Acting Course

About Patience and its importance when one wants to learn about acting. One needs to be a good listener in order to be a good learner and an actor as well. The importance of patience and focused listening skills.

What is subconscious and the importance of reflex which follows as things get processed in our subconscious. How subconscious plays a pivotal role in acting and understanding a character.

Gesture / Posture and body language continued class with the role of facial expression and eye movements which also help in understanding body language.

Learning Acting through Paintings and Statues to learn about different types of stills and poses in order to inculcate their body language in acting for example Ajanta cave paintings, the postures of dance poses in Nataraja and the kind of emotion each pose tries to convey. Try to study and observe it.

The technicalities of acting – S.B.L (Simple Basic Logical), The Acting Graph Whatever you do have to be divided into 3 units -Beginning, Middle, End which together combined makes the acting graph of the act. The intensity of the act should be a little bit in the beginning followed by at its peak in the middle and finally completely toned down by the end of the act.

The technicalities of acting continued – The importance of shape and size of the props and objects on the set. Next comes the imaginary location and area which the actor needs to imagine as per the character to be played and prepare the location and area already in the mind.

Technicalities like cut-to-cut acting, types of shots and types of camera angles, Types of editing styles etc.

The classes begin on Characterisation. The first class would introduce the students about how to read a character and analyze the character so as to understand the state of mind of the character, in this way the students will learn how to first grip the character and understand his personality pr his nature.

Then comes the entire journey of the character i.e. the background of the character, his life struggles and hardships, understanding his past life and what role does it play in his present life or how far it has helped in shaping his present personality.

Then we need to understand the reality of the character and his state of emotions, that is how he feels the various ranges of emotions and what is the way he articulates those emotions, whether he is expressive of his feelings and emotions or if he suppresses his emotions and desires which can reveal a tendency of frustration from not being able to openly express his emotions.

How to transform into a character: feeling the intensity of emotions felt by the character, making his subconscious and motives fit in mind which can come out naturally as a part of reflex, understanding his journey and his past life what drives him into the present time, his motives and intentions.

Transformation into character continued class. Differentiating between side A and Side B can help an actor grip a character.

Now side A is the actor and how he need to observe and inculcate the several aspects of the character into themselves to prepare and play the character on screen. And the side B is the character that the actor has to play. So, understanding the characteristics of the person that he is to play is crucial to understand side B.

It is actor vs person.

Side A is the actor and the side B is the person whose character the actor has to play.

Now after preparing the 5 characters the students are expected to first show it in written format and then they are to play it on the stage. The Characterisation in written format would help evaluate the way in which the student has put into use his imaginative skills, observatory skills, analytical skills and gripping of the character. So, this will be a theoretical class.

Practical class of 5 types of character and enactment of those 5 characters.

Method acting? What is method Acting? Is it possible to do method acting with subconscious mind or is it fully methodical and prepared? Are emotions prepared in a certain way to present and give a tailor-made reaction to every emotion?

Difference between method acting and normal acting? What is the actual difference or whether is there any difference at all?

Final class on all the basic aspects of acting. An analysis of all the basic topics taught and a thorough revision by the teacher of all the topics. Then it is followed by the students doubt clearing session if anyone has a doubt after the full revision then the student can get it clarified.

Sound. The meaning of sound, variations of sound, animal sounds, different types of animal sounds.

Practical class on animal sounds continued. The students would be shown variations of animal sounds with examples through screenings. Then they are supposed to imitate the animal sounds and practice it on stage.

Difference between sound and voice. Difference between sound, voice and noise. How does sound gets translated on camera and how does voice and noise get translated in the camera. The use of sound adds emotions in movies. Use of background sounds, use of theme sounds, use of sound in different songs for different emotions throughout the film.

Importance of tone, Different types of tones and dialect – angry tone of voice, frustration in tone, happy tone of voice, sad tone of voice, scared tone of voice, compassionate tone of voice, disgusted tone or annoyed tone, brave tone of voice, peaceful tone of voice. Practicing different types of tones essentially the 9 types named here and prepare it as homework.

After the tone, comes the pitch and volume. How to control volume and pitch so as to balance out each other and add nuanced emotion to the dialogue with the help of stressing on either pitch or increasing or toning down the volume as per the requirement of the emotion to be enacted through the dialogue delivery.

Practical class on dialogue delivery: Through an example of storytelling. Story telling can be narrated via two ways: one in a dubbing manner which is done backstage with infusing emotions in each dialogue and the other way being normal plain narration as a part of script reading or narrating the story to explain the story or plot of the script. The practical class would include both the dubbing way of saying dialogue and narrative style inculcated in storytelling.

Practical class on Dubbing and narrative style continues.

Practical class on 10 min short act with dialogues to be continued.

The exercise of saying one dialogue in 9 different tones and pitches. The variations in one dialogue would also require stressing on a different word each time the same dialogue is spoken by the student.

Introduction to The Rasa Theory – Its roots and origin in literature but also enacted on stage dramas and plays and theatre. Then it was adopted in acting theories and classes. THE 9 TYPES OF EMOTIONS OR RASAS IN ACTING. EACH RASA TO BE DISCUSSED IN DETAIL.

The 9 types of emotions to be taught in details. The 9 types of Rasa are –

1. Shringhara Rasa / Prem Rasa
2. Hasya Rasa
3. Karuna Rasa
4. Raudra Rasa
5. Bhayanak Rasa/ Bhaya Rasa
6. Vibhatsa Rasa
7. Veer Rasa
8. Adhbhuta Rasa
9. Shanta Rasa

Hasya Rasa

• Theoretical class (1 hour)
• Practical class (2 hours) – A short act of 2 to 5 minutes or a monologue, standup comedy, mimicry, silent comedy, slapstick comedy, etc. to be presented in front of the class by each student.

Karuna Rasa

• Theoretical class (1 hour)
• Practical class (2 hours) – A short act of 2 to 5 mins or a monologue which shows the emotions of compassion, melancholy, pain, grief and sorrow.

Veera Rasa

• Theoretical class (1hour)
• Practical class (2 hours) – A short act or a monologue of maximum 5 to 6 mins in order to articulate the emotions of Veera Rasa associated with bravery, courage, velour, agency and unity, strength and heroism.

Bhayanak Rasa

• Theoretical class (1hour)
• Practical class  (2 hours) – A short act or a monologue of 5 to 6 mins portraying the emotions of fear, horror, terror.

Adhbuta Rasa

• Theoretical class (1hour)
• Practical class (2 hour)s – A short min act or a monologue of 5 to 6 mins showcasing the feelings of wonder, amusement and astonishment. When one gets to see anything strange which arises amazement and a surprised reaction then it showcases Adhbhuta Rasa.

Shanta Rasa

• Theoretical class (1 hour)
• Practical class (2 hours) – A short act or a monologue of 5 to 6 mins showing the Shanta Rasa which as the name suggests showcases feelings of peace, tranquility, a sense of calmness and serenity which almost represents a zen like mode or a saintly predisposition.