Acting Business Boot Camp

"Teaching is just rehearsal, it is desensitizing the instrument, actor, the artist, to get them to come out to play."

If you want to be in the major leagues, you gotta training with people who are on the level of the major leagues.

The importance of having a life.

Never stop training

Remain humble about where you are as an artist so you are constantly striving.

You can't say that you're done learning.

The key to staying sharp— read!

• Things not in the field
• Articles
• Newspapers
• Things in the field
• Be a researcher

If you're not a reader and if you're not someone who's willing to say I don't know how I learn as an adult, I know how I'm taught as a student until you figure out that switch, you have less power.

You have to find things that as an actor you are drawn to.

If you don't know what you like, you are basically just prey to anyone telling you what to do.

Don't be that actor who just shows up after all the words are written.

Two types of actors:

1. That show up expecting to be given things
2. Those that say, "I know what I want and what I like and now I have to find a way to meet you and your ideas with as much thought as my own"

If you can be clear and memorable and open and available then I will go toward you.

How to approach Co-star and Guest Star auditions

I AM FEAR by Lou Tice

I am Fear. I am the menace that lurks in the paths of

Life, never visible to the eye but sharply felt in the heart.

I am the father of despair, the brother of procrastination,

The enemy of progress, the tool of tyranny.

Born of ignorance and nursed in misguided thought,

I have darkened more hopes, stifled more ambitions,

Shattered more ideals and prevented more

Accomplishments than history could record.

Like the changing chameleon, I assume many disguises.

I masquerade as caution. I am sometimes known as

Doubt or worry. But whatever I am called, I am still

Fear, the obstacle of achievement.

I know no master but one; is name is Understanding.

I have no power but what the human mind gives me,

And I vanish completely when the light of understanding

Reveals facts as they really are, for

I am really nothing.

Awareness, acceptance, and action.

Where do you feel fear?

When do I use fear for healthy reasons, and when do I use fear for unhealthy reasons?

Thoughts that work against you vs. for you

How can I move my misguided thoughts into positively guided thoughts?

Use your mind to govern your brain.

What has fear stopped me from doing in my past that I wished it hadn't?

How does my fear masquerade itself? In what forms?

How can I have it but still do it? Still pursue my dreams?

Michael Jordan, "why would I worry about a shot that I haven't even taken yet?"

Have a game plan for when your fear comes up again.

About Robert:

Robert is currently starring as Weselton in Disney's FROZEN. Other Broadway credits include: THE LION KING (Timon), THE MYSTERY OF EDWIN DROOD (Durdles), ANYTHING GOES (Purser/Moonface), CHICAGO (Amos), THE LITTLE MERMAID (Chef Louis), CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG, and JACKIE MASON'S LAUGHING ROOM ONLY. He was co-author and star of the hit Off-Broadway musical CAGNEY which ran at the Westside Theatre, NYC for over 500 performances. For that role he won the Fred Astaire Award for Outstanding Male Dancer and was nominated for the Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards as Best Lead Actor in a Musical. Last season he was a recurring guest star on the CBS series The Good Fight. Other guest-starring roles include Elementary (CBS), Law & Order (NBC), The Family (ABC), and Life on Mars (ABC). For his cabaret "Ain't We Got Fun!" he won NYC's prestigious Bistro Award for Outstanding Entertainer. His debut album Ain't We Got Fun! was released in 2012 on the LML music label.

Robert's First Show and How he Made the Shift

Director Kent Paul

Wanting to be an actor vs deciding to be an actor

You have to decide beforehand.

Build your foundation of training.

"Be realistic about your gifts, but if you think you got it, then you have to decide there is no give up."

Keep taking right action.

Don't get discouraged and keep moving forward.

How Cagney came to be.

His Audition Process for Frozen

The Three Pillars

1. The Core Work
2. The Quality of your acting Training
3. The Language of the Agents and the Casting Directors

Your Audition/ Meeting Notebook

Get a little notebook!

