Speaker 1: You know, the funny thing about acting is that the goal is to not look like an actor The goal is to be so real and so believable that people forget you're acting and actually see a real person living out a real-life Scenario you can't really say that about any other profession You know, like you can't say man that plumber was so good at what he did for a moment. I forgot he was even a plumber It doesn't really work does it but with acting that's exactly what we're trying to do to not look like actors How do we do that? Let's find out Hey guys, it's Kurt from small market actor comm so today's question is how do we not look like actors in front of the camera? easy Stop acting Wait, what? Hear me out Most people see acting as the grown-up version of playing pretend in fact Part of the draw of acting is people think it's fun to pretend to be a different person and pretend to do imaginary things But that's the problem when you pretend to do something. It looks staged. It looks fake That's because pretending by definition is staged and is fake So when I say stop acting I'm saying to stop pretending The great acting teacher Sanford Meisner said the foundation of acting is the reality of doing What he's saying is that when you do something as an actor you really do it. You don't pretend to do it Meisner had an exercise he used in the classroom to demonstrate this point and I'm gonna borrow that exercise and share it with you right now Ready? Okay, take a look at the palm of your hand either hand and count how many skin creases there are on your middle finger Okay, go ahead and do that right now Done All right. Now, let me ask you a question When you were looking at your hand, were you really counting or you were you pretending to count? Now most likely you were really counting because hey you were doing it in real life So the point is to make sure you do the same thing when you're acting When you're on stage or in front of the camera never pretend to do anything Really do whatever it is that your character is doing in that situation If you're gonna count you really count if you're gonna write your name down on a piece of paper You really write your name down on that piece of paper This is the foundation of acting everything in acting should be as it is in real life Now let's take that exercise one step further when you were counting Were you counting as yourself or were you counting as someone else? Were you counting as yourself or were you counting as let's say some character from a movie a lot of beginner? actors pick up a script and then think about how their favorite Hollywood star would play the part and then try to mimic them this Doesn't work because it's not truthful and again won't look real The best actors aren't really playing a part or a character They're able to find themselves in the role and are essentially playing a truthful part of themselves Put it this way when a painter wants to paint some mountains. Okay, does she think to herself? Oh, um, how would Van Gogh paint these mountains and then just try to mimic that? No, she paints her own personal interpretation of those mountains So as an actor if you can do the same thing with a script It will never look fake because everything you're doing is coming from your true authentic self. You won't be acting You'll be living Thanks again for watching. I really love doing these videos for you guys And if you like this one Please give it a thumbs up and head on over to small market actor comm join in the conversation over there