Public Speaking Starts with “Pub” Because It Should Be As Fun As Drinking. (Responsibly!)
In the article “I CAN’T WRITE!” - Yes You Can! (Tip #1: Stop Saying That!) I started with the premise that if you are among the lucky majority of people who can speak, then the truth is that you can also write, and if you want to – or need to! – then there are some...
Making Friends with Monologues
If you wanted to frighten a group of actors with something they’d find ghastly and dreadful, you could turn to vampires, zombies, or ghosts. Or you could just tell them to prepare a monologue audition. For actors, it seems, monologues and zombies have much in common:...
Race, Oscar, Race!
There has been quite a stir in entertainment news lately as one influential actor after another tweets, or posts, their outrage at the lily-white list of Best Actor contenders that was revealed during last week’s Oscar nomination announcements. In short order the...
Dear n+1 Magazine Hartford Critic
Like the proverbial accident that one can’t turn away from, I read every word of n+1's Hartford, Connecticut article despite my disgust. I was simultaneously struck by the deftness with which it was written and the relentlessness with which it railed. So many words...
Thoughts for the Aspiring Performer That Are Practical, Kind, and True
First published on LinkedIn Pulse A fanciful dreamer can imagine a life as a performer, but it takes a bold inclination to make it happen. I myself was that way bent at a very early age, and as an acting teacher and coach I have traveled alongside countless students...
Objectives: The Key to Grounding Yourself on Stage – Part 1
This article originally appeared on LinkedIn Pulse Great! You read my previous article Verisimilitude: The Key to Good Acting, you understood that the only way for you, as an actor, to bring truthfulness to the stage is for you, as a character, to pursue wants on...
Objectives: The Key to Grounding Yourself on Stage – Part 2
This article originally appeared on LinkedIn Pulse So, did you rush right over to the library after reading Part 1 of this article, grab a copy of Death of a Salesman, find a juicy scene, and try to formulate an objective for it? No?!? Oh, that’s okay. (I was...
Lessons from My TV – Part 2
Ah, television… the “idiot box” of my youth that has become the Elysian Fields of my adulthood, where wunderkinds and veterans alike flaunt their talents in a collective output that is impressive indeed, even if, as I confessed in Part 1 of this series, Lessons from...
Lessons from My TV
Despite what I do for a living, oddly, I watch very little TV. There was a time, a long time ago, when saying that would make me appear snobbish, but nowadays, with the television landscape regularly flaunting tremendous talent and achievement, saying that makes me...
Just Say, “No.”
This post originally appeared on LinkedIn Pulse Show business is a tough nut to crack. At every turn the odds are against you, and while I find the phrase, “It’s not what you know, but who you know” to be overly caustic, it is certainly true that at times great...
To BFA or Not To BFA… That Is the Question!
Every year as summer greenery gives way to autumn polychrome, high school seniors across the country begin the panicked and puzzling process of applying to college. For those students considering - or intent on - pursuing a performance degree, the process becomes even...
Verisimilitude: The Key to Good Acting
This post originally appeared on LinkedIn Pulse. Here is a simple truism: for something to have the ring of truth it must appear as something we recognize as truthful. And here is a correlating truism: nothing speaks from the stage but truth. Nothing! Whether you are...
The 5 Audition Tips You Absolutely Want to Know! (+ a Few Bonus Tips)
This post originally appeared on LinkedIn Pulse. Whether you audition with a reader, a monologue, or with sides at your local community theater, the truth is that auditioning is a skill that is more like a cousin to acting than a brother. To be sure they are similar,...
5 More Audition Tips You Absolutely Want to Know!
This post originally appeared on LinkedIn Pulse. Auditions… like all 12 films in the Friday the 13th series they can send chills down your spine. At worst they are a necessary evil; at best they are a chance to perform (albeit briefly). In reality, they are a means to...
How to Maintain a Healthy Attitude Toward Job Interviewing
This post originally appeared on LinkedIn Pulse. Most actors know that auditions are like job interviews, but I’m not sure how many non-actors realize that the reverse is also true. Since a wannabe performer might go on more auditions in a year than most people will...
An Open Call for Opinions
Hamlet said, "...there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so," and to the depths of my soul I have always believed this to be true. In fact, I recently created a pair of customized Converse sneakers with that phrase emblazoned on the side. (Okay,...
Semicolon Use Simplified
This post originally appeared on LinkedIn Pulse. I have always liked the semicolon, the cute ocular half of a winky smiley face. Despite the great confusion it seems to cause many of its would-be users, it is actually a very straightforward punctuation mark. That...