A towering presence in cinema –literal and figurative– has died. Max von Sydow, an actor we’ve seen on screens since the 1950s, has died at the age of 90. You can read (and listen) to accounts in the BBC, Variety, and NPR among many others. What struck many of us moviegoers was the wide range of parts he would play… and could play with such quiet conviction. Here is a man who played the Son…
I haven’t been in a stage production for an age, but I was both on stage and backstage enough times to lose count — and I was a theatergoer long before that. So I greatly appreciated Mark Evanier sharing actor, director, and all-around theatrical Larry Blyden‘s theatrical laws. Laws, do you hear? Okay, to be honest, I haven’t always followed Law #5 or Law #10, but I definitely do my best with Law #17. Law…
I’ve linked to Mark Evanier’s series on rejection before. It’s very useful for writers — and many entries perfectly connect to film and TV actors and voiceover artists. This latest installment may resonate particularly with voiceover artists. In the realm of voiceovers (and frankly, in plenty of realms), people like to work with who they know. And it’s not only who you know, it’s safe bets. How does this relate to Gary Owens (aka the…
This past weekend, I was talking about the National Theater Institute of which I am quite a happy alumnus. They practice a maxim of “Risk. Fail. Risk again” which is kind of like the positive spin of the War Boys’ outlook in Mad Max: Fury Road. Same flamethrower guitars (metaphorically), less desolation. But that’s all artsy stuff, what about science? This is where David Noonan writing in Scientific American comes in. Apparently, some folks did…
Wow, has it really been over a month since I’ve posted anything? Okay, well, I can’t go into everywhere that I’ve been, but I can tell you where I will be this weekend: Escape Velocity! Escape Velocity 2019 Promo from Museum of Science Fiction on Vimeo. I’ll be part of two panels and one performance…. Friday @ 8:20pm: Alien: 40 Years of Fright I get to chat with Charles de Lauzirika all about Alien and…
For whatever reason, back when I was in school busy with acting training, many instructors felt the need to let me know that I’m not a “leading man” type of actor. My guess is they dealt with many acting students who would feel that was beneath them or represented failure. Little did they know that, having grown up with my Dad giving us Turner Classic Movies before TCM existed, I already enjoyed the work of…
As much about writing as it is about acting, here’s a 20-minute video for GQ with Monty Python’s Eric Idle explaining many of his acting roles over the past 50-odd years. Speaking for myself, this makes me want to go out and create something.
I’ve always loved character actors and spotting them in myriad movies and TV shows is a habit I’ve inherited from my dad. I also like “creature features.” So really, when someone put together a video honoring the very talented Doug Jones, I had to share it:
I have a number of events coming up in the next 30 days, so I fear my posts may become a tad more erratic. Luckily, indomitable blogger Mark Evanier had a post this past week that perfectly meets my needs: how actors are like cats. Yes, I know many actors who are dog lovers. Don’t worry guys and gals, you can still love your dogs (just as surely as they love you), but you’re still…
Mark Evanier added to his long-running series on “Rejection” last month. This one is about his own personal experience that writers (and others) don’t actually get hired by friends who then hire them back. I’m not going to lie, I probably like this because it scratches me right in the confirmation bias. Nevertheless, his personal experience rings true with mine. People like to work with people they know, sure. But they also want to work…