Doing 2 Takes For a Self-Taped Audition 

If you can achieve the same emotional content and intent of your character WITHOUT any indication of the hug, then eliminate the hug all together. Same goes for any other physicality in a scene. If it MUST stay, then to the minimum. I would frame such that when you’re giving the hug, your don’t see much below your collarbone or mid chest. Then, instead of hugging the air, hug yourself low around the belly. Just keep it simple.

You’re so welcome. Thanks for watching!

You are so welcome! Glad it was helpful!

Thanks, Makala. Glad it was helpful!

Thanks for the tip, but our engagement is pretty respectable, even for the longer vids. That said, I totally get it when I'm on other channels watching content, and my attention span doesn't always keep me around. We're serving a pretty niche audience, though, so not many people will randomly get baited into watching these vids unless they're already invested in the answer...

You’re welcome. Thanks for watching!

That’s great Joe!

So I’m guessing you never made it to the 90sec point in the video? I make it abundantly clear that your authenticity needs to exist within the context of all research you do. And if you talk to enough CDs, they’ll reiterate that they WANT to be surprised by you being You. It’s the one thing that takes all that research that every actor is doing and ensures that you don’t do a cookie-cutter imitation of a stereotype. It’s why at dozens of these Q&As (and more recently on Clubhouse) you hear the same phrase repeated: “we want an authentic read”. And your final point supports our POV in a way. We firmly believe that the core essence of you is exactly what they want and need. We believe that great acting is not putting on a mask, but stripping down to your core humanity. That is still challenging, depending on the script and role size. And when an actor gets out of their own way, empowers themself to be authentic, and allows their own unique humanity to shine through, it’s intoxicating. Here’s a quick example. There’s no possible way you can be Heath Ledger’s Joker. That’s Heath. And even though that role took a lot of stretching, that is still a unique part of Heath’s humanity that makes that performance feel real. If you try to “stretch” into an approximation of his performance, you’ll look inauthentic. Think of “stretching” in the literal sense. When you stretch a muscle, it doesn’t become something different. You don’t add matter or take it away, you just create more possibilities. But from the same lump of muscle fibers.

Glad it resonated with you, Mike. Thanks for watching. Here’s to hoping next year is more “Yeah!” and less “Blah”. 🙂

Indeed!