? Where do you get to make the mistakes?”
Luckily for both professional actors and drama school applicants, Audition Doctor has proven to be that place. Audition Doctor is where actors are encouraged to take big risks, fail and subsequently become better.
Lyn Gardner wrote recently about how theatre should be a risky business and how venues should not be afraid of making choices that could alienate their established audiences. Playing it safe, in both programming and performance, betrays a lack of creativity. As Gardner states: “In fact, there is no such thing as “an audience”; only a collection of individuals sitting in a shared space.”
Audition Doctor sessions are sought after because Tilly discourages students from being risk-averse. The choices that students end up making are often daring and different. Drama schools are looking for those who are fearless in defying convention in favour of the unexpected. As Gardner states: “An audience that is up for being challenged and surprised, when it comes down to it, probably won’t like everything it sees.”
Many speeches that students rehearse at Audition Doctor – particularly for drama school – are well-known. Often they are part of a literary canon and have been performed by stalwart actors. Consequently, many people find it difficult to break away from how they preconceive the character to be, whether it be the thoughts behind the lines or even how the line sounds. On the BAFTA Acting Guru site, Idris Elba gave his advice to young actors starting out which is also encouraged at Audition Doctor: “It’s important to have an open mind, you are the vessel and on top of which and added onto are these personalities that you have to portray. [Have] a blank sheet and throw away any ideas and build from the beginning.”
Similarly, in the Guardian, Lenny Henry spoke of his process to approaching Shakespeare, which closely resembles the way text is approached at Audition Doctor: “Think of long speeches as a series of connected thoughts, not one big clump of dialogue. Each thought, each sentence, is a separate piece of your armoury. Think through each sentence: about how you glue it together; what it means; how you feel when you say each thing. You’ll find it comes together like a kind of delicious soup.”
Audition Doctor is about building up an arsenal of authentic emotional responses through risk and failure. Consequently, Tilly’s students get parts and places at drama schools because their performances challenge not only themselves, but also whomever is watching.
by Bel | Dec 3, 2014 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
Drama schools have long been been accused by critics of being middle-class enclaves. This is perhaps understandable with actors such as Benedict Cumberbatch, Tom Hiddleston, who yesterday won the Evening Standard’s Best Actor award, and Damian Lewis recently dominating the Culture section of the papers. Actors such as Judi Dench and Julie Walters, themselves drama school graduates, have also been voicing concerns over how tuition fees at conservatoires are preventing those with talent from entering the industry.
It is therefore reassuring to know that The Stage has published findings that show that 80% of students at drama schools are state-educated. Furthermore, despite the fact that drama school and indeed all higher education is expensive, drama schools such as LAMDA have “strong scholarship and bursaries programmes”.
Despite the criticism levelled at drama schools, however, they are just as oversubscribed as ever because students know the value of investing in practical conservatoire training.
Simon Russell Beale stated in the Guardian: “The actor’s primary responsibility is to make the text understandable at first hearing. That’s quite a big thing, and quite difficult, especially if it’s a fairly complicated text. Know the rules about verse-speaking. After that, I don’t care whether you break those rules – just make me understand what you’re saying, the first time you say it.”
The reason why drama schools, like Audition Doctor, are popular is because they are one of the few places where you are given sufficient time and guidance to push yourself emotionally and intellectually. A sizeable number of Audition Doctor’s students are professional actors who have had professional training. In spite of this, they understand that in order to achieve longevity in the profession, their training requires upkeep and continual progression.
Simon Callow spoke of the crucial process that students go through at drama school, which is not at all dissimilar to a regular student at Audition Doctor: “The important thing about training is that it buys you space – three years, ideally – in which to make an absolute and total berk of yourself, in front of your fellow actors, who are going through the same thing. It’s a controlled environment in which you can slowly unpack your own neuroses, your inhibitions, your resistances. And if it’s a well-devised course, you can slowly – having, as it were, disassembled yourself – reach back towards the light.”
Training, whether you do it at drama school or at Audition Doctor, will cost you – both financially and emotionally. However, actors who are lucky enough to have experienced these unique and demanding environments usually have the knowledge of what is required to take the audience by the hand and lead them into another world. This is why actors who come to Audition Doctor know that their success lies not only in the solidity of their training, but also in the work they do with Tilly.
by Bel | Nov 26, 2014 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
Judi Dench recently spoke of how uninspiring teaching led her to a mental stalemate with regards to understanding some of Shakespeare’s plays early on in her career. She credited seeing the plays performed on stage, as opposed to reading “six lines each in turn, regardless of who was saying them”, with igniting her passion and understanding.
