My Top 10 Little-Known Theatre Acting Secrets for Aspiring Actors: What Drama Schools Don’t Tell You
It’s opening night. The lights dim, and the mumbling from the audience vanishes into silence. Finally, the curtain rises. Your heartbeats grow in intensity as you step onto the stage.
Aspiring actors dream of this moment. But the path to the stage and mastering the craft of a stage actor is often mysterious, especially if you’re, like I was, an outsider in terms of knowledge and contacts. My parents weren’t actors; honestly, I didn’t know anyone in the industry who could guide me.
I understand some things today, acting tips that could have saved me years of training if I had known them from the start.
The tricky thing about acting is that you must experience it with your body. You can’t rely on a theoretical understanding and expect to master it.
That being said, some concepts will get you far ahead. And by adopting the right mindset, you can save a lot of time in your acting career. Many of these ideas are also reminders to myself that I continue practicing.
While drama schools offer valuable training, you must first be admitted to one, which can be challenging. Then, there are many things drama schools, teachers, and casting directors don’t tell you. At the same time, knowledgeable casting directors won’t have the time or knowledge to inform you.
Today, I’m pulling back the curtain to share my top 10 little-known acting secrets – insights many drama schools overlook. Let’s dive in!
1. Don’t Focus on Your Emotions
Many beginner actors believe that displaying emotions and crying on demand is an essential skill. They probably draw inspiration from their favorite films, theatre productions, and memorable scenes.
But it’s one of the biggest misconceptions that you must be deeply in touch with your emotions. Believing that being emotional is equivalent to good acting – it’s just a tiny part of a character’s expression.
The only situation when I might focus on my emotions is in the preparation stage.
Then, if absolutely vital, I might try to find an experience from my life similar to what the character is experiencing and go through that emotion through meditation and visualization techniques. However, this rarely happens.
The last time I did this was when I had to perform a car crash scene in a commercial, sitting with my dead friend’s body in my hands.
Focusing on them during a theatre performance will only detract from your acting because it’s not part of your character’s inner goals.
Just like in real life, in what scenario would you actively try to make yourself cry?
Well, probably never, right? Unless you are trying to manipulate another person for some reason. And sure, if that’s what your character is trying to do – go for it. But that rarely is the action your character is pursuing.
PRO TIP: The audience will become occupied by, what you are focusing on as an actor.
So, what is an action? It’s your character’s objectives. Understanding actions and goals is fundamental to modern acting techniques and script analysis. It’s out of the scope of this article, but I will discuss this further in another post.
Different directors and casting directors understand this on various levels. But knowing your character’s motivations is your task, not theirs.
So when preparing for a role, you should look at the script and ask yourself:
- What does my character want in this scene?
- How is my character using their lines trying to get it?
- What is my character’s overall goal in the entire scope of the story?
A good character-driven story impacts the audience through characters fighting to achieve something existentially vital to them.
Emotions usually follow naturally if you focus on your character’s actions and goals.
The point is that emotions are not the goal. Some nights, I feel many emotions when I’m on stage, and other days, I’m empty. And that’s the beauty of live performances.
2. Be Open and Flexible
Being open and flexible in the rehearsal room or on a film set is a crucial and often overlooked skill among many beginners. The truth is that people want to work with actors who are open, positive, generous, and easy to be around.
It’s not always the most competent actors that get the job. It’s more about likability and your vibe.
Unlike the polished performances audiences see on stage, rehearsals are a time of exploration, experimentation, and sometimes beautiful mistakes. To create the right atmosphere in the rehearsal process, the actors need to adopt the right mindset.
Stage acting is about creating together with your colleagues. That’s how characters are born, your story is born, relationships are forged, and the true essence of a play is discovered.
Theater is a collective art form. You are part of shaping the atmosphere where ideas can flourish.
In essence, this means you adopt an affirmative mindset by:
- Being attentive to your fellow actors’ interpretations
- Listening to stage directions
- Being flexible regarding your ideas and wants
3. Stillness & Silence
In general, a natural instinct for beginner stage actors when wanting to draw attention is to do more and speak louder, meaning at a higher volume and with rapid movement.
And I get it; you want to be an essential part of the cast and the story. But in general, you become more powerful in your presence when doing the opposite. So, one of my best tips is the old mantra: less is more.
This involves:
Active Listening
Fully concentrate on what your fellow actors are saying and doing rather than just waiting for your cue to speak. It allows for more natural, reactive performances, leading to exciting, spontaneous moments on stage.
Understanding Subtext
Carefully try to sense the subtext in your co-actors delivery. This will allow you to respond not just to their words but also to their underlying emotions and motivations.
