Reading Response for Movement for Actors
Teaching Charlie Chaplin How To Walk
In our reading this week I was struck by a few things. I have never really been into Charlie Chaplin but after reading about his walk and movements on stage, I had the desire to watch him in action. After watching several clips, I felt that Dan Kamin was right on when he said that Chaplin's movement were fluid. I did not know that Chaplin was an alcoholic and maybe that added to his fluidity. When I am drunk, my movements are definitely more fluid, or at least I feel that they are.
I really connected with the section about Robert Downey Jr.'s struggle to get Chaplin's movements. When we are playing characters that are more relaxed then us we should start are warmup process with daily relaxation and work that is specific to that character. In fact, we should cater each warm up like we do with vocal warmups and base them on the nature of our characters.
The Smallest Mask: The Red Nose
This reading reminded me that we need to make a connection with the audience. It's so important in clowning to make eye contact, keeping the fourth wall open. Another area that struck me was to use our limitations as comedy. I feel in clowning we must be more vulnerable. This will make our characters stand out and make the audience feel a closer connection to us. The three-second wait was a great exercise to get us out of our own personal movements.
Movement Training: Dell'Arte International
This chapter helped to remind me that truly the audience bases everything off of what they see and what they hear. To just walk across a stage as yourself, when you are playing a character that is totally different than you, is a failure. We as actors must make our characters believable. We want the audience to feel something. The other part that really spoke to me was about how as we grow up we have learned to mask our emotions. This is so true and we need to remind ourselves that showing the audience is extremely important.
No comments:
Post a Comment