Speaking of the reluctance of many to engage with Shakespeare, Dench said: “It’s a fear, there’s a terrible fear about Shakespeare that it’s a language we don’t understand. [But] it couldn’t be easier. It’s the prejudice of things. Somebody telling you it’s hard, and the fear that you’re not going to understand it. You’re not going to be able to understand? Well that’s up to the actor.”
Gregory Doran, artistic director of the Royal Shakespeare Company, also said: “If you’re reading Shakespeare you can get baffled by the language, but if you see actors deliver it with passion and engagement, even if you don’t pick up every word, you can follow a story and be transported to a different world.”
The importance that both place on the actor is why Audition Doctor is sought out by professional actors and drama school applicants alike. Audition Doctor students succeed in landing jobs and places at drama school because the sessions places such importance on unpicking the text. Once the language is understood, there’s a framework within which to experiment. Audition Doctor sessions encourage students to explore the myriad of ways to play the scene and students often experiment in ways that oppose one another. However, as Indira Varma said of her time rehearsing with Pinter: “If you’re truthful, nothing you do is wrong.” Of course, that has to be within the limitations of the play but it was the most liberating thing to be told.” There is no right or wrong at Audition Doctor, but Tilly will guide you to the option that shows you to be bold and above all, the one that rings the most true.
Another reason why actors, particularly those in TV, come to Audition Doctor is because of their lack of rehearsal time. Imelda Staunton spoke about the problem in this week’s Telegraph:
“That’s the thing that’s disappeared unfortunately with television is a terribly old-fashioned word called ‘rehearsing’. As if it doesn’t mean anything – ‘It doesn’t matter, you don’t need it’. Well, you do need it! And I think you need it for everything, particularly this, and thank goodness we got it. There’s no way we could have done it without. And we all mourn the days of – they were awful the BBC rehearsal rooms in Acton – but you rehearsed. You did The Singing Detective – you rehearsed it and then you did it. Like any piece of work you do, whether it’s a play or theatre or film, you don’t just turn up and go, ‘That’s what I’ve done, I’ll do that’. And it was very valuable for this and I wish more people would think about putting an extra two bob in to allow people to have a bit of time. We live in a world where we want instant things. ‘Just do it now! We want it instant, we want it good and we want it successful’. Well, the best things take time, whether it’s a very good stew or a show. The best things take time to cook and develop and I think people underestimate that. No one wants to rehearse to waste time, it saves time.”
In today’s unforgiving climate, Audition Doctor has become a rehearsal space where actors have the time to work on their parts and develop their craft. The instant success that Staunton speaks of is nigh on impossible to achieve without professional direction, hard graft and time – all of which Audition Doctor provides.
by Bel | Nov 19, 2014 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
Maya Angelou said: “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” It appears to be this sentiment that has been the driving force behind the the Guardian and the Royal Court’s decision to co-release a series of online state-of-the-nation microplays. The coupling of journalism and theatre is a move to humanise the statistics that are routinely quoted but rarely truly comprehended in articles.
The first microplay explores the neglectful and seemingly merciless attitude of the coalition government towards food poverty, with Katherine Parkinson playing out Edwina Currie’s unforgiving sentiments earlier this year. The feeling that you experience at the end of the play will linger far longer than reading the fact that “food prices have soared by 43.5% in the past eight years while the disposable annual income of the poorest 20% fell by an average of £936 over the same period.” The numbers are shocking, however, they are forgettable when compared to excruciatingly watching Parkinson trying to make a substantial meal out of a can of tomato soup, a tin of fish and no electricity.
Director Carrie Cracknell wrote: “Why is it more useful for it to be a drama than a well-researched, well-written article? As my work develops, I am increasingly interested in the ways in which stories can open out and shine light on our day-to-day realities and perhaps this way hit you in the heart as well as the mind.”
