Brando_ Songs My Mother Taught Me - Marlon Brando [74]
These strange characteristics can be witnessed in an actor’s performance. Often actors choose to underplay a moment in the drama. If he shows little or no reaction, the audience will try to imagine what he is feeling. Sometimes actors are superb in their underplaying, but others can’t wait to hit their head on the top of their part. The great Jewish actor Jacob P. Adler, Stella’s father, advised his company of actors, “If you come to the theater and feel a hundred percent, show them eighty percent. If you feel sixty percent, show them forty percent, but if you only feel forty percent, put the understudy onstage.”
Never hit your head on the top of your part, Stella said. There are some roles in which less is more, and you should underplay them. Jimmy Cagney had both great acting talent and a terrific presence. He had a distinctive look, a very strong, clear personality, and was a self-made actor. He never went to acting school. But unlike most actors of his generation, he tried to take on the subtle aspects of his characters. He believed he was the character and made audiences believe it.
One of the most difficult lessons an actor has to learn is not to leave the fight in the gym. In other words, you must learn to keep your emotion simmering all day long, but never boiling over. If you give everything you’ve got in the long shot, you will have less in the medium shot and, where you need it most, in the close shots. You must learn to pace yourself so that you don’t dry up when the close shot comes. Even smart performance directors—and God knows there are few of them—misuse the actor unless they are experienced.
As an example, in my first movie, The Men, I had an emotional scene in which I had to admit to myself that I would never be able to walk again or to make love. It was a scene in which it was proper to cry. I got to the studio at 7:30 A.M. and went to my dressing room loaded with mood music, poetry and anything else that would elicit an emotional response. I played the scene over and over in my mind, rehearsed it quietly and was moved. But by 9:30 A.M., when I had to play the scene, I had nothing left. I had left the fight in the gym. I have remembered that moment ever since.
Unless you’re fully experienced, some directors can destroy you with their insensitivity. An actor’s motivation often depends on focusing sharply on small details. If a director doesn’t prepare the crew and the other actors, he can destroy the mood of a scene. Directors don’t realize how hard it is to create a fragile emotional impression, and how easy it is to break the spell. The most fatiguing aspect about acting is turning your emotions on and off. It’s not like pushing a light switch and saying, “I’m going to be angry and kick the walls now,” and then becoming yourself again. If you have an intense scene involving sadness or anger, you may have to hover in the same emotional territory for hours, and this can be extremely taxing. Some directors don’t understand this because they were never actors, or else were bad ones.
An actor can profit greatly from a good director, but often directors who have a sense of inadequacy try to conceal this by being authoritative and issuing commands and ultimatums. With such directors, who mistake