Observations on the Art of Acting from a Non-Actor

Occasionally I break my promise not to read the comments on videos.  It wasn't a deliberate act. I was scrolling to find a link at the bottom of the page when I saw this comment under an interview with Jim Parsons of the Big Bang Theory on CBS.com:

"I find it weird when actors separate themselves from their characters."

My first thought was "Someone is very unclear about the concept of acting."  And I could be very correct about that.  But at the same time, not all actors approach the art of acting in the same way.  Jim Parsons couldn't play Sheldon Cooper if he was like Sheldon Cooper, because a personality like Sheldon could never be an actor. Parsons doesn't even have the same interests. In his own words:

I don’t feel like I’m bringing much of anything when it comes to personal experience with him. For one, he doesn’t talk about anything that I have second nature of. Not only do I not have my own language for science, but for comic books, graphic novels, most science fiction, after Star Wars. I think this has been to my benefit and allowed me to connect with him more on a humanistic level because I don’t really get what he’s talking about 90% of the time.

From http://techland.time.com/2010/09/23/big-bang-theory-the-jim-parsons-interview/2/


People like Sheldon aren't emotionally aware enough to portray a realistic and humanistic view of themselves.  You need someone like Jim Parsons, who can portray him in a way that the rest of us can understand and identify with, while still being able to recognize as someone who is quite different from ourselves.  The same thing goes for the Evil Version of Wil Wheaton on The Big Bang Theory:

When he first talked to me about working on the show, Bill Prady told me that I'd be playing a "delightfully evil version" of myself. This sounded like a lot of fun to me, but it was more difficult to find that character than you'd think. When I'm playing Fawkes on The Guild it's easy to slip into his kilt and be a jerk, but wearing my own clothes and essentially playing a stylized version of myself made it a real challenge to hit "delightfully evil" without veering into "not committed to being delightfully evil" or "just plain evil." Keeping that twinkle in my eye, and knowing that Wil Wheaton (The Big Bang Version) is planning to scam Sheldon from the moment he sits down, was essential to this particular characterization working out, and I didn't completely find it until we'd run the episode a couple of times.

During one of the run throughs, when Jim did his Klingon bit, I turned to Kevin and asked him, "Did he just say 'revenge is a dish best served cold' in Klingon?" like I was trying to figure out if that's actually what happened, like maybe I misunderstood him. Chuck Lorre told me that it would be funnier if I was more exasperated. "You're just here to play this game, and now some guy is quoting Klingon at you. This happens everywhere you go," he said.

I sighed dramatically, and said, "Oh, it does." Everyone laughed, hard, and Chuck pointed his finger at me. "Yes. That is exactly the way to play that beat."

When Chuck gave me that note, I grokked how to play Evil Wil Wheaton (The Big Bang Theory version), and I could see the comedy in every beat I played for the rest of the show. I totally grew a level in comedy acting, and learned something about letting go of who I really am, so I could embrace the Delightfully Evil version of myself (who I seriously hope will return in the future, because OMG was it fun to play him.)

From http://wilwheaton.typepad.com/wwdnbackup/2009/10/the-creepy-candy-coating-corollary.html


I think the evil version of Wheaton works because in reality, he's so not that way and is able to play a jerk because he doesn't have to be in denial that what he is doing is obnoxious.  He doesn't have to defend it or minimize it because it's not really him - it's a warped-alternate-reality him.  Of course, this is comedy, so exaggeration in proper amounts is essential for success.  This may also be why people say comedic acting is actually harder than dramatic acting.  You almost have to step outside yourself to be able to deliver these lines without becoming self-conscious about the whole thing.

Now on the other end of things, you have Viggo Mortensen who played Aragon in The Lord of the Rings.  By all accounts, Mortensen practically became Aragon. He carried his sword with him even into town and actually spent his days off riding the horses he used and even bought them because he bonded with them.  Being a dramatic actor, he goes to great lengths to become the character he's playing.  For Everybody Has a Plan, he learned his character's hobby, beekeeping.  He explains how he prepares for a role:

I think part of it is just how you prepare roles. When I prepare, I ask a simple question: “What happened between the character’s birth and page one of the script?” And right there you can find most of the answers, even before you start shooting. I find that process really enjoyable. Just like a kid does when he pretends: It doesn’t matter how little they look like a princess or an Indian or a Viking or a sports star, whatever they’re pretending to be, they really believe it. They enjoy playing, basically. So the goal is always — in a very serious, methodical, detailed, much more layered way, I suppose, intellectually, than kids use for make-believe — to get to the same place where it’s just fun and play. But you have to do your homework first, and that’s what I try to do.