Meanwhile, at the National Theatre, Meera Syal will be appearing in the forthcoming production of Behind the Beautiful Forevers, which depicts the appalling reality of living in a Mumbai slum. Echoing Cracknell in an interview for the Telegraph, Syal agreed that “powerful storytelling has a better chance of thwacking people in the solar plexus. People are more likely to want to effect change if they are affected emotionally rather than intellectually. A good play can get to a part of you that a thousand political speeches might not.” Consequently, the actor has a huge responsibility – to not only make you feel but also inhabit a world that is so distant from your own.
Audition Doctor is where you learn to create such worlds organically and gradually. Both professional actors and applicants for drama school have found Audition Doctor sessions to have been indispensable. Tilly’s methods mean that any ego or self-consciousness that students feel are easily put aside in favour of telling the truth of the story.
Actors come to Audition Doctor for help with both stage and screen acting, recognising the need to be familiar with as many mediums as possible. Versatility has always been essential in order to make a living in the industry. The online microplay, which Cracknell describes as a “new adventure where theatre meets film in an inescapably theatrical setting”, will undoubtedly have its own unique demands. However, what remains constant is the actor’s commitment to be true and to be real. At Audition Doctor, all students give performances that cost them. This vulnerability and daringness to portray what it is to be fallibly human is what forces an audience to feel. Consequently, students who come to Audition Doctor often end up unforgettable.
by Bel | Nov 4, 2014 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood, Training
At the Cheltenham Literary Festival, The Times reported Judi Dench disagreeing with the commonplace practice of understudies playing the roles of leading stage actors in matinees. She credited her training at drama school as the thing that equipped her with the stamina: “That doesn’t faze me at all – eight performances a week, I know it’s rather fashionable now to get someone else to do two performances but that’s not the way I was trained.”
However, she also recently mentioned the difficulty for actors without significant private backing to receive professional training. Earlier this year, The Times carried out research in which “a study of 100 British actors to have been nominated for Bafta or Olivier awards in the past decade showed that state-educated actors outnumbered their privately schooled peers until 1957, when the trend reversed. Even before that turning point, products of a state education were still at a disadvantage as they represent more than 93 per cent of the population.”
With drama schools now charging £9,000 in fees and complaints about the dearth of working-class stories portrayed on television, acting is understandably seen as being a profession monopolised by the wealthy. Furthermore, Dench lamented the fact that “there aren’t [repertory theatres] where you get to learn about how other actors do it. Where do you go to learn, and to make mistakes?” The disintegration of the repertory system has meant that drama school has increased in importance as a space where young actors can learn and make mistakes.
Dench went onto warn that “it [is wrong to assume that good actors will rise to the top. It doesn’t hold that the actors who are good actors are in the jobs. It’s if you’re lucky, you’ve got the job”, reinforcing the idea that getting a place at drama school has become even more important.
However, as Jake Gyllenhaal said on the On Acting blog of the Bafta website: “Education is essential…it doesn’t mean you have to go out and get it from an institution but educating yourself is the most important thing, otherwise you’re making blind choices that you’re not sure about.”
Audition Doctor has become an alternative place for both professional and aspiring actors to educate themselves with professional guidance. Gyllenhaal stated that what he looked for in a role wasn’t “about a genre or even about a specific character, it’s if I feel that there’s an honesty and a sort of beating heart that exists underneath the material…it’s the honesty and truth between characters.”
It is this that Audition Doctor focuses on: the creation of a truthful and three-dimensional human being. Audition Doctor’s students come regularly because unlocking the beating heart that is underneath the material that Gyllenhaal speaks of, takes time and a commitment to both failure and experimentation.
Furthermore, Audition Doctor students understand what Gyllenhaal means when he said: “For a long time I was looking for a sense of resolution at the end of a movie or a scene, feeling like as Chris Cooper said to me once “Never having regrets”, but that’s impossible, there is no resolve. You never fully get there and it’s a constant search.”
by Bel | Oct 29, 2014 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
Ideastap recently published an article by Denis Lawson where he explored the false perception that an actor has to “perform” or “act” in order to affect an audience. He mentioned the instance when Billy Wilder was directing Jack Lemmon: “There was a particular take that Wilder had Lemmon do over and over again. “Too much,” Wilder would say, “Do it again.” Finally, Wilder said, “That’s it.” Lemmon replied, “But I’m not doing anything!” “Exactly,” said Wilder.
