A Life-coaching Approach to Screen Acting

Acknowledgements ix

Introduction 1

PART ONE WHAT IS HOLDING YOU BACK? 5

1 Get Out of Your Own Way 7

2 Values and Fulfi lment 11
Identify your values 13
Fulfi lment 14
The wheel of life 15

3 Saboteurs and Limiting Beliefs 16
Saboteur words and phrases 17
Limiting beliefs 19
A note on your inner critic 20
Use of language 21
Fear 23
Getting help from your captain 23

4 The Impostor Syndrome 25
What can you do about it? 27
Some quotes from people you may respect 28

5 Perfectionism 30

PART TWO MOVING FORWARDS 35
6 Confi dence, Success, Perspective and Reframing 37
Confi dence 37
Success 39
Perspective 41
Reframing 42

7 Learning Something New 44
The four stages of learning and creating new habits 44
Believe you can develop 45
What are habits and how do they form? 46
Neuroplasticity 46
The theory of marginal gains 48

8 Trust and Creativity 50
Trust list 52

PART THREE AS YOU ARE MOVING TOWARDS SOMEONE ELSE 53

9 Screen Experience 55
10 Focus and Concentration 58
Milestones and anchors 60
11 Emotions 63
Pushing and indicating - trying too hard 67
Affective memory 67

12 Imagination 70

13 Listening 74

14 Nerves and Nervousness 77

15 Lines and Learning Them 80
The potential limitations of actioning 84
Playing stakes and consequences 85
Some ways people learn lines - a non-exhaustive list 86

16 Adjusting Your Vocal Levels 88
Volume 88
Speed 90

17 Size Matters 92
Less is more 92

PART FOUR TOOLS TO LIVE SOMEONE ELSE'S LIFE 97

18 The Inner Actor and Inner Character 99

19 Truth: It All Starts With You (and a Little About Method Acting) 105
Method acting 107

20 The Senses and Sense Memory 111
A sense of place 113

21 Thinking and the Inner Monologue 119
Thinking and the eyes 120
A kaleidoscope of thought 120
A third entity 122
Inner monologue 123

22 Improvise and Personalize 128

23 Meet Your Character 135

24 Mind, Body and Soul (Thought,
Physiology and Emotion) 136
The pressure cooker 137
Emotion through physical manipulation 138
Keep it simmering 141

25 Wrapping It Up 142

Appendices 143

References 155

List of Video and Audio Links 157

Index 158