From http://www.vulture.com/2013/03/viggo-mortensen-everybody-has-a-plan-interview.html

He's not kidding about being more layered.  He's not just playing Agustín in the movie, he also plays Agustín's ailing twin brother Pedro, and then plays Agustín pretending to be Pedro.  I haven't seen the movie, but based on the trailers, I don't see much of Aragon in those characters.  And let's face it, outside of cult films, an actor who can only play one character isn't going to be that successful.

Helen Mirren, who does an awesome job in both dramatic and comedic roles, approaches her craft much differently than Mortensen:

A light bulb went on in my brain. I thought, ‘That’s it! Just play what’s on the page.’ I’ve followed that ever since. If it says, ‘Over-the-hill, angry woman with no makeup gets out of bed,’ that’s what I’ll play. I don’t mess it up with, ‘What’s her back story?’

From http://www.simplyhelen.net/category/interviews/

Obviously, there are many different ways to be an actor.  You can be like Robin Williams and ad-lib when the spirit hits you, leaving the director and editors decide what fits with the story content-wise. Or you can be like Ian McDiarmid and memorize the scripts so thoroughly that you can easily change the delivery of said lines to fit the mood of the story, without derailing anything later in the plot.  It all depends on what works for you and the role you're playing.

Back to the young lady who posted the comment that started all of this musing.  While it would be easy to dismiss her as just lacking in knowledge, it's very possible that perhaps she, herself, doesn't have the capacity to separate - to imagine herself as someone much different than she is - to get inside someone else's experience.  So, it would be extremely mystifying that people can do this; she may even think that they really aren't doing what they say the are.

I'm just as guilty about this.  For over 30 years, I could never understand why people would not only eat cilantro, but relish it. To me, cilantro tastes like liquid dish soap.  I had assumed that people must have deliberately cultivated their love for the taste of soap, for reasons I couldn't fathom.  The closest I came to a reasonable explanation was to think that maybe they had their mouths washed out with soap too often as children, but that wouldn't explain the wide-spread acceptance of cilantro as a culinary mainstay. Then one day my best friend took me to a Mexican restaurant for lunch because I needed to get out of the house.  Already in a grumpy mood, I complained about the salsa dish not being rinsed out properly. She was about to ask the waiter to bring me another bowl, but I told her not to worry, I would just take my salsa from the center.  Then I tasted soap again, only this time I paused a moment and detected the taste of leaf behind it.  "Oh, it's cilantro," I said in a disgusted tone.  I then launched into my I-can't-believe-people-like-this-stuff rant, when she interrupted me with "Cilantro tastes like soap to you?" I nodded and she excitedly explained how they were discussing on her foodie mailing list that about one third of the population has a genetic tendency to taste cilantro as soap. She was extremely stoked to find out that she knew someone in real life that had this condition.  And I realized after all those years that the rest of humanity wasn't actually insane when it came to this herb, they just weren't tasting it the same way I was.

So, in answer to the woman who commented - actors separate themselves from their characters because that really is how they experience it.  Even though Jim Parsons "becomes" Sheldon for short periods of time, he's not Sheldon.  He's not a comic book geek.  He's not an arrogant physicist, who looks down on others.  He's no where near as socially clueless as Sheldon.  He's not even heterosexual.  But he can portray a character who is all of those.

And it's okay that you don't have the ability to separate from yourself and an imagined self.  I have several friends like that.  I used to think that they were like that because they were afraid of losing themselves in some way, or of weakening their moral compass.  But as I've grown older and studied more, I've found out that for some people, that's just the way their consciousness works.  Sure it frustrates the hell out of me sometimes when you're not able to understand any view different from your own, because running separate mental simulations is how I explore concepts and achieve empathy to a level that I am not naturally gifted with.  But I realize that I can be just as frustrating to you too.


I'm not sure how to exactly transition in this story into this post, but I really have the impression that it belongs here as part of the discussion of being someone else other than yourself. Many years ago, I created a persona for an online group my kids initially wanted to be a part of.  She was brash, out-spoken, devious, and a born leader.  She was also a Slytherin head of house. Even though my daughter lost interest in the online group, she liked pretending to talk to Prof. Mysteria Ester Paracelsus, and we had fun pretending together.  Then one day she came up to me, looking glum, and asked if she could talk to Mysteria.  I assumed that she just wanted to be cheered up, so I played along.  To my shock, she began to tell me about something that happened at school that upset her.  Staying in character, I gave her Mysteria's solution to such a problem - a solution that I would never advocate as her real mother.  Then I dropped the character and reminded her that I was always there for her; and that I didn't approve of the solution my alter-ego just gave.  She said, "I know, Mom.  You would have suggested (...), but I really needed to talk to someone who has no problem kicking butt."  I realized then that what she needed was a way to stand up for herself, not a way to be diplomatic and civil.

