Training strategies towards performing emotions on film: an integrated approach

Abstract

South African film budgets do not allow for extensive preparation and rehearsal periods. South African film actors prepare their portrayal of emotion as part of their performance scores in isolation and are expected to present their already crafted performances while the camera is rolling. However, the actor must be able to produce an emotion at will. They must navigate the onset and conclusion of the emotion whilst effectively portraying it to the camera that is capturing the moment on film. The (film) actor’s physical manifestation of the character’s emotion is the means through which audiences gain insight into characters (Baron and Carnicke [2011]. Reframing Screen Performance. Michigan: The University of Michigan Press, 174). The actor needs to embody these elements to signify the character’s emotions (Gosselin et al [2005]. Components and Recognition of Facial Expression in the Communication of Emotion by Actors. In: P. Ekman, and E.L. Rosenberg, eds. What the face Reveals: Basic and Applied Studies of Spontaneous Expression Using the Facial Action Coding Systems (FACS), 2nd ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 243–270) quickly, upon demand, and with the required filmic verisimilitude. This article offers a five-phase process, that draws on various embodied performance pedagogies (such as Emotional Body, Laban/Bartenieff Movement Studies and Lessac Kinesensics), as well as from relevant scholarship in the field of Emotion. This process facilitates and brings forth required embodied emotions in actor to character development in a way that reinforces verisimilitude and can be effectively strategised away from the actual filming moment. It is structured to be safe in its approach, effective in the emotionally embodied delivery, and acknowledges both cultural and idiosyncratic diversity in the actors in the service of the character to be portrayed.

Keywords:

• film acting
• actor training
• performing emotion

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Not all theatre performances rely on text. For the purposes of this study, however, text-based performances are of importance.

2 To be sure, the act of representation in a space is real, but the narrative itself is constructed, and therefore, in these circumstances, not real. As such, the actor is real, but the character is constructed.

3 Although the film director and camera may substitute for the film actor’s audience, the film actor, unlike the theatre actor, is not affected by the immediate response of an audience during performance. (Indeed, often the presence of the director and film crew, as ‘technical recorders’ become potential hindrances to the acting moment).

4 However, an argument can be made that film audience expectations across time have changed, and therefore a film actor modulates the performance according to these expected changes.

5 Aligning with the trajectory that Stanislavski offers (see Carnicke 1999).

6 Netflix used to pay between $ 40 000 and $ 70 000 for an African film while paying between $ 100 million to $ 250 million for international blockbuster films (Poe 2021).

7 The University of Cape Town, Stellenbosch University, University of the Free State, The University of Pretoria, Tshwane University of Technology.

8 These tertiary institutions may offer Camera Acting as a subsection of a subject. At the University of Pretoria one of the authors teaches Camera Acting as part of a subject called TNP310: Performance Studies. Various informal private camera acting training opportunities exist. A discussion on these opportunities falls outside the scope of this article.

9 According to Blair (2008, p. 57–58), the standard rehearsal period for a regional theatre play in the United States in 2008, was three-and-a-half weeks – a period Blair (2008, p. 58) considers to be insufficient ‘for allowing the actor to get the work into her body.’

10 The prefix ‘ur’ can refer to ‘underlying’ such as in the German words urform and ursatz. It can also refer to ‘primeval’ as in the German word urzeit, or ‘primitive’ as in the word urtrieb (Parrott 2012, p. 247).

11 We include the term posture as it is used in certain scholarships. Posture refers to the orientation of the body but could be perceived as a fixed position. The dynamic body is in continuous motion. To support this notion, we prefer the term body attitude.

12 One of the authors received initial training in Alba Emotimg and is an Emotional Body apprentice.

13 Which may align with L/BMS. See below.

14 We do not have embodied training in Rasaboxes nor PEM; as such we do not apply them in our praxis.

15 One of the authors is a Certified Laban/Bartenieff Movement Analyst.

16 Effort factors exist on a continuum of opposites. An individual’s movement can lean more towards one end of the continuum than the other or can be executed with equal attention to both affinities (Adrian 2008, p. 113).

17 The authors are trained in these approaches and thus have an embodied understanding thereof.

18 The first author is a Certified Lessac Kinesensics trainer, and the second author is a Lessac Kinesensics Master Teacher.

19 Although our five-phase approach is continuously under development and iterative scrutiny, the trajectory stayed the same over time.

20 Should the actor fall into habitual patterns, they are advised to revisit phases 1–4.

21 In this particular example the three actors could be seen as belonging to the same socio-cultural paradigm. However, in our teaching practice we facilitate a diverse range of actors.

22 Through personal correspondence.

23 We deliberately do not name the emotion that we observe in the various images, as interpretations are subjective and contextual.