Aaron Marcus shares two techniques for powerful acting performances: arriving early to acclimate to the set and reduce anxiety, and using music to quickly access the emotional state a scene requires. He learned the music trick from his background as a professional musician.
Hey, in this video, I'm going to be sharing with you how to make your acting performance really powerful by using this special technique. And watch this till the end, I've got a great bonus video for you. It's why these people angered me. Not an easy one to shoot, but I want to share it with you. Okay, let's get started. Hi, I'm Aaron Marcus, and welcome to the Acting and Modeling Quick Tips channel and the Actor Career Center. Look, giving a great performance, it's hard. And I can tell you from my experience— actually, you know what I just thought of? There, there, there are 2 things I'm going to be sharing with you in here about making your performance powerful. One of them, which is not what I was planning on talking about, but it just popped into my head. If you've never had the, the pleasure of working as a principal on a TV show or a feature film. Let me just give you a little bit of background, and then I'll share the technique, and then I've got another technique to share with you. So when you arrive on the set or in the studio, typically you're going to be sent to your trailer, and then at some point they'll take you out, they'll take you to hair and makeup and wardrobe, just make sure everything is good. And And you sit in the trailer, and sometimes you can sit in there for hours and hours and hours. And then a PA, a production assistant, typically will come by at some point and say, you know, they're ready for you. And then you walk onto the set and maybe you get a rehearsal. Sometimes you start shooting depending on the situation. I don't like sitting in a trailer. I feel like I'm sitting in prison, to be honest with you. And then all of a sudden you're let go, and then boom, now you're, you know, going from being isolated to potentially being in front of hundreds of people, and then you have to perform. It's, it's a hard transition for me. So something that I always ask for— it doesn't always happen because sometimes it's just not possible— I always ask If I could get onto the set of where we're going to be shooting ahead of time, and that way I can breathe, I can go over my lines, I can just get accustomed to the atmosphere, and it makes it, at least for me, a much easier transition to beginning to— to begin shooting the scene. So anyhow, I always ask. Sometimes it can't work, and if it can't, I still like to get out of the trailer depending on the weather. I much prefer being outside if possible. So anyhow, I wanted to share that with you. It just helps relax me and it makes— it just makes things much better for me. Here's the other technique. Oh, Before I share with you the other technique, hey, if you haven't done this yet, don't forget, subscribe, click the notification bell so you always know when I upload a new video. If you like the video, give it a thumbs up because that actually is very helpful, and share the link with your fellow actors so we can continue to build a great channel of actors who are learning and sharing information with each other. So here's the other technique that I wanted to share with you that has been really, really helpful to me. This took me years to figure, to figure out. Actually, I shouldn't even say I figured it out because I saw somebody else doing it, and I thought, hey, there was a director who was doing this, and I thought, well, the director's doing it, it must be, you know, good for him. Let me give it a shot. So when I first got started, and I'm going back over 40 years ago, once again, I didn't have any technique, I didn't have training, I didn't grow up as As a kid, as an actor, having— didn't have aspirations to be an actor. So I kind of jumped into this industry much later in life than a lot of people. And I was working on a TV show, and I was watching this director. And before this— and this guy was a fairly new director at a big show. And before the scene, he's listening to music. And I thought, huh, well, that's kind of interesting because what I used to do before a scene, which is not a good thing to do, but once again, I just didn't know. I'm not blaming myself, I'm not kicking my— I just didn't know. Nobody told me. And, and I learned everything that I do by trial and error. I mean, of course I've taken classes, studied with people privately. But I used to, right before my scene, I would go over my lines and I would run them over and over and over and over and over and over again and then start this. It's not a good way to do it because it, it kind of felt like an exam. I was taking a final, and I don't know if you've ever done this, but right before you get started, you're flipping through your notes, looking through pages and things like— Hey, at that point, either you know it or you don't know it. And so I stopped. Not to say I don't go over my lines before, of course I do, but it's not that repetitive thing just over and over and over and over again. Sure, when I walk onto a set, whether it's right before we start shooting or if I have more time, I will go over my lines just, just to make sure that I'm comfortable, I've got it. It helps me. It really does help my performance. But here's what I do. I typically don't do this on the set, but I'll do it prior to getting onto the set. I listen to music, and I, I do— I, I figure out what music ahead of time, and it's dependent on the scene. Sometimes I want to listen to music That just puts me into a, a certain space. And I'm not going to play any music here for you because I don't want to deal with, you know, copyright issues of playing somebody's song. But you can figure out what songs are right for you. But if I need to just be at a place where I'm more relaxed, I'll listen to music that relaxes me. And something I don't I really don't talk about with people unless it comes up, but before I was an actor, I was actually a musician. I was a singer-songwriter, and I performed full-time for 7 years, and I used to do tours and things like that. So music is, is still really important to me, although I don't play, but it's still really important to me. And I know that it affects me greatly depending on the music, depending on the song. And so if I just need to be in a certain place mentally I'll listen to the music that takes me to that place. Now, the other thing that I will also do is if I need something for my character to get into a certain emotional place character-wise, I will do that as well. And so if there is some kind of— just give you an example. Let's say there's some kind of sadness in this particular scene. I'm going to listen to music that will put me into that space, and I find that to be a really powerful tool. So I just want to ask you if there are any tips or strategies that you have that you use right before— it could be an audition or a performance— please share it here on the channel so we can learn from you as well. I just find those things to be really incredibly helpful. I did promise, and if you look up here you'll see the link, For a video that I had created, why these people angered me. And what you're going to find is, look, in any business there are people who are going to anger you, and you have to learn how to deal with it. And you will watch the video and see what I did here and why. So anyhow, I hope this was helpful. I can't wait to hear your ideas and also can't wait to talk with you soon. I'm Aaron Marcus. See ya.