This is something that Audition Doctor focuses on; the ridding of the extraneous theatrics that get in the way of an honest portrayal of a character. Both professional actors and drama school candidates come to Audition Doctor to find a way of using both the words as well as themselves to create a fully fleshed human being. Audition Doctor’s success rate is high because in encouraging her students to play to their inherent unique strengths, what is shown to an audition panel is less of a “performance” and a more natural and unstilted rendering.
Textual analysis is essential, however, it is often seen as a way of creating a character by the building up of information from the writing layer by layer. Conversely, Lawson argues that the words should prompt the peeling away of layers and it is the act of stripping back which makes for an authentic performance.
Lawson says that while “it’s part of an actor’s equipment to be able to transform ourselves from part to part. Changing our appearance, altering our movement, our body language. But what can be equally challenging is nothing: just to be you. To have the confidence to work in front of an audience or in front of a camera and not do but be: peel back the layers to reveal yourself, and, through the sheer force of your concentration, to take the audience on a journey while appearing to be doing nothing. That takes nerve and confidence. The camera certainly loves it, but take that ability back on to the stage and it can be very powerful. I certainly feel now that if I’m straining and pushing for something, it’s wrong.”
Audition Doctor sessions encourage you to realise that less is more. However, this doesn’t mean that less work is done on the text. The confidence that results from intense textual exploration means that your performance can be informed and nuanced without having to resort to the artificiality that comes from “acting”.
Audition Doctor continues to be in high demand because aside from the practicalities of preparing for an audition, such as working on language and exploring a character’s intentions, Tilly encourages each of her students to realise what Lawson failed to realise early on in his career – that “the most potent weapon we have at our disposal as actors is ourselves.”
by Bel | Oct 21, 2014 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
Harriet Walter wrote of her experience in The Guardian of preparing for the male role of King Henry in the upcoming all-female Donmar production of Henry IV.
“People ask us whether we have to do a lot of research or do different things to get into a male character. The answer is: not really. The actor’s job is to get behind the needs of their character that give rise to what they say and do…Shakespeare has done most of the work and my task is to lift his words and thoughts off the page. It is part of an actor’s equipment to be able to imagine life in a mind and body other than their own.”
Although Walter acknowledges that “Shakespeare is tantalising…, he gives us the most wonderful words to say, the most dramatic situations to re-create”, the task of crafting a believable human being out of Elizabethan language for a modern audience is difficult.
Aside from professional actors, drama school applicants make up an equally significant proportion of Audition Doctor’s student body. The majority of accredited drama schools require people auditioning to perform a speech from a Shakespeare play. Some schools, such as the Central School of Speech and Drama, provide those auditioning with a set list of Shakespeare speeches. The panel will be seeing thousands of Juliets, Portias, Hamlets and Macbeths. Due to the fact that the list of monologues that applicants can choose from is limited, the need to distinguish yourself from the masses is even more paramount. The reason why Audition Doctor is in high demand is because the work undertaken with Tilly is so tailored to you, that the interpretation you take to the audition is by nature original and specific.
Walter says of acting Shakespeare characters: “We have to stretch wider and higher and dig deeper than our standard selves in order to reach those words and those situations.”
Audition Doctor’s popularity is also due to the fact that actors recognise the difficulties of exploring characters alone. An Audition Doctor session affords students a structured and concentrated time to do precisely what Walters says – to go beyond your standard self. The openness and supportive nature of the sessions mean that experimentation with the text is only ever encouraged and never prejudged. Consequently, the resulting interpretation of your character is always a unique creation that is simultaneously supported by the text.
Kristin Scott Thomas mentioned in The Telegraph how exhilarating it was to work in theatre again: ““In films, they can edit and cut you; on stage, you have complete control. Ian [Rickson] gives me instructions and we work through stuff together but if I turn up at the opening night and decide I can do the whole thing standing on my head, no one can stop me,” says Scott Thomas. “There’s something incredibly exciting and dangerous about that.”
Similarly, Tilly gives her students direction and suggestions. Ultimately, however, it is the freedom and confidence to make your own artistic choices that characterises Audition Doctor sessions and why Tilly’s students often land the jobs and drama schools they audition for.
by Bel | Oct 15, 2014 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, classes for acting, tilly blackwood
This week, Ideastap uploaded a video of the Associate Director of the National Theatre, Anna Niland, giving advice on how to audition. The first thing that she mentioned was the importance of picking the right monologue. As an actor, the nature of the job often renders you passive; you are the one waiting to be chosen, whether by an agent or a director, as opposed to the one making active choices. However, the choice of an audition speech is one of the few instances where you can exercise complete control.
