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On specificity
I went to see Savion Glover tonight. He's an amazing tap dancer -- watching his feet move so fast that a cloud of dust rose from the stage, I could easily believe that it was actually smoke, and that he would end up engulfed in a pillar of flame created by a pair of magic shoes.
But what struck me most about his performance in the end was the specificity, which is something I've been thinking about a lot for a while now. Savion knows exactly what sound every fraction of every inch on his shoe will make, how those sounds will differ on every section of the stage, and how to use those sounds softly or loudly and fast or slow to create amazing patterns and soundscapes that somehow end up expressing something. It's not just a matter of a shuffle or a toe dig; he has an entirely vocabulary that is miles beyond what most dancers can do, and he uses it intentionally.
It's the same in design. Some people might choose to use a sans serif font, and just go with Arial or Helvetica, where I might choose Univers 47 Condensed Light at 10/12 leading tracked out to 10.
It's there in writing; a rose might be red, or it could be a deep velvety crimson. A person can say something, or they can cry it, whisper it haltingly, mutter it… I'm not a writer, but you get what I mean.
I've been struggling over the past few years to really grok specificity in acting. I think I've made some progress on gesture -- I'm trying to move away from just waving my hands about, as we often do in normal conversation, and more toward specific choices, for example, a reaching motion that comes from the shoulder and uses the space around me, and that gets held until a specific beat in the scene. The harder part for me to pin down is in intention -- making emotions specific, figuring out precise relationships, knowing what I want from the other characters… there's a lot to work on there.
The more I think about it, the more I realize that there is specificity to be found in everything -- in painting, in cooking, in clothing, in speech. So! Where do you find it in your life? I challenge you to think about some of your choices over the next day or two and share with me some stories of where specificity matters to you, and if you feel making more specific choices makes a difference.
But what struck me most about his performance in the end was the specificity, which is something I've been thinking about a lot for a while now. Savion knows exactly what sound every fraction of every inch on his shoe will make, how those sounds will differ on every section of the stage, and how to use those sounds softly or loudly and fast or slow to create amazing patterns and soundscapes that somehow end up expressing something. It's not just a matter of a shuffle or a toe dig; he has an entirely vocabulary that is miles beyond what most dancers can do, and he uses it intentionally.
It's the same in design. Some people might choose to use a sans serif font, and just go with Arial or Helvetica, where I might choose Univers 47 Condensed Light at 10/12 leading tracked out to 10.
It's there in writing; a rose might be red, or it could be a deep velvety crimson. A person can say something, or they can cry it, whisper it haltingly, mutter it… I'm not a writer, but you get what I mean.
I've been struggling over the past few years to really grok specificity in acting. I think I've made some progress on gesture -- I'm trying to move away from just waving my hands about, as we often do in normal conversation, and more toward specific choices, for example, a reaching motion that comes from the shoulder and uses the space around me, and that gets held until a specific beat in the scene. The harder part for me to pin down is in intention -- making emotions specific, figuring out precise relationships, knowing what I want from the other characters… there's a lot to work on there.
The more I think about it, the more I realize that there is specificity to be found in everything -- in painting, in cooking, in clothing, in speech. So! Where do you find it in your life? I challenge you to think about some of your choices over the next day or two and share with me some stories of where specificity matters to you, and if you feel making more specific choices makes a difference.
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http://www.boston.com/ae/theater_arts/articles/2011/01/29/for_savion_glover_teaching_is_as_gratifying_as_dancing/
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I attend to that more than many.
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Also, after
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Much like you, I've been on a search for greater specificity in my acting. This search was sparked by the Shakespeare class I just took. My scene partner for Midsummer and I were meeting with the professor, and at one point, he noticed that my eyes weren't really focusing on one particular thing, and that oftentimes I would be breaking away from whatever I was looking that to look at my scene partner, what he called "checking in" with your scene partner. He wanted to start pushing me away from that choice, stating very simply that it wasn't specific enough, that I was wandering too much. He said that, as an audience member, if you see an actor wandering like that, the audience won't be as engaged. I had absolutely no idea I was even doing that. What I ended up realizing is that the lack of focus was coming from trying to remember my lines! The professor said to me at one point in this meeting: "Everything you do on stage has to be really, really specific."
From that moment, I've been working towards striking more of a balance between knowing my lines and making sure I'm directing my focus at a very specific point. I began right away to notice the difference it was making in the work I was doing both in class for the Hamlet scene we worked on after Midsummer, and in the work I was doing for Sweetest Swing. During both rehearsals and performances, after my scene was over, I would get off stage and immediately begin analyzing what I had just done: Was I engaging the other actors enough? Did I wander at all? Was I simply expressing an emotion, or did I find enough levels within that emotion to express it with more variety? The answers to these questions would be different from one night to the next, but by asking them I noticed that the time I spent on stage would be much more productive and it had improved the overall quality of my work. I received a greater deal of positive feedback, surprisingly more often from complete strangers in the audience!
I certainly don't mean to imply that I've perfected this. I think that only comes from years and years of practice, as well as having some guidance from someone who has had years and years of practice. So, it looks like you and I are in for the long haul. :)
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