First Pass at Performing Tango - Acting

The whole body is involved in the story you are telling. Acting isn't just about the face or raising your shoulders up high to show passion.

We believe "A movement that doesn't come from your center is a lie." Martha Graham

Timing is so much a part of communication and, therefore, it's an important element in acting. You can use a tiny pause to signal that what is coming is important. You can use a moving through from one movement to another to create a flow and concentrate the audience's attention on a larger piece of choreography.

What is the difference between unethical and ethical advertising? Unethical advertising uses falsehoods to deceive the public; ethical advertising uses truth to deceive the public.

Artist Name:: Astor Piazzolla
Song Title:: Finale (Tango Apasionado)
Album Title:: The Rough Dancer and The Cyclical Night
Artist Website:: http://www.piazzolla.org/

(Paraphrased from wikipedia): Piazzolla's tango was distinct from the traditional tango in its incorporation of elements of jazz, its use of extended harmonies and dissonance, its use of counterpoint, and its ventures into extended compositional forms. As Argentine psychoanalyst Carlos Kuri has pointed out, Piazzolla's fusion of tango with this wide range of other recognizable Western musical elements was so successful that it produced a new individual style transcending these influences.

00:18: And the question is, "How did they do that?"
00:20: Right, you look at them and you're like, "Man, they've got so much chemistry. It's so passionate!"
00:24: Well, maybe they do have chemistry. Maybe it is passionate. But there's also technique.
00:27: Thank you both. So, on that note.
00:32: First thing, is there's an instinct not to face your partner.
00:36: And, if you want to have sort of all this acting and passion, you want to be to your partner.
00:42: So, you saw they went straight to each other. It was powerful.
00:45: If you see the wrong... So, one wrong is you do too big. Just do it to each other, do it a little bit too fast and a little bit too big.
00:52: Just here. Actually, do a lot too big, just so they can see.
00:58: Right, and the truth is, you see all this movement, but it's not really to each other.
01:02: Oh, OK, they're good. So it's still to each other. They only half-did wrong, it's OK.
01:06: But still, all that movement made it less profound, because that made it more about the movement, and less about this.
01:13: Second thing is speed. So, if they're here, I'm doing oh, mad passion.
01:21: Then she's like, "Oh, mad passion?"
01:24: So, instead, you want to take your time going forward. As they just did.
01:29: Next thing, I want to talk about quality of touch. So, if you embrace right here...
01:35: If there's just a soft embrace, that shows to some extent.
01:41: Because this is about acting, so, this is a performing track. Right, for an audience, you want that...
01:45: If what you're doing is about chemistry, if you want that to show, then you actually have to show in your touch.
01:49: So, when he holds her, you see much more activity in the body and the hand.
01:54: Actually, let's move you a little bit this way, just so they can see.
01:58: Little more, little more, little more, little more, right there.
02:02: So, if you see, in his left arm, his left hand,...
02:05: Let's put it higher, so they can see in the camera... Right there, if he's there... Just stand still.
02:09: So, because of the facing, you can see alot of chemistry.
02:12: However, if you just look at the hands, you wouldn't say anything was happening.
02:16: But if you add a tiny bit of movement or of pressure...
02:21: Then it looks like more is happening. Well, more is happening. It's not more looks like more is happening.
02:26: And so, if I talk about just different things, you can be here, or you can be... here.
02:33: Or, you can be, very softly, like a flicker, "Ah", there.
02:39: And they're all beautiful places, but they're very deliberate, careful places.
02:43: Thank you.
02:45: Next thing. As we're doing about acting.
02:49: In some sense, I want you to think that it's about being uninhibited.
02:53: So, there's an instinct, I said it in a different chapter, I think,
02:57: To... To break, to give.
03:01: Right, so the same way we might say, you give in your center, when you do a step. "Oh, there's this wonderful step", and then you give.
03:06: You can do the same thing, when you're acting. We can be acting up mad passion, and as I... "Oh my God, he's a guy."
03:13: And then I go up to her. "Oh my God, I can't do this." And it's somehow, something is lost.
03:19: But what happens is you don't do that like that. What happens is you do it by giving.
03:24: Oh, mad passion, oh, mad passion, oh, I better make this less, less mad. And then, all of a sudden, it all drops away.
03:32: So, if you guys start moderately far away. Let's start there. Now, that's good.
03:38: And you, very slowly, engage the body, very alive, and you slowly walk towards each other.
03:44: If you do that... When you try this at home, there'll be an instinct, right before that, to break, and to start looking away, or to start giving.
03:52: And so, if you're going to perform, you don't want to give... No, keep going, keep going.
03:55: You don't want to give, you want to keep going towards each other and towards each other. It almost never ends.
03:59: And then you go on. And then they see it.
04:02: So, do this with conviction. And do it from a place of realness.
04:06: Right, it's not something you put on. It's something from inside.

Series:: First Pass at Performing Tango
Tags:: Connection, Technique, Performance