So after a 10 year gap, I just completed my second course on Method acting. My actor’s journey actually began with Method in about 2009. At the time, I had gotten the co-lead in a high budget short film, and thought that that was a good reason to officially begin training. As there was no way to study acting in English in Tokyo at that time (at least insomuch as I knew) I took what little cash I had and hired what seemed like a reputable Method acting coach from the Bay Area who said that she could work with actors abroad through Skype.
Looking back on it now, I could see that she was probably just bitter for personal reasons (or maybe she was just in a bad point in life), but whatever the reason, she wasn’t strict, she was just plain mean. Case in point, in the very first lesson,I told her “I was recently cast in the co-lead for a short film, and I don’t want to go into this with no formal training.” to which she replied, “Why in the f*ck would you take a lead role if you aren’t a trained actor?!” She seemed downright angry about it.
Having already paid for it and no previous experience of studying acting, I decided to see it through to the end, (although she never bothered to show up for the last lesson) but it was just a painful experience all around. Especially because Method involves deep exploration of inner feelings, past trauma and your own deep
psyche.
After that, over the course of the next ten years I put all of my energy into the physical side of acting; action, stunts, stage combat, etc. but it wasn’t until I signed up for this course that I realized how much dread and apprehension I had developed about formally studying acting. Despite that though, the draw and the desire to act never faded. I had done my first actor’s audition when I was 15, (I auditioned for Saved by the Bell) at the same time I started Taekwondo, and I had always wanted more... despite my continual branding myself on the action and stunt side of things, since then, I had always always continued to get and do acting work. So much in fact that if you look at my IMDB page, to this day I have more acting credits than stunts, and among Tokyo agencies I developed a reputation as “a good actor” even though I generally labeled myself as a stunt guy.
Not too long ago though, while playing one of the main characters on a reinactment drama, I met a fantastically talent method actress and asked where she had studied. Through her, I was introduced to a coach based out of NY. Despite my dread, I knew that the only way to progress was through proper training and I signed up, while she was here in Tokyo. Over the course of 9 hours of concentrated study with her, I felt more evolution as an actor than I had in years of reading books and studying on my own. I immediately booked her again before she left the country. After the course, I came to the conclusion that studying acting through books and then trying to work on set is like trying to learn a martial art through a book and then just stepping into the ring. Yes, you are better off reading than not; but the different between having a proper coach or not is just night and day. As she comes to Tokyo fairly regularly, she has agreed to keep an ongoing relationship with me which is awesome... and it means for the first time ever, I am finally stepping into this ring with a regular coach.
Before she left Tokyo, I told her that I regretted losing the past ten years because I hadn’t sought out proper training; and she replied “You didn’t lose anything. In this time you have become a master of the physical side of the equation; now you have the opportunity to master acting and integrate them.”
This year, I already did a major stunt for the most anticipated Japanese movie of the year, and now after her coaching, I just landed a dramatic speaking role in a different film of the same scale. Whether I set out to be or not, I’ve always been both an actor and a stuntman, and not it finally feels like I am fully walking both paths.
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