Taking Method Acting a Bit Too Seriously

I have acted in a variety of plays over the course of my life. From my first role as one of the three wise men in a nursery school pagaent to larger roles in Hindi dramas when I was a young man, I have had the opportunity to make humble attempts at acting. In that time I've also had the opportunity to observe some very good actors and learn from their acting techniques and skills in an effort to improve upon my own. I think one of the most over-used terms in the realm of acting these days is method acting, simply because I don't think many people understand exactly what method acting is. In a nutshell, method acting is when an actor attempts to 'live' the experiences of the character they are portraying in order to fully bring out the reality of the character. Attempts at this can vary from extreme to mundane things and whether or not it is an effective means of acting or not is still up for debate but there are those who steadfastly believe in it.

There are stories of how actors such as Robert DeNiro or Dustin Hoffman have done things to accurately portray the characters they have been. For example, in preparation for his role as the troubled Travis Bickle in "Taxi Driver", DeNiro actually did drive a cab for a number of weeks in order to understand the lifestyle that these drivers experience. Another story relates how for the filming of the famous Russian Roullette scene in "The Deer Hunter" DeNiro insisted that at least one real bullet be put in the gun to heighten the tension. This is of course only rumor and DeNiro has denied it but the fact that he is so into 'the method' that it's not out of the realm of possibility.

In other films, this type of conditioning is like when the actors undergo abbrieviated 'boot camp' in order to appreciate the conditioning soldiers go through before portraying them in films such as "Black Hawk Down" or "Saving Private Ryan". The reality maybe so subtle that those of us outside of those experiences may never fully realize the depth of preparation these actors go through but it certainly makes a difference for many of them. However, some people tend to take it a bit too far.

In a recent performance of Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar", the actors were depicting the famous 'Ides of March' assassination scene of Caesar. For an added touch of realism, the director insisted on real knives for the scene but the scene was staged in such a way that none of the blades would ever come close to the actor thus avoiding injury. At least that was the plan. The scene went off quite well and the actor portraying Caesar collapsed to the floor 'dead'. However, shortly thereafter, the actor portraying Brutus, Kent Hudson Reed (who was also the director of the production) began flubbing his lines. It was then that the rest of the cast noticed the blood running down the leg of Reed. Apparently at the conclusion of the scene, in his enthusiasm, Reed ended up stabbing himself in the leg with his own knife. "Et tu Brute" indeed.

Needless to say, the production was immediately halted and Reed was rushed to a nearby hospital but for a while at least, there will be no more real knives on stage. Using such props is inherently dangerous. In my production of the Marathi play "Double Game" last year, there were numerous scenes in which guns were involved. In two scenes there was a need for a gun to be fired on stage. Now I'm not insane enough to insist on real bullets in the gun but the level of safety we attempted to instill on stage was quite extensive. We had rehearsals where the actors actually handling the gun would practice and were familiarlized with the guns. Safety also included aiming the gun away from the actors so that on the off chance that there was some mishap, it would not be aimed at anyone or anything. Even then, there was always a bit of tension.

Thankfully in the case of Reed, he ended up being okay and has since returned to the stage, albeit with a pronounced limp. For some actors out there, that is a testament to bringing reality to the stage or screen. I'm all for reality. In plays where I've had to be angry or show a villainous slant, I attempt to think about things that put me in that frame of mind. I am at a loss as to what to focus on when playing an out and out villain but when looking for some inspiration for being angry, you can always come up with something. One of the great things in acting is that you are afforded the opportunity to let others believe that the character you are portraying is real. I think a true testament to an actor's ability is when the audience invests itself so much in the story that they tend to forget that you aren't really that person but rather that it's 'you' on stage and not a character. Still, if you can achieve that without stabbing yourself, all the better!