Seduction, Burgers and Panopticism: My Short but Eventful Acting Career
From Awkward Auditions to Existential Crises: A Not-So-Glamorous Look at My Acting Days
Panopticism: Because 'We're All Watching Each Other' Didn’t Sound Fancy Enough
I studied acting seriously for about two years and worked as a professional actor for another. All things considered, looking back, since I was actually getting paid and working for a first year out of acting school, things were going well. But I was the most miserable wretched soul you could imagine. As an actor, you are quite literally always watching each other. It’s also an art form where you have the least objective perspective on what you are creating. You are constantly at the mercy of other people’s gaze. You create with your own body, voice, soul. Some actors manage to watch their own takes while on a film set. In fact, I have done this myself; I have actually acted in a short film that I directed called Happy Hour, but that was long after I had switched to directing, and it wasn’t what I would call comfortable.
Seduction Mode: The Actor's Full-Time Job
To work as an actor, you must be in 'seduction mode' all the time, and I don’t mean romantic seduction—although some are also—I mean your wit, charisma, self-confidence, humour, etc. Everything you do is a calling card for your instrument and its player: you. I often hear film folks say that actors are exhausting as they are eccentric, demonstrative, always loud, but there is a reason for it: they cannot be ordinary, can they? It’s territorial. It’s a brand; you can rarely let it down.
I don’t think I ever thought of this when I was acting; I wasn’t really strategizing much, as usual. Thinking back, I think my niche could have been the rather unsettling charismatic villain, I suppose, which ironically is what I cast myself as in my own film! But I think, back then, being so young, so taken by Shakespeare, so obsessed with getting the title role, I dreamt of Romeo, not of Iago—even though Iago is so much more interesting!
This is a very typical problem for all actors, by the way. A number of extremely successful actors have made tremendous careers by brutally accepting that they would never play neither Romeo nor Juliet—but it’s hard to be wise when you are 18.
Anyway, on the whole, for me, this lack of external view on my art was soul-breaking. I’m a rather introverted person. Being on stage was okay because I was protected by the author’s genius, but the whole carnival around it... Running castings, being constantly on display, watching and being watched. Being watched while you're watching people being watched… I have literally seen drama teachers, handsomely paid by their students' tuition, say the most ignoble things about a student while they couldn’t hear it. Actors are the most ultra-sensitive, injured, strong, weak, disoriented beings. But they like to look like they are on some kind of magic drug all the time and nothing can reach them. I love them, though; I think I understand them better because I have been one. In some way, I am still one.
The Casting Lottery: From Burgers to Shakespeare
For a year or so, I participated in some nice and not-so-nice projects, from the well-paid big audience play to the most obscure unpaid film project. I did casting for burger ads, where actors go in in groups of threes and you are told within five seconds of walking in: 'You are Spiderman, you jump from building to building. Action!' Or the most highbrow casting where you are being asked to be fire, or water, or a laser to the moon… I sang Disney songs for kids in gymnasiums, played teenagers in educational interactive plays about domestic violence. Eventually, I didn’t question anything anymore. I had to work. Well, at least I had to. Of course, there are always people who don’t have to work. They can be picky because the rent is not really a problem for them, so they’d rather wait for the beautiful part and keep their CVs 'clean'. Well, I wasn’t one of them. If it wasn’t acting, it would be selling oysters, or clothing, or doing God knows what, so for me, money mattered. This is, by the way, a recurring theme in my path, but I’ll get back to this in my directing career.
But what about my original goal in all this? What about that elusive meaningful contribution to humanity that art represents to me? Maybe, probably, had I been more patient, things would have improved; I would have climbed higher and gotten some more interesting stuff to sink my teeth into, but there was something fundamentally wrong. I was deeply unhappy.
The Lion King Meltdown: Hakuna Ma-ta-taaaAaAaAAAAAAAAGH!!!
So I actually realised I couldn’t carry on like this during a casting for the musical The Lion King. An incredible female singer with the voice of Whitney Houston had just gone into the casting room right before me for the main role, and I was already sweating buckets. I wasn’t auditioning for the main part, but some minor singing part. I could sing, but I was still just an actor. The stage was immense; the director and musicians looked busy and stressed out already. I came in and handed my printed little score for a Jungle Book song I liked. The Louis Armstrong one, 'I want to be like you'. The pianist started, played the first verse, and I sang and clowned and did my best. Then the chorus came… and the pianist played the first verse again. What? How? Why? It sounded awful; I stopped and said that it was time for the chorus. He snapped and waved the score at me. 'I’m just playing what’s in front of me, OK?' I explained that after the first verse, the chorus came 'Whoop-dee-doo…' Had he never seen the goddamn film? What was wrong with the score... 'OK, let's try again,' the director said, already looking like I was wasting his time. I made sure to explain again, first, one verse, then, one chorus, ok? Fine. Here we go again. First verse, singing and clowning, then chorus—First verse again… Exactly the same thing. Mind blown. The director was like 'OK, thanks a lot.' I took my score, left the building and sat on the outside; this was in Paris in summer, real hot. I felt so angry and frustrated. Did I even care about singing this role in this Disney musical? No, I didn’t at all. Would it be good for my career and bank account? Sure. I was so confused. Why did I put myself through this? Because I had to work. I wanted to be Hamlet, to live many lives, to go on adventures. There must be another way, and thankfully another way I found.
In my next post, we’ll look into my transition into writing and directing and how that completely transformed my life.