Acting Emotions

Actors and actresses play characters such as the embittered Medea, or the lovelorn Romeo, or the grieving and tearful Hecabe. The theatre audience holds its breath, and then sparks begin to fly. But what about the actor? Has he been affected by the emotions of the character he is playing? What'sgoing on inside his mind? The styling of emotions in the theatre has been the subject of heated debate for centuries. In fact, Diderot in his Paradoxe sur le comedien, insisted that most brilliant actors do not feel anything onstage. This greatly resembles the detached acting style associated with Bertolt Brecht, which, in turn, stands in direct opposition to the notion of the empathy-oriented "emotional reality" of the actor which is most famously associated with the American actingstyle known as method acting. The book's survey of the various dominant acting styles is followed by an analysis of the current state of affairs regarding the psychology of emotions. By uniting the psychology of emotions with contemporary acting theories, the author is able to come to the conclusion that traditional acting theories are no longer valid for today's actor. Acting Emotions throws new light on the age-old issue of double consciousness, the paradox of the actor who must nightly express emotions while creating the illusion of spontaneity. In addition, the book bridges the gap between theory and practice by virtue of the author's large-scale field study of the emotions of professional actors. In Acting Emotions, the responses of Dutch and Flemish actors is further supplemented by the responses of a good number of American actors. The book offers a unique view of how actors act out emotions and how this acting out is intimately linked to the development of contemporary theatre.

Based on the latest research from the fields of neuroscience and mind-body psychology, Acting With Passion offers a revolutionary new approach to the age-old problems of the actor: dealing with nerves, engaging the body, quieting the inner critic, auditioning, creating a character, and even playing comedy. With this step-by-step guide, actors who have struggled with 'visualization' and 'emotional recall' can learn an alternative method of accessing feelings through the release of chronic, subtle muscular tensions that connect into the brain at lightning fast speed and can actually produce emotions on cue. Written with verve and accessibility, and using practical exercises to guide the actor through each stage, Acting With Passion is the must-have text for actors seeking that magical 'state of aliveness'.

Amy Lyndon is Hollywood's Premiere Booking Coach and creator of the revolutionary Lyndon Technique: The 15 Guideline Map To Booking Handbook. Besides being a Coach and Mentor, she is also an Actress, Award Winning Director, Producer, Casting Director, and was a CEO of a successful Personal Management Company for 9 years. Her clients are Series Regulars, Guest Leads and Starring in Feature Films around the globe. Some of her Clients include: Nadine Velazquez (My Name is Earl), Adam Brody (The OC), Christel Khalil (The Young and the Restless), Hosea Chanchez (The Game), Sterling Knight (Sonny with a Chance), Kenton Duty (Shake It Up), Matthew J. Evans (Bad Teacher) and Raini Rodriquez (Austin and Ally). Lyndon won one of the Best Cold Reading Teachers in Los Angeles Backstage Magazine 2010, 2011 and 2012! The Lyndon Technique proves to be a practical approach to auditioning and booking the job on the first take. Each chapter provides detailed insight into each of Lyndon's 15 Guideline Map to Booking Technique. Lyndon travels Internationally to teach the principles of Booking, Marketing and running a successful business as an Actor. The information is applicable no matter where you live or where you are in your career.

In film, television and theatre, scripts often demand that actors reach intense emotional places. Great actors know how to personalize these emotions. They make them real, they make them specific, and they make us remember them. This book demystifies the process by breaking it down into simple, straightforward technique. For the first time in an acting book, artists are given the opportunity to improve their emotional intelligence with extensive exercises and a format for writing down important details and discoveries.

In Performing Emotions, Peta Tait's central argument is that performing emotions in realism is also performing gender identity. This study integrates scholarship on realist drama, theatre and approaches to acting, with interdisciplinary theories of emotion, phenomenology and gender theory. With chapters devoted to masculinity and femininity specifically, as well as to emotions generally, it investigates social beliefs about emotions through Chekhov's four major plays in translation, and English language commentaries on Constantin Stanislavski's direction (of the play's first productions) and his approaches to acting, and Olga Knipper's acting of the central women characters. Tait demonstrates how theatrical emotions are predicated on embodied social performances and create cultural spaces of emotions. Performing Emotions investigates how sexual difference impacts on the representations of emotions. The book develops an accumulative analysis of the meanings of emotions in twentieth century realist drama, theatre and acting.

The Invisible Actor presents the captivating and unique methods of the distinguished Japanese actor and director, Yoshi Oida. While a member of Peter Brook's theatre company in Paris, Yoshi Oida developed a masterful approach to acting that combined the oriental tradition of supreme and studied control with the Western performer's need to characterise and expose depths of emotion. Written with Lorna Marshall, Yoshi Oida explains that once the audience becomes openly aware of the actor's method and becomes too conscious of the actor's artistry, the wonder of performance dies. The audience must never see the actor but only his or her performance. Throughout Lorna Marshall provides contextual commentary on Yoshi Oida's work and methods. In a new foreword to accompany the Bloomsbury Revelations edition, Yoshi Oida revisits the questions that have informed his career as an actor and explores how his skilful approach to acting has shaped the wider contours of his life.

Acting Face to Face: the Actor's Guide to Understanding How Your Face Communicates Emotion for TV and Film is the first book to define the significant difference between acting for the stage and acting for the camera. That difference being how your face communicates thought, feeling and emotion. The actor who has the tools and skills to create and control how and what their face communicates is the actor most suited to work in front of the camera. Acting Face to Face is also the first book in a series about the "Language of the Face" - or how the face communicates nonverbally. The book is particularly useful for actors transitioning from stage to screen, by clearly defining the difference. On stage, you communicate with your body and voice; on camera you need to add a third means of communication - your face. When you understand this difference, you also understand why only a small percentage of actors get the majority of on-camera work. Acting Face to Face reveals the tools you'll need to level the playing field.Acting Face to Face exposes the myths and misconceptions about on-camera while addressing some of the major challenges most actors face when relying solely on their stage acting training to work in front of the camera. The book contains detailed photos and experiential exercises; it also helps you understand how you personally communicate and what's missing or misunderstood about your facial expressions, so you can take your acting to the next level.After working with thousands of actors and studying the work of leading researchers in the field of emotions for over 10 years, John Sudol - a veteran actor, director, casting director, Hollywood acting teacher and audition coach - has developed this book series, which stands to change the face of acting.Though developed specifically for actors, this book is also helpful to anyone in the communications business who would benefit from knowing how their face nonverbally speaks to others.* The second book of the Language of the Face series, Acting Face to Face 2, How to Create Genuine Emotion for the Camera is now available. Whereas the first Acting Face to Face defined the challenges of On-Camera Acting, Acting Face to Face 2, reveals a step-by-step process to overcoming those challenges.

The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Literary Studies applies developments in cognitive science to a wide range of literary texts that span multiple historical periods and numerous national literary traditions.

Based on the latest research from the fields of neuroscience and mind-body psychology, Acting With Passion offers a revolutionary new approach to the age-old problems of the actor: dealing with nerves, engaging the body, quieting the inner critic, auditioning, creating a character, and even playing comedy. With this step-by-step guide, actors who have struggled with 'visualization' and 'emotional recall' can learn an alternative method of accessing feelings through the release of chronic, subtle muscular tensions that connect into the brain at lightning fast speed and can actually produce emotions on cue. Written with verve and accessibility, and using practical exercises to guide the actor through each stage, Acting With Passion is the must-have text for actors seeking that magical 'state of aliveness'.