Some days, I think I need to channel Mysteria more often...

Reasons why kids are sometimes better at technology

After finishing my masters, I decided I wanted a break before going on to a doctorate program. So at the moment I'm employed doing technical troubleshooting over the phone. While in training, the truism about children being better at technology was brought up. Our trainer confirmed that children were indeed easier to troubleshoot with - because they were better at following directions and did exactly what you told them and nothing more. As a parent, this sounded rather counter to my experience; however as a technician, I've found out that she was right. More often than not, the children I've talked to (after getting the parent's permission) weren't really all that more knowledgeable than Mom and Dad. Of course, as we're often reminded, the customer who actually know what they're doing are usually the last ones to call for technical support, but still there is a pattern between the two populations.

1. Children have less preconceived ideas on how something is supposed to work. It never fails to amaze me the expectations people have of electronic equipment. Despite the fact that they have to replace light bulbs in their homes, flashlights, and cars, there are people in this day and age who still think that electronics should last forever. The fact it comes with a time-limited warantee is completely lost on them. But even more frustrating is the customer who thinks they know how a piece of equipment works and tries to jump ahead of the technician. Children don't do this. They let you tell them what the next step is - even the teenagers.

2. Children focus more on the task and less on the embarrassment. When troubleshooting with a child, there hardly ever any self-esteem problems to deal with. They feel valued just by the fact that an expert is willing to work with them.

3. Children are literal. When you ask a child what is showing on a screen, they will tell you exactly what is on there. If you ask a child if the screen says something specific, they will tell you just that and nothing more. If you ask a child what a cable looks like, they never say it's just a cable.

4. Children are open to being taught. This one is sort of a combination of the others, but I've worked with adults who showed the other traits and still failed in this one. The last thing most technicians want is a customer to keep calling back with the same problem when it is something easily fixed. Also, an educated customer is less likely to panic the next time something goes weird. Panicked customers are always difficult to troubleshoot with.

I could probably tack on that children tend to be more trusting of the technician, but that isn't necessarily why they are better at new technology. And for the record, I've dealt with senior citizens who show these traits and several of them have actually taught themselves to be technically savvy at ages that most people would not thought possible. Elderly women in particular seem good at this. I suspect it is because they don't have the preconceived idea that they have to be experts at it. So you can teach an old dog new tricks, but that can't beat old dogs who can teach themselves.

Adding another wish list

This one is just for books I want for research purposes. In other words, it's only being made public for the curious. So far I have a lot of books on art, cognition, senses, psychology, art history and color.

In particular, I also have a book on color science. This is deliberate on my part. I used to be a packaging quality assurance lab technician for a top Fortune 100 company and I had to learn color science for one of my projects. While I don't need the formulae, I do remember some very interesting science in regards to color and I would like to review it.

So here it is, for the morbidly curious, Cosmic Siren's Research Book Wishlist!

My Google Reader Feed

For those who need more stuff to read.

Mostly contains psych articles, art, some science and the occasional news item. Occasionally stuff from various blogs that I read from there. (I recently moved some of them from my LJ friends list to the RSS reader.) I have stuff from both sides of the political spectrum, so don't get all weirded out if you see some conservative, libertarian, or liberal.

Geeks can be cute too

The following videos are not being put up for their content - even though that was why I watched them - but for the reaction I got from my daughter when I insisted on watching the latest one.

Several weeks ago, I saw that Brain Cox had done a talk on what went wrong with the Large Hadron Collider. I wanted to watch it, because I hadn't bothered to read the news posts on it when it happened (doing graduate work sort of saps up your time). So, I downloaded it to my laptop and decided to watch it in the evening, before I turned in. However, my 17 year old daughter was bored and wanted us to do something together. We watched a few old TED talks and then I insisted on watching this one. She rolled her eyes and sighed an "okay".



Less than a minute into the talk, I hear a delighted squeal of "he's cute!" behind me. Not used to such talk coming from my child, I asked her to repeat it. She admitted that she thought Brian Cox was really cute. She ended up watching the video several more times, so she could draw a portrait of him.

Taking advantage of her enthusiasm, I showed her his first talk on the Large Hadron Collider:



Then I looked for him on Wikipedia, where we found out that he used to be part of a band and was only four years younger than me. It gave her mixed feelings, but who knows - maybe she actually knows something about the Large Hadron Collider now?

Okay, maybe not. But it did make me, geek mother that I am, happy to see my daughter having a crush on a physicist. I tried to get her to watch Brian Greene's talk on string theory, but she informed me that he was more my type than hers.



Well, at least I learned stuff from the talks. And my daughter doesn't have a problem with geeks and nerds.

