PERFORMANCE: The Actors' Roundtable: "In Character"

In our new Actors’ Roundtable series, Paden Fallis poses one question each week to a group of professional working actors from a variety of backgrounds. Our goal is not to demystify the work of the actor or explore their careers, but to dig a bit deeper into their artistic working process. ACTOR’S ROUNDTABLE: “IN CHARACTER” In John Guare’s Six Degrees of Separation, Quisa says to her husband that she fears turning the young hustler Paul, who had entered their lives, into a “punch line you’ll mouth over and over for years to come.” She fears becoming a “human jukebox.”  I think of this when I think of how actors speak of their work. I feel that we “mouth over” things we’ve read, been taught and conditioned to say. It becomes rote. And when it becomes rote, then we become “human jukeboxes.” Specifically, I think of this anytime I hear this phrase… “I was in character.”  In character. In character? I’ve studied and worked for many years as an actor and yet at times I’m stumped by what being “in character” means. So, I put it to our first group of actors: What does being in character mean to you? - Paden Fallis, Performing Arts Contributing Editor

WILLIAM BELCHAMBERS It can’t be a play without the paper—the words—so you have to give that the most respect. The benefit of working for companies that give you long rehearsal processes is that you have the luxury of doing a lot of table work with the text and can ask the right questions and unearth the right information, so you have the confidence to approach even the most daunting characters.  Once the confidence is in place, I would normally start with the physicality that I could apply for the character. Starting with the body has always been integral to the way that I work and the way I trained.  The rest is something that I find hard to put down, in the sense that some nights are good and some nights are bad. One night I can feel like two hours pass by in two minutes and I am not fully sure how I got there; other nights I am constantly monitoring what I do and how I am reacting…. not a good thing. But I always fully believe Charlie Chaplin’s advice to David Niven when a young Niven asked the Master what he thought of his latest film.  Chaplin replied, “You have to learn to listen, that is the hardest thing to do.” And so, if it be a good night or a bad night, and whether it be Fringe or The National, I always try to listen.

LAURIE OKIN Being in character means that you have taken the time to make thorough choices about the emotional makeup of the character, and thereby how he or she feels about what is happening in the context of the play. It means taking that emotional landscape and applying it to every inch of your physicality, head to toe.  As an actor, it is our job to remove ego, which is to say this: Being in character is not about what you WANT that character to be, but is about looking at the character without judgement. You as the actor do not get to have an opinion about the character, which is very different from deciding what the CHARACTER’s opinions are. We have to remove our own ego, and replace it with the will to serve. Also, to be in character is to draw the distinction between being “in” character, and BEING the character. It is not our job to lose ourselves in the character. That is selfish acting, and is a way to justify selfish behavior: Suddenly deciding that your character would behave differently than what has been decided, after working in the circle of trust that is the creation of a play or a film, and springing such behavior on your fellow actors because you were “just being in character”, is irresponsible and amateurish. There is a time for experimentation and exploration, during the rehearsal process, in the service of discovering who the character is in a safe environment. Being in character includes being in control at all times. It includes always being the professional actor, which is the part of you that the audience can’t see when you’re “in character”; the third eye that is always watching and being trustworthy with the choices that have been decided upon, and NOT spinning off at any moment into your own impulses.

ERIKA ROSE There’s no ‘in’ or ‘out’ of character for me. I can go in and out of listening, focus, fear, and commitment perhaps, but I’m never not me and I’m never just my character. I’m always both. So, the idea of being in character or out of character isn’t useful to me. It’s more helpful for me to think about how committed I am and how willing I am to say yes to a character’s journey. In the end I think that’s all we’re doing, committing to living someone else’s journey for a time. If there are parts of the journey you don’t understand or you are afraid to live, it’s your job to figure out how to say yes to them and be open enough to let how you behave and react stay fluid and full of life. I guess my issue with the idea of “getting into character” is it’s all about you, which is the wrong way to go. A large part of the human experience is about how we bounce off of and relate to other people and the world. You can’t relate to other people on your own in a corner while “getting into character.” Of course, there are decisions you can make about how your character behaves based on script analysis and imagination, but how we move and behave in the world is also about how we interact with and behave around the other characters in the play. You can’t whip that into existence by yourself. Character is something that comes from a set of imagined circumstances, your understanding of the story, and your relationship with other people on stage. I never want to zip up a character suit, so to speak, and go out and perform my canned and planned version of this person I’ve pegged. I want to stay loose enough that I can tell the story, live my character’s experience, and still leave room to be surprised by the story, the other actors, and myself.

THOMAS WARD Being “in character” has less to do with the role you’re playing and more to do with the aesthetics of the piece. That’s a fancy way of saying that it’s just following the rules. Following the rules doesn’t sound fun, but it’s essential. I’m talking about following the rules of each production, each play. Rules are created for the play-world, the made up universe on the stage. They are created through the script, direction, style, ensemble, etc. I prefer this way of thinking as opposed to just how I talk and walk and behave. Obviously externals such as dialect, specific physicality, etc. are often involved, but then why is it possible to “drop character” when playing someone your age and build? It’s because a rule, an agreement between the actor and the audience regarding the aesthetic of the play has been violated.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

William Belchambers is an actor who trained at R.A.D.A and has spent most of his career in theatre, in England, Europe, and U.S.A. Currently performing at The National Theatre, London, he has also spent seasons at The Globe and The Royal Shakespeare Company. Laurie Okin is a Los Angeles-based actress who has been seen over the years in dozens of national commercials, as well as guest starring on The Office and as a series regular on PBS’s Copshop. She has also appeared in Samantha Who?, My Own Worst Enemy, Friends, and MadTV. Laurie also has an extensive background in the theatre and is a company member at The Road Theater and Rogue Machine Theater. Erika Rose is a Helen Hayes Award-winning actress living New York City. Regionally, she’s best known from her eight years of work on Washington, D.C. stages. Thomas Ward is an actor and playwright based in Minneapolis. He appeared in the Off-Broadway premiere of Craig Wright’s The Unseen at the Cherry Lane Theatre. He has performed regionally with Actors Theatre of Louisville, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Georgia Shakespeare, WaterTower Theatre (Dallas), and the ZACH Scott Theatre (Austin), among others. He was previously profiled by stated.