• Date
• What was the Audition/Meeting for?
• What was the Type of Audition? (OC, Industrial, Print)
• Who was the Casting Office? Specific Casting Director?
• What Material did you do? (Script, take a picture)
• What did you wear? Hair? Facial Hair? Makeup?
• Where was I emotionally?
• What did I do well?
• What is my intention for my next audition?
• Additional notes

Your follow up list

About Scott:

For the past twenty-five years, Studio Head, Scott Freeman, has taught at many of the nation's premiere actor training programs and is recognized as one of the leading acting teachers in the country. Mr. Freeman was a member of the founding faculty of The Actors Center in New York City, where he taught throughout the eleven years of its existence.

In addition, he enjoyed a long association with The American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco as a core faculty member of its MFA program and a member of its acting company. He also served as the founding Head of the University of Minnesota/Guthrie Theater Actor Training Program. He has also taught at Rutgers University, NYU, SUNY Purchase, The Atlantic Theatre Company, and The Stella Adler School of Acting. As an actor, theatres he has worked at include The American Conservatory Theatre, South Coast Repertory, New York Theatre Workshop, Mark Taper Forum, The Magic Theatre, San Francisco Shakespeare, San Jose Repertory, Cincinnati Playhouse, and St. Louis Repertory. In addition, he has several film and television roles to his credit.

How did Scott become an acting teacher?

"Actors, not students, but Future Colleagues"

How "ego" can help you.

Teaching isn't all about knowledge, its also about form

Why is curiosity important to an actor?

• "Its a curiosity about people and why people are the way they are"
• "How did they get there?"
• "Having an insatiable curiosity is paramount to being an actor."

Tips about Acting Class:

1. Carve your own path and say what you need
2. Make your ears grow bigger
3. Make it about your technique
4. Resist the urge to make it about your career
5. Craft in the Class, The Business outside
6. Do you have ownership of your craft or are you just waiting for someone else to tell you what to do?
7. Reliability and Longevity
8. If you have questions, make them about craft!
9. Start to figure out why you want to do this and what you want to do

When you know what it is, just keep imagining how good it's gonna feel when you achieve it!

Advanced/ Intermediate Actor:

1. They know where to go
2. How to build this character
3. Determine what they're going through
4. And the ability to go there
5. Advanced actors can do this more reliably.

You can work on pure craft and the career

"I'm trying to get you to work fast and slow at the same time."

You have to get to product while having the integrity of process.

Tap into the jugular vein.

"It's not about showing I know what I am doing, it's about me knowing what I am doing."

"How you do one thing, is how you do all things"

We want to start making the uncomfortable, comfortable.

The Three As

• Awareness
• Acceptance
• Action

Used as a tool to change so you can fulfill your life's and career's potentials.

Awareness: In order to change we must become aware of what needs to be changed

Acceptance: Once we are aware, we need to accept where we are at with it.

Action: You can't take action without the first two.

Definitions:

An intention: the message you give yourself about what you are planning on doing. It is how much and what type of energy you have to put towards it.

Consciousness: You awareness of who you really are as opposed to the "you" that you believe you are or were taught that you are

3 Circles Intersecting that make up your Consciousness

1. Who you are—Your Awareness
2. What you do— The Acceptance
3. How you do it— The Action

How do you describe yourself?

How do you move beyond them?

Ask These Empowering Questions:

1. How do I limit myself by putting a label on myself?
2. How do I limit myself by putting a label on my acting career?
3. How do I limit myself by putting a label on my abilities as an actor?

Bonus Empowering Questions:

1. On a scale of 1 to 100%, what percentage of my potential do you believe you are currently using or living?
2. On a scale of 1 to 100%, what percentage of my potential do you believe you are currently using in terms of your acting career?
3. What action could you take to boost that percentage by 5% of your life and your acting career?

About Amanda:

Amanda Quaid has over 15 years of experience teaching speech, dialects, and language skills to actors and other speakers from around the world. In addition to her coaching on plays, films, and television, she maintains a thriving private practice in New York City. She's been featured as a dialect expert on WNYC, and her book, American Accent Drills for British and Australian Speakers was released in 2020.

1. Oral Posture: Position your articulators are in for the Duration of the Accent

ie: A low jaw, pursed lips

2. Signature Sounds: The vowels, consonants, and intonation

Axis of Expressivity (Pitch variety)

How Amanda approaches American Accent Acquisition (as opposed to accent reduction)

3. Find out what the Accent brings out in you

Techniques for rehearsals, performances, and auditions

The Importance of Breath

Inhale— The act of taking in the partner

Exhale— The act of giving a part of yourself

The Miller Method

The Power of Affirmations

Principle: Energy attracts like energy.