Well...

I found out where it went and I deleted the obsolete blog, but I can't convince Google to post to this one. I might need to try this again later.

Okay, found it again. Apparently Blogger is ignoring my request to publish directly to the blog.

I'm trying to figure something out.

Basically how the "publish to blog" feature works from Google Documents. At the moment, I've posted two items and I have no idea where they are. Perhaps I have to wait for an update cycle or something.

Or maybe the stuff is being posted to somewhere else. I hope not, because it would make it a lot easier to post stuff here if I could just do it from Google Docs while working on school papers.

Geek Nirvana

As of today, I have become the answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and everything. My baby sister even gave me a towel to celebrate.

Hear the Siren

Podcast now available.

The World eBook Fair

http://www.worldebookfair.com/

The World eBook Fair welcomes you to absolutely free access to a variety of eBook unparalleled by any other source. 1/3 million eBooks await you, all free of charge for the month from July 4 - August 4, 2006, and then 1/2 million eBooks in 2007, 3/4 million in 2008, and ONE million in 2009.

She sings!

I was in a weird mood. I was going to sing "Catch a Falling Star", but then my throat began to constrict on me, so instead I sung this song from my childhood. I went ahead and posted it without listening to it, because I probably would have chickened out and deleted it otherwise.

The reability of this blog.

Check here for your blog

Readability Results for http://cosmicsiren.blogspot.com

Readability Results Summary Value
Total sentences 171
Total words 1,532
Average words per Sentence 8.96
Words with 1 Syllable 1,026
Words with 2 Syllables 319
Words with 3 Syllables 121
Words with 4 or more Syllables 66
Percentage of word with three or more syllables 12.21%
Average Syllables per Word 1.50
Gunning Fog Index 8.47
Flesch Reading Ease 71.23
Flesch-Kincaid Grade 5.55


SUMMARY OF INTERPRETATION

Typical Fog Index Scores
. . .
8 - 10 Most popular novels
. . .


The result is your Gunning-Fog index, which is a rough measure of how many years of schooling it would take someone to understand the content. The lower the number, the more understandable the content will be to your visitors. Results over seventeen are reported as seventeen, where seventeen is considered post-graduate level.

The result is an index number that rates the text on a 100-point scale. The higher the score, the easier it is to understand the document. Authors are encouraged to aim for a score of approximately 60 to 70.

The result is the Flesch-Kincaid grade level. Like the Gunning-Fog index, it is a rough measure of how many years of schooling it would take someone to understand the content. Negative results are reported as zero, and numbers over twelve are reported as twelve.

Now, I feel old...

While talking to someone, I realized that people younger than me, (which would be MOST of the people who read this site) probably don't have a clue what some of the things I talk about are. For a time reference, I learned to program in 1976 - the same year the home version of PONG became popular. (Sears got the marketing rights the year before.) Before then, it was an arcade game, like pinball, which was created in 1972. I was eight years old in '72 and didn't go to bars and pool halls. So as far as I was concerned, Pong didn't exist until Sears started doing ads for it. By that time, I was playing the text version of Star Trek and had already solved most of the Collosal Cave with my mom and sister. Watching two lines and a ball move wasn't that exciting to me.

Anyway, to help some of you all out, I found some links:

Good computer history site with pictures and a glossary of old terms. But not extensive enough in my opinion.


Teletypes similar to what my dad's first homemade computer had before he was able to snag a broken monitor and repair it. The ASR33 was the model I think we had.

Punch cards. Only when we got them, they already had holes punched in them. We used them for all sorts of crafts. At one time, people made Christmas wreaths with them.


The write-protect ring I talk about, you can find on this page. Do a CNTL-F and type in "tape". A short scroll down will show you a magnetic tape reel and the plastic ring I'm talking about.

I wanted to find a picture of the oscilloscope my dad had when I was little, but that would have taken me forever. Instead, here's a page about what an oscilloscope is.


History of the Apple II computer and Apple II text files.

If there is anything else I've mentioned that you don't get, leave a comment and I'll try to help.

Am I a real geek - part nine

Final musings.

What do you think? Am I still a real geek or am I a geek has been?

Am I a real geek - part eight

My social interactions and school life.

Am I a real geek - part seven

My current geekness and attitudes reviewed

Am I a real geek - part six

My favorite shows and books growing up.

Am I a real geek - part five.

Some ramblings about earlier computers and my current dependence on the Internet. I am getting really dizzy again, so I'm going to take more medicine and go back to bed. I might finish my series tonight or tomorrow.

Am I a real geek - part four.

Our Apple and my rant about the interview I had with Personal Computing. Still pissed about that.

Am I a real geek - part two.

The early childhood of a female geek.