By Any Means Necessary?

No one really cares how you get the results and in film and television particularly, you won’t be congratulated for doing it.

Your method, technique, way, system or approach isn’t the concern of the director, but delivering the results is yours.

It doesn’t matter how you get there, you have to be able to deliver those results in the audition, on the night or take after take.

It won’t matter to anyone else what you believe, it only matters what you can deliver.

So whatever your approach to acting, it needs to deliver:

Consistently without fuss. You can’t have half an hour to go write some notes, change your emotional prep or alter your as-if. You have until they are ready for you.

Don’t get precious about your way, if your approach consistently delivers (as opposed to delivering consistency which might become deadly to the spontaneity in your performance), then it delivers but if it a technique based on some aspect of luck, you may need some other tools in your kit, to bring out when luck isn’t on your side.

Sure I have an opinion on what approaches might work better than others, but all the industry cares about is.. Can You Do It?

A working approach must be healthy too. One that pokes around in your head might not be that healthy. Of course, the choice is yours, but far too many actors have ended up depressed or worse from over-personalisation. Take care of yourself at all costs, don’t have someone collect your Oscar posthumously. It’s not worth it. Dying for your cause might be worth it of it changes the lives of millions of people in your oppressed country but not if you are an actor.

But when you find an approach that you connect with, really study it hard, question it, test it, look for its weaknesses and yours.

Over the course of your career, all techniques merge, and your approach, idiosyncratic and personal emerges.