Gandhi, "Be the change you wish to see in the world."

"Be the change you wish to see in your acting career."

We attract and create our world.

Focus on what can be.

We do this through affirmations and self-talk.

Create a healthy, productive, and friendly neighborhood in your actor brain.

Living an abundant life begins with believing in and focusing on an abundant world.

Assignment: Practice gratitude in your acting career.

Creating a gratitude list with at least 5 things on it

If we focus on lack, that's what grows.

Truth: the world is an abundant place and there are enough resources for all.

"Winners focus on winning, losers focus on winners."

Truth exists regardless of belief or consensus.

• Truth vs. truth
• truth: ego's truth
• Truth: Universal Truth

Empowering Question: Sit down, set a timer, focus on this question for 15 minutes.

If I did _______________, for my acting career, what would be possible for me?

Consciousness: Your awareness of who you really are, as opposed to the you that you believe you are and were taught that you are.

Affirmations:

Use your mind to govern your brain.

"I love myself and I approve of myself."

Assignment:

Practice these affirmations

1. I am enough
2. I am a working actor. I am a successful working actor.

If that's hard for you try adding, "I am willing…"

If you still can't get there, add "I am willing to be willing to believe…."

Practice consistency. Write them out 10 times a day.

About Frank:

Frank is a 30 year veteran of the music and post-production industry, which a long list of IMDB credits from TV networks, feature films, and animation companies like Disney, Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network.

He spends his days making commercials, cartoons, TV shows and more at Digital Arts in NYC. At night, he's on a mission during Covid Times to get everyone up to speed so we can continue working together!

First thing: Get a coach, take the classes, learn the craft!

Common Biggest Mistakes:

1. A home studio is not a USB mic, a laptop in the middle of your living room
2. Your mic isn't connected
3. Think outside the box
4. Forgetting to turn phantom power on
5. Turn the Rolloff off
6. Mouth noise tricks
7. Stop ruining your sound by over-processing it

Values: What Motivates you to Pursue your Goals in 2021?

They make you tick or drive you

Fear Based Values vs Conscious Based Values

Fear Based

• Take action to avoid
• Half Truths, I have to do this, I have to do that

Conscious Based

• Allow you to take positive actions
• Want or need to choose
• Comes out of wanting to fulfill that goal

Are you choosing from your passion or choosing from your fear?

Empowering questions to ask:

My objective: Help you to be more true to your conscious values

1. Think about a time in your acting career when things were really good. Ask yourself, "what value was being expressed or honored at that time?"
2. Think about a time in your acting career when you were really upset. Ask yourself, "what value was being challenged at that time?"

What is really important to you? Why are you doing this?

When do you compromise your values and why?

What stops you from doing your best?

What will it take to get you off your goal?

Let's look at the things that you feel you must experience in your life. Why is that so important?

We're learning what are your fear based values and what are your conscious based values?

Accountability

Accountability is the process by which we help ourselves keep the commitments we have made.

1. What is it that you will do? And by when are you going to do that?
2. Who could help keep you to that goal and time frame?

The brilliance of book-ending.

The tool of prioritizing. The most important thing you need to do now and why you need to do it.

Rank. Look at values.

1. Why do you want to achieve this goal?
2. What is at stake?
3. Why does it matter?

You want to be brave AND rigorously honest with yourself.

"Let go of your good and focus on your great."

Inspiring

You are stimulated and lifted to a new level. You see the absolute best in who you want to be and what you want to create

Who would you like to become?

What are positive affirmations that I can say to myself to back this up?

What are the actions to illustrate that this is who I am now and who I am to be?

Championing

Done before a task is done or completed

Being your own cheerleader!

Trying to bring out the best in yourself and have faith in your own abilities.

"Act as if…"

Take the action, let go of the result.

Good healthy self-talk and good healthy action

Celebrating

The skill of honoring your accomplishments

Make yourself conscious of the good you have done and allowing yourself to appreciate the accomplishment of your goal.

Acknowledge what you say and celebrate what you do.

How am I going to celebrate the completion of this goal? How am I going to feel when I do what I say I am going to do?