Niland said: “Don’t just go to the female monologue book or the male monologue book because that’s what a lot of people will do and that’s not particularly interesting. Go to the theatre, watch new plays, think really carefully about the kind of character that you want to play and also the kind of work that you want to be seen in. That’s why the speech you choose says so much about you and about your knowledge of the theatre.”
In The Telegraph, Jack Lowden, who is appearing in Electra, discussed how he envied dancers because they can practise: “You can’t really do that with acting, apart from working on your voice.” Audition Doctor is one of the few places where practicing is possible, which is why Audition Doctor is equally popular with professional actors who have been to drama school and those applying.
Audition Doctor’s high success rate can be attributed to the fact that students understand that preparation requires time and patience. Audition Doctor’s students usually come on a regular basis because they recognise the veracity of Niland’s statement: “The more you prepare, the more you will be able to walk into the [audition] room and bring that world with you.” Audition Doctor is about truthfully creating the world that your character inhabits while simultaneously being open to suggestion, experimentation and redirection.
Niland encourages actors to “be flexible, [audition panels and directors] want to see whether you’ve rehearsed it so hard one way that there is no other way you can do it. Most drama schools and directors are looking for actors who can throw stuff out the window and try something fresh…and be able to to do something new with that character.”
Niland says: “It’s really important that you watch things, so that could be watching the telly, watching a play at the theatre, watching a film, watching people. It’s only going to make you more employable, more interesting than the next person coming into the room who hasn’t been to the theatre in three years. If you want to do it, immerse yourself in it.”
True immersion comes from not only watching others act but also doing it yourself. Lara Pulver, who was recently in Sherlock, says in The Telegraph that “acting is all about making good choices” and as all Tilly’s students can attest, coming to Audition Doctor is one of them.
by Bel | Oct 8, 2014 | acting classes, acting classes london, audition classes, audition doctor, auditions, tilly blackwood
As a testament to the proliferation of learning tools for actors, The Stage have started to compile weekly lists of the best that are currently on offer. These range from apps that help you learn lines to books that offer advice and exercises.
Although written material and websites with video blogs can undoubtedly be useful means of furthering your development as an actor, they are still passive ways of learning about a practical and active profession. The reason why Audition Doctor is popular with both professional actors preparing for auditions and drama school applicants is that they understand that there is no comparison between reading a book on acting and physically getting up to play a scene.
Describing how she operates while on stage, Judi Dench said: “Although you and I can be playing a scene together, this ear here is not actually listening to you, it’s turned round like a cat’s and it’s listening to that person up there is coughing and this eye is also watching over there. It’s kind of a dichotomy.”
The skills required to achieve this kind of balancing act is something that cannot be reached using an app. It has to be practiced endlessly and diligently.
Harriet Walter advised: “Start from a humble point of view about your own knowledge. Be open to everything. It’s better to risk being a prat at drama school than in the outside world.” Students have realised that both Audition Doctor lessons and drama schools are concentrated pockets of time where they have the freedom to take risks. The rules of probability state that risk will involve a sizeable amount of failure. The advantage about doing this at Audition Doctor is that decisions that don’t serve the character or scene are scrapped and you have the opportunity, under Tilly’s guidance, to make better choices.
Talking of the nature of film versus theatre, Judi Dench said: “There are a thousand ways to do a scene, it’s agony to me that only one way is chosen. So that one way is kind of in formaldehyde…that’s why the theatre is so alive and spontaneous. Tonight I will do something that I didn’t do last night; I may do it worse but I may do it better.”
The reason why students normally have regular Audition Doctor sessions is that they know that from lesson to lesson, Tilly’s advice can give their performance an added dimension that they previously hadn’t thought of. No performance is ever set in stone. Furthermore, the experimental nature of the sessions mean that actors enter auditions with the advantage of having unusual choices in their arsenal while not stubbornly clinging to them. The unselfconscious willingness to experiment is something that Audition Doctor fosters. Audition Doctor’s success rate, in terms of drama school places and professional jobs landed, is proof that listening to a podcast is poles apart from a session with Tilly.
