Practical Acting Summary

This author thoroughly enjoyed the article, “Practical Acting” in the April 2015 edition of Dramatics Magazine by Jon Jory, going so far to place one of the quotes in his classroom, the school’s call board and the adjoining classroom. According to Jory (2015) “If learning lines perfectly is too much work then you don’t have the will and the drive to be an actor or, unfortunately, almost anything else.” (pg. 14). Most often this teacher finds it hard to read many of the magazines passing through his in-box however this article was attention grabbing and quote worthy. It is one of the few acting articles this director requires all his cast performers to read and he examined before the requirement of the Summer MA Program. Jory breaks down the fundamentals of acting in an accessible, humorous, easy to follow
82). Giving a student actor humorous imagery is an excellent way to link the memory of the step to an easily recalled example of, taking a shower with all your clothes on, as a way to recall what it is like to be in a heavy rain storm. Emotions: In this section Jory (2015) gives some of the best advice to student actors, “… you don’t have to pretend to have emotions.” (pg, 15) He postulates that if you follow “Want and Circumstances” the emotions may or may not come but to fake emotions is as bad as “Soy Ice-cream” This is echoing Bruder (1986) speaking of being in the moment and using the emotions of the others in the scene and organically produced in the performer. (pg. 42) Variety: Jory laments concerning variety “…is the most neglected in American acting” (pg. 15) Jory recommends sometimes talking quickly or slowly, sometimes loud sometimes softly. Variety in speech will help to keep your audience awake. He clarifies his meaning of variety to keep the young actors from flailing about the acting space with the