Brian Timoney - Method Acting

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Aly
I will be posting various information on the acting technique that Brian Timoney teaches. He sends regular emails to my address, and if you'd also like to receive them, Brian's website is at the bottom of this page. I hope this is of some use to many of you.



Welcome to my Method Acting Tips Report. As you may be aware, 'The Method' is used by many of the top creative actors of our time. In my own journey as an actor, I was intrigued by how these actors achieved such an exceptional standard of acting. This led me to study The Method with some of the leading method tutors in the world.

I am now considered to be the UK's Leading Expert on Method Acting and mine is the only Actors' Studio in the UK to solely teach Lee Strasberg's Method Acting approach on a full-time basis. I have been featured on the BBC and in The Sunday Express and The Stage.

To give you a feel for the approach, I have outlined some practical exercises for you to try out and consider within your acting.

1. Develop Your Concentration

A high level of concentration is essential to enable top quality acting. Concentration triggers your belief, impulses and imagination.
Concentration is not abstract. Often you will hear teachers or directors telling actors to concentrate and focus, but what on? You have to concentrate on something real and something specific this evokes real thought. Not phony or pretend thinking, but real thought.

To build concentration and belief in what we are doing, the first exercise we tackle in The Method is the Sense Memory exercise.

2. Sense Memory Exercise

It is understood that we perceive the world through our senses. We see, we hear, we smell, we touch, we taste. This is what stimulates us as human beings. It's also understood that the memory of these senses can affect us. We have all felt hungry and thought of our favourite food and started to salivate, or heard a song that has reminded us of a relationship we once had. Our memories are strongly linked to our senses.

To develop your concentration and sense memory, begin with this simple exercise.

The Breakfast Drink - Recall what you drink first thing in the morning, in intricate detail. Close your eyes and recreate in your mind's eye the room that you have the drink in - really see it, smell it, touch it, hear it. Then bring your attention to the drink - and slowly start to drink - really concentrating on the senses. Try this for 15-20 minutes. Then choose a monologue you have learned by heart and start to say the lines whilst thinking about the drink. The drink is the main focus of concentration - the lines are secondary.

You must ensure that you are truly focused on the drink. Test this by continually asking sense questions internally to yourself such as, ‘How hot or cold is it?' 'What is the cup made of?' 'How does it taste?' at the same time as saying the lines. Tricky I know, but it will have a significant effect on the believability of the lines. The reason for this is that the experience of the drink is real to you - you believe in the drink. This belief then starts to transcend into the words of the character.

3. Overall Sensation Exercise

In the same way as the breakfast drink, try an overall sensation sense memory. Ok, this part can be a bit uncomfortable, but take a cold shower...for real. Then later try and recreate that event in your mind's eye. Use all your senses to relive the cold shower. Once you have done this for 15-20 mins, try saying the lines from a monologue, whilst recreating the experience of the cold shower. This will have quite an impact on your senses, and will impact the way that you say the lines significantly.

This exercise, once again, trains the senses and concentration. Also, because it's a real event that you have actually experienced and believe in, that belief transcends into the lines.

4. Personal Object Exercise

Ok, you're probably getting the hang of this by now. This time, identify a personal object from your own life that has significant meaning to you. Take the object and really focus on it. Investigate it from a sense point of view. How does it look, smell, taste, feel and sound? Whilst doing this, start to say the lines from a monologue. Do nothing more other than investigate the object in intricate detail in your mind's eye and say the lines. The memory of the object will impact the way that you say the lines of the character.

5. The Animal Exercise

This exercise is relatively famous within the technique. It requires you to humanise an animal's physicality to recreate a new physicality for a character. If you look at Marlon Brando's performance in The Godfather, he plays a bulldog or in A Streetcar Named Desire you can see that he plays an ape.

Pick a wild animal that you think could have similarities to your character. Go to the zoo and study the animal physically. Study in detail how it moves, eats and sleeps. Then at home, physically recreate the animal to the best of your ability. Once you've done this for a while, stand up and humanise the animal. How would it walk and move if it were human?

You can take this further by looking at the physiological traits of the animal. For example, Rhinos get a reputation for being bad-tempered and they tend to charge at things. The reason for this is that they are short-sighted and feel frightened when they cannot make out what is approaching - so they charge to protect themselves. This would be an interesting trait within a character.

6. Identify the Character Needs

It's of prime importance to identify what your character NEEDS. Why is this important? Well, characters and humans in general go after what they need. It's a very active approach. To get what we want, we have to take action. If you understand this within the character, then it makes it easier for you, the actor, to take creative actions to get what the character really needs.

All of these exercises encourage you to get creatively involved with the character and lessen worries or concerns about failing in front of an audience. They replace these negative thoughts with creative real thoughts that expose the character and their experiences.


In the coming weeks, I'll be sending more acting tips, advice and information.

To ensure you receive your Acting Success Tips please add this email to your address book [email protected] - For instructions on how to do this please click here: http://www.briantimoneyacting.co.uk/whitelist.html

Best wishes

Brian Timoney

Providing Professional Method Acting Training to Increase Your Ability and Advance Your Acting Career

www.briantimoneyacting.co.uk

Brian Timoney Actors’ Studio Ltd
55 East Road
London
N1 6AH

Posted: 2009-07-14 19:45:12
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