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Acting for the Stage
If ain't on the page, it ain't on the stage.
We've all heard that one, right?
But what about this one:
If you're in the theatre, and you can't hear the actor on the stage, you best ask for your money back.
When an actor presents their thespianism, live (as opposed to recording their performance for television or film), they need to be
heard, and they need to project their voice. That doesn't mean yelling for the sake of yelling. It means acting with a vibrant
energy that can be felt - as well as heard by the dude in the last row in the back of the theatre.
Suffice it to say that acting for the stage is VERY different from filming a movie or a TV show. And the best way to explain this,
really, is to reference television.
Let's go back to January of 1974, shall we?
The Brady Bunch and The Partridge Family have just been cancelled by ABC. Clearly, it's a very sad time in the
land of TV (wink, wink). But wait - a breath of fresh air is about to, uhm…air - in the form of Happy Days, starring
Ron Opie Cunningham Howard and a little known actor-cum-superstar named Henry Winkler who aaayyyed his way into our
hearts as The Fonz, Fonzie and/or Arthur Fonzerelli. (the hood with a heart and no-need-to-comb hair).
Happy Days originally aired as a 15-minute segment of Love, American Style. It was a pilot with which ABC was
unimpressed until American Graffiti (featuring Howard and ironically, a pre-Laverne & Shirley Cindy Williams)
started doing gang-busters at the movie plexes. Consequently, ABC reexamined Days, and gave it a spot on its regular
schedule. This Days was filmed like a movie (like they used to do TV sitcoms, in the past of That Girl (and in the
presented of Arrested Development, produced by Winkler). In other words, there was no live audience.
As such, the acting was intimate. Richie, Potsie (Anson Williams), Ralph (Don Most), Mr. & Mrs. C.
(Tom Bosley, Marion Ross), etc. all conversed with one another in regular speech, as we do in reality (though less today's edgy,
post-Seinfeld speak).
Soon, however, things changed. ABC's then president, Fred Silverman, saw the potential of Winkler's Fonzie, upped him to a
starring role, and moved the show to film in front of a live audience. Consequently, the low-definition HD actors started
projecting more, speaking a few octaves higher, and playing more to the audience, instead of the camera (which, technically
speaking, is really, really the wrong thing an actor can do, character-interpretation-wise).
Ultimately, the no-live-audience Happy Days lasted only the first and second seasons. From the third season onward, until
the series ended its initial network run in the Spring of 1984, the Days were numbered in front of a live audience.
So, here's your homework for today. If you want to learn how to act for TV and film in an intimate way, watch the first and
second seasons of Happy Days. If you want to understand the complexities (well, at least the basics) of acting for the
stage, run the last eight seasons of Fonzie and the Happy Days Gang. Oops! Wait a minute. That was the name of the
animated Days series that ran on ABC's Saturday morning line-up from 1980-82. But that's okay, because you can also
learn a lot about acting for the stage by listening to those voiceovers (especially Fonzie's new dog, Mr. Cool) of
the Days cartoon. Shoot, any cartoon (er...animated series) for that matter - because they're all
littered with exaggerated sounds and magnified emotions, all of which are ideal to employ (but not overcompensate with),
in regards to…acting for the stage...
Herbie J Pilato is an Actor, Writer, Producer, and Singer. The author of several books on pop-culture
(including Bewitched Forever and The Kung Fu Book of Caine), Herbie J has appeared on or helped to produce
hundreds of radio and TV shows, including E! True Hollywood Stories on Bewitched and David Carradine,
A&E Biographies of Elizabeth Montgomery and Lee Majors, The Learning Channel's Behind the Fame specials
on The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Bob Newhart Show, LA Law and Hill Street Blues, the
Sci-Fi Channel's short-lived but critically-acclaimed Sciography series, as well as several segments of
Entertainment Tonight and the special DVD release of Kung Fu: The Complete First Season. As an actor,
Herbie J has appeared on everything from Highway to Heaven to The Golden Girls to The Bold and the Beautiful.
And he's directed mainstage productions of A Phoenix Too Frequent, Leonard Malfi's Birdbath, and
Little Shop of Horrors. Herbie J will soon be seen as a Cultural Commentator for Bravo's upcoming
five-part mini-series, The 100 Greatest TV Characters of All-Time (on which he also served as Producer).
Herbie J is presently working as a Consultant on Nora Ephron's Bewitched feature film
(starring the Oscar-winning Nicole Kidman, and Will Ferrell, Shirley MacLaine, and Michael Caine),
while a special ANNIVERSARY EDITION of his book, BEWITCHED FOREVER, is
available now. To place your order for this book, or any other of Herbie J's books, please email
hjpilato@aol.com or visit
Herbie J's Blog.
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