Asking Clarifying Questions
If you don’t understand a direction, don’t be afraid to ask for clarification. It’s better to seek understanding than to misinterpret and waste rehearsal time.
Balancing Interpretation With Direction
While bringing your ideas to a role is essential, incorporating a director’s vision into your performance is a valuable skill. It’s about finding the sweet spot between your instincts and the overall vision for the production.
Sometimes its more productive to stay quiet and still. Both in rehearsals and in front of the audience.
4. Don’t Pretend to Be Somebody Else
One common pitfall is pretending to be someone entirely different when playing a character, going too far into your character interpretation, and trying to change your voice and body expression to fit an imagined character.
What usually happens is that you lose your presence in the process. And the audience will have a more challenging time connecting with you.
Seasoned actors trained in physical and vocal expression might be able to do this. However, as a beginner, it is not advised because it limits your expression too much.
Your natural expression
Instead, bring yourself and your natural expression into the role. Use your body memory to put yourself in a familiar state. Find aspects of your character that resonate with your experiences, beliefs, and emotions.
This connection will make your portrayal genuine and relatable.
The audience wants to see a real person on stage, not a caricature. By infusing your unique qualities into the character, you create an authentic and compelling performance. The audience will relate on a subconscious level.
5. It’s All About Having Fun & Being Playful
I’ve spent a total of six years in theater schools. Many times, I’ve wondered why the heck I’m crawling around on the floor pretending to be a snake or jumping around like a squirrel, not quite understanding what it all has to do with acting and performing.
Thinking I could spend my time better by rehearsing scenes similar to those I’ve seen in my favorite movies or plays.
Engaging in these seemingly childish exercises, can be very beneficial for your future abilities as an actor.
Here’s why:
Acting is About Physical Instinct
Being able to act from your gut rather than your head. Those exercises encourage that type of playfulness.
Freeing up Your Expression
You want to become as free as possible from self-censorship, both physically and mentally. That will make your expression on stage more interesting.
Letting Go
As an actor, you need to practice letting go—in auditions and on stage. It’s not all up to you. The director is ultimately responsible for the story, so you need to trust that the story and the team are doing their job. When you are too focused on results, you can’t be creative.
6. The Magic of Truly Knowing Your Lines
This advice might seem obvious. But in all honesty, I didn’t take it seriously for years. Until an older, more seasoned actor I was working with on a play told me:
“The thing that separates a good performance from a really good performance, is the split second the former is using to remember the lines.”
That’s really true because on stage, you need to focus outside yourself in order to be present and fully engage with your fellow actors. The split second you use to return within yourself and retrieve that line will remove you from your presence.
In return, this affects your entire performance because it directly correlates to your timing. And puts you back into “the thinking mind.”
Step outside your mind
While performing on stage, we generally want to think as little as possible. The same is true for an audition when working in a film production or auditions.
Arthur Miller famously said:
“The theater is so endlessly fascinating because it’s so accidental.”
You allow “accidents” to happen when you deliver lines by instinct rather than thought.
I will explore learning lines and the technique of doing so in another article. It’s one of the technical elements of acting that is vital and useful to harness to become a compelling performer in a production.
7. Physicality Beyond the Script
Acting is Not Only Speaking
It’s more about physicality. Your facial expression, gestures, energy, mood, and movements all impact your character’s portrayal and expression.
Even if the script doesn’t specify physical actions, and your director tells you to speak in a certain way and doesn’t mention your physicality. You should still try to think about how your character would move in the space and interact with their surroundings because the audience receives a lot more with their eyes than ears.
The Room
A stage actor needs to think about the space more than a film actor because you compose the image the audience sees. By incorporating the room and your physicality, you add another layer to the story and give reasons for using your lines.
Your director will love you for suggestions that make the fiction come alive.
PRO TIP: Showing up with relevant suggestions for a rehearsal is one thing that separates amateurs from professional actors.
Physical Obstacles
Consider your character’s goals in each scene and try to think of a way to create physical obstacles for them. You can discuss this with your director or even the costume designer. Dress rehearsals are great for seeing how your costume empowers you on stage.
The Stage Design is Your Friend
Explore the possibilities of stage design with the director. A skilled set designer will think a lot about how the actors can use the design as a tool for expression that nurtures the performance.
If you don’t have a stage designed with physical movement in mind, you can create your own circumstances by using a chair or even a tiny object like a pen. It’s all about using the current space you are inside, just like we do in real life.
PRO TIP: Words are the result of an inner need for expression starting inside you.
8. Variety and Dynamic Performances
Predictable Performances
Human beings are programmed to detect changes in the environment. Things that stand out from expected patterns of behavior attract our attention.
Imagine, for instance, sitting in a library by yourself, reading. If you saw another person looking through books on a nearby shelf, you would probably not react, right? But if someone suddenly starts dancing salsa, you will undoubtedly notice.
Why? Because it breaks the expectation and goes against the patterns of behavior you are expecting in that moment, place, and time.
As beginners, it is easy to fall into the trap of looking at your performance from a literal, story-focused perspective. Even stage directions from experienced directors can lack this perspective. But if we only focus on the literal meaning of a scene, our performance can become static and boring. Dynamic changes in pattern make you heard all the way to the back row.
Tools for Rhythm & Breaking Patterns
For example, an actor might say, “I’m playing Romeo, who is in love with Julie.” And that’s what this story is about.
While valid, the audience experiences the story and your performance on a rhythmical, musical level, meaning they won’t hear every word in your monologue. Instead, they hear the nuances and changes in your performance. And their brains react when you are dynamic and act in unexpected ways.
You can achieve this though:
The changes in your pitch, tone, and volume
The changes in your bodily and verbal tempo
The changes in your subtext (the meaning behind your words)
The changes in your tools to achieve your goal (best described with a verb like encourage, tease, mock)
The key takeaway here is change. As a helpful tool and concept that all storytelling centers around. A story evolves over time, starting from the changes within a scene and continuing over the development of the act.
That applies to acting as well. So, make sure to change your expression throughout the performance.
PRO TIP: The final next step is to make that change unexpected, by letting it flow naturally from the moment. To the degree that you're not even expecting the changes yourself.
9. Embracing Vulnerability
Stepping onto a professional stage, or any stage for that matter, can be a daunting task, even for a professional stage actor. People have paid to be entertained and are expecting a high-level performance.
As humans, our instinct is to close down and protect ourselves in such a situation. That’s what happens when we are being judged and observed, and having stage fright is, therefore, a completely natural reaction to the situation.
But you need to open up instead of closing down, meaning – you need to move against your instincts.
That is why stage acting is such a challenging job, yet extremely liberating once you get the hang of it.
To do this, you need to embrace Vulnerability. Being vulnerable on stage means being open, even if uncomfortable.
This could mean allowing yourself to feel ugly, weak, or small or simply speaking in a tone you don’t feel comfortable with in real life. It could also mean allowing yourself to feel like you want to hide.
Because once you allow those emotions, they can pass through you. And you eventually become relaxed. While at the same time, you are letting the audience in on your experience.
Directors and casting directors will notice this and value your effort.
In life, we might benefit from being strong and grounded in our presence. However, stable characters who are unaffected by their surroundings are boring on stage. (Unless they are minor roles whose sole purpose for being in the play or film is for the main characters to bounce off from them.)
It’s about creating inner movement and allowing yourself to lose control. The audience doesn’t want to see somebody projecting their own self-image upon them. Rather, they want to see stage acting with characters throwing themselves into an unknown situation and dealing with it unknowingly of potential outcomes.
10. Watch a Lot of Theatre
To grow as an actor, immerse yourself in the world you want to participate in. Watch as many performances as you can, not only to study other actors but also to discover your taste in the medium.
Understanding what resonates with you will help you develop your unique style and preferences, which is critical to your progress.
When I look at theatre, I ask myself questions like:
- What exactly makes me like the performance of that actor?
- Why am I not present while looking at this play?
Be specific in your answers. Saying that something is good or bad is for amateurs.
You are trying to decode performances. Not by judging but by being articulate and specific. A
You might find things like: “This actor has a pacing that appeals to me.” Or: “How she delivers her lines feels natural and unforced.” Or “This play is boring because the characters mainly talk about the past. I prefer plays that use a first-person perspective, acting out events in the moment.”
One day, your superpower will be knowing what theater style you want to create. Exposing yourself to various genres will also give you insights into different storytelling methods and acting styles.
Conclusion
In the competitive world of theater, standing out in auditions and growing a career require more than talent; it demands a deep curiosity and a willingness to expand one’s own limits.
With the right mindset, you can make this into an exciting path of discovery rather than a struggle.
Live theater and acting demand that you lend your life to the story. Which is challenging on many levels, but it also lets you grow as a human being. So, as you advance in your acting, your personal life improves along the way.
I’ve always seen theatre as my second parent. Its taught me so many things about life, about being a human and understanding other people. Both through the stories you discover in each production, but also thorough the self discovery innate in the craft.
By incorporating these little-known secrets into your stage and film acting, you can elevate your progress and act confidently on stage, in the audition room, and in dress rehearsal.
Keep exploring, experimenting, and refining your skills!
