Use All Gently

SCENE II. A hall in the castle.

Enter HAMLET and Players

HAMLET

Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you,
trippingly on the tongue: but if you mouth it,
as many of your players do, I had as lief the
town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air
too much with your hand, thus, but use all gently;
for in the very torrent, tempest, and, as I may say,
the whirlwind of passion, you must acquire and beget
a temperance that may give it smoothness. O, it
offends me to the soul to hear a robustious
periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to
very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings, who
for the most part are capable of nothing but
inexplicable dumbshows and noise: I would have such
a fellow whipped for o'erdoing Termagant; it
out-herods Herod: pray you, avoid it.

First Player

I warrant your honour.

HAMLET

Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion
be your tutor: suit the action to the word, the
word to the action; with this special o'erstep not
the modesty of nature: for any thing so overdone is
from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the
first and now, was and is, to hold, as 'twere, the
mirror up to nature; to show virtue her own feature,
scorn her own image, and the very age and body of
the time his form and pressure. Now this overdone,
or come tardy off, though it make the unskilful
laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the
censure of the which one must in your allowance
o'erweigh a whole theatre of others. O, there be
players that I have seen play, and heard others
praise, and that highly, not to speak it profanely,
that, neither having the accent of Christians nor
the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so
strutted and bellowed that I have thought some of
nature's journeymen had made men and not made them
well, they imitated humanity so abominably.

First Player

I hope we have reformed that indifferently with us, sir.

HAMLET

O, reform it altogether. And let those that play
your clowns speak no more than is set down for them;
for there be of them that will themselves laugh, to
set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh
too; though, in the mean time, some necessary
question of the play be then to be considered:
that's villanous, and shows a most pitiful ambition
in the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready.

Exeunt Players

You Are An International Phenomenon

THE WORLD IS YOUR STAGE.

I teach a series of workshops for emerging professional actors to learn how to establish and maintain their acting career. The series includes workshops on marketing and promotion, and preparing for auditions. In one class, I present a series of maps to the actors and ask them to identify their target market. The first is a map of their city, the next their province, then Canada, then North America and, finally, the world. The presentation speaks for itself.  There is no "local" market for a professional Canadian actor. I haven’t yet met a full time professional actor who only works as an actor, only in one city.  Narrow your market that much and you’ve probably diversified into other fields besides acting...

Google any significant film or TV production that’s been shot in the last decade and you’ll get thousands of hits from around the world.  I just tried it and I found a French website about “Less Than Kind”, A Greek website about “Degrassi” and a Portuguese website about Gary Yate’s “High Life”.

It may feel great to be a comfortable, safe, relaxed, part-time Canadian actor, but when we audition for any significant Film or TV project, we are competing with actors from other Canadian and American cities and often actors in other countries and continents.

If you audition for a lead, supporting or principal role on an ACTRA production, you should assume you are competing against actors in Toronto, Vancouver, New York and L. A.  If they’re looking at six people for the role in Winnipeg, there are probably another eight actors auditioning in Vancouver, eight in Toronto, eight in New York and twelve in LA - and the L.A. actors probably have whiter teeth. An international co-production may have you auditioning against actors in Britain, Belgium, New Zealand or France.

Even if the role you are auditioning for is a small “Actor” role that is likely to be cast locally, the director and producers are still comparing your work to all those other actors in all those other cities.  Make sure they’re seeing you at your best.

In a busy centre like Toronto or Vancouver, actors have many opportunities to audition.  I’ve heard different statistics, but it’s reasonable to say that actors in a busy centre may audition for twelve or fifteen roles for every job they book. When I worked in Vancouver, I auditioned anywhere from two to ten times a week in the busy season.  An actor in a larger centre auditions more often in three months than a Manitoba actor auditions in three years.  That’s a lot of practice.  That’s what you’re competing against.

There are advantages to being a “local” actor. If the project is being shot in your town, the producers want to take advantage of provincial tax credits by hiring as many locals as possible.  They also save on airfare, hotels and per-diems by using local talent.  It makes sense, financially to hire a local actor for a locally shot production.  That’s your advantage over the out-of-town actors. It cost less to hire you.  But, it’s only an advantage if your audition is as good or better than the actors in other cities.

Remember the directors, the producers and the casting directors all want you to succeed. They want the next actor that comes into the room to be the one they cast.  They want to say yes to you. You just have to ensure them that they are saying yes to the right actor.

All you have to do to succeed is to do the work and be prepared for EVERY audition.

Read the script, do your homework, learn your lines, be professional, be focused and, most of all, be excellent.  See you at the next audition.

John B. Lowe