The Loud Whisper Takeover
Featuring interviews with actors, stunts, dancers, filmmakers, action movie directors, athletes, Krav Maga teachers, acting coaches, thriller cinema experts, and more.
Epic tales of changemakers, authentic personal stories, and top tips about the industry, the podcast is a treasure of knowledge helping storytellers of all kinds on their own journeys, and inspiring people to take action upon their own dreams.
Ever heard your inner voice getting louder and louder, urging you towards a new path? When our inner guidance starts to become so loud, we can no longer ignore it, and we MUST take action... This is often a time when life changes direction drastically. We are literally being called to take that leap of faith, make that phone call, write that script, make that film in other words, time to embrace our wildest dreams, shift gear, and grow exponentially.
Let's dive into the art of listening courageously to our inner compass. Because every one of us is destined to live a grand story and adventure while walking on planet Earth!
Headphones on, notebooks out, and buckle up!
Hosted by Cindy Claes (action actress, filmmaker, public speaker)
The Loud Whisper Takeover
33: Action Actors Lab - Training for Fight Choreography and Physical Roles
Former dancer and choreographer Cindy Claes, now action actress and filmmaker, reveals the essential skills and mindset needed to break into action acting, drawing from her extensive background as a "movement nerd". She is now also leading workshops called the ACTION ACTORS LAB.
• Understanding the fundamental differences between real combat sports and screen fighting choreography
• How physical posture directly influences emotional states for more authentic character development
• Using physical theatre embodiment techniques to create unique physical signatures for characters
• Balancing technical skills with character awareness in action scenes
• Adapting self-tape techniques specifically for action scenes
• Working with multiple languages and how each affects physical presence and authority
• and more!
If you're interested in joining the Action Actors Lab to develop these skills in person, send Cindy a DM or message on social media to learn more about these workshops.
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Welcome to the Loud Whisper Takeover podcast. My name is Cindy Klaas. I'm an action actress and I'm a filmmaker. Before that, I had a professional background in the world of dance and choreography. I also have a background in the world of fitness, combat sports and, obviously, screen fighting. The journey it has been to become an action actress has been a journey of self-discovery, but also of research of what are the skills that I need to have to be an action actress, same thing as a filmmaker. It has been a quest to understand what kind of films I wanted to make, which kind of stories I wanted to tell and, more specifically, how I wanted to tell those stories. A lot of my work is rooted, grounded, in movement. So really action movies and any genres of cinema that are related brothers, sisters or cousins of action movies movies are really my world.
Speaker 1:Today's episode is really for actors that want to get involved in action movies or actors that really want to use their bodies with full awareness within their roles, within their characters, and really feel connected to the body. So in this episode we will talk about what it takes for an actor or an actress to become an action actor. We will also talk about the connection between all the work we do as actors and the connection with our body, how we can use the body to dive into a script. How can we use the body as a starting point of a character's journey. How can we use the body to tap into an emotional state that we can't really tap into through the mental, the intellectual, the analysis of words? I'm also the founder of the Action Actors Lab, which is a workshop for action actors. If you cannot come to join the workshop physically, I hope that this podcast will at least give you some pointers or some food for thought of how you, as an actor or as an actress, can start challenging yourself to be and become an action actor or a better action actor. First I'll tell you a little bit more about myself and my journey so that you fully understand where I'm coming from. I'm an action actress today and a filmmaker.
Speaker 1:How I started was actually as a choreographer and a dancer. I started in the world of hip hop, krump and dancehall. Those were my specialties. Of course, being a dancer, I also did a whole bunch of other different dance forms. I did salsa, bachata, contemporary dance, house dancing and you name it, but my specialties were really hip-hop, krump and dancehall. I very quickly, as a choreographer, started to tell stories through my dance work. So I started to mix theater and dance together and I dived deep into the world of narrative, of storytelling through the body. Then I also wanted to add words, because the body was not enough to really portray the messages or the narrative arcs that I was after. I wanted some things to be very specific. So that's how I ended up using words, dialogues, slam, poetry into my dance work as well.
Speaker 1:In the world of theater, I was a choreographer. I also was a movement director, usually for other productions. I wrote plays, so I was a playwright and I was a choreographer. And I was a choreographer. I was a theater maker. I always worked with people, performers that either were dancers either actors that were ready for a physical challenge. As a teacher, I've been teaching internationally, in the UK, in Spain, in the United States, in Jamaica, in Venezuela, in Belgium, probably other countries too that I don't think of now, but I very often have been teaching dancers how to use words and how to act. I've been teaching dancers how to face this fear that they had of speaking, and then I've been coaching a lot of actors how to move and how to use their bodies, because the words or text was their comfort zone, but moving was stepping out of their comfort zone. Alongside my career in dance, choreography and theater, I also worked in the world of circus, and I did aerial circus, harness work, bungee work, and this is something that I am still very much, very fond of. I really hope that as an actress, I will book a role where a lot of cable work is involved. That's a big dream.
Speaker 1:Later down the line, I had to face some health issues. These health issues actually brought me on the path of fitness, so I became a gym rat and freaking passionate about weightlifting Once my health got back on track. At that time I actually had become an actress and I wasn't really working that much anymore with movement and dance and I was bored. I really felt something was missing in my day-to-day creative expression. I wanted to go back to it, somehow being able to work out again at a very high level and even at a higher level than whatever I did before being a professional dancer. I started to really dive deeper into stage, combat and screen, fighting and combat sports, fighting and combat sports. So all of this started to make sense Movement, choreography, this new vitality that I had found through fitness, feeling strong, feeling like I had the power to really face any physical challenge possible, getting more and more interested in a variety of martial arts and combat sports and self-defense, like the dots started linking and that's where this door opened up for me, which was actually action.
Speaker 1:Movies is the dream. That's the path I want to walk. I also forgot to mention I went to a physical theater school called Jacques Lecoq, which is an international theater school, which was previously based in Paris. Now they are in Avignon, but I went there to study when I was an adult and that was also an opportunity for me to dive deeper into the world of physical theater. So, on top of my career that I had before, which was making theater with dance, I started to dive deeper into the world of what an actor is able to do with acrobatics, the understanding of its body and how to really use the body as a starting point for an emotional state, for a character, for a narrative, and not start with the text, the word, and not start with the analysis of a script and not start with the mental or the intellectual or the memories we have, but really with the body, and the body only as a tool. So where I'm at now is I'm an action actress, I'm a filmmaker.
Speaker 1:I'm also a movement nerd. When I say movement nerd, yes, I have a huge amount of knowledge in the world of movement and body awareness, but it's never enough. There is always a new skill I want to learn and I continue learning new skills and I literally continue also diving down the rabbit hole. When I touch on something new as an action actor or action actress, you will also see and discover that, yes, you will master some skills, but it's never enough. There is always a new skill that you could start learning or could start mastering. You will have to make choices, but the journey probably never ends. So let's talk about you as an actor or an actress that wants to dive in the world of a movement. I am aware that you might not be able to lead a whole parallel life as a dancer, as a circus artist, as a martial arts practitioner on the side, but there are still a lot of things that you can do to really master or advance your understanding of how the body is going to help you move forward in the world of action movies.
Speaker 1:So I'll break down this podcast episode, the same way I break down the Action Actors Lab, which is the workshop that I'm teaching. Part one we're going to talk about how to develop our fighting skills for the camera, which is very different from real fighting skills. Whatever you would do in a real combat, you will probably not do it for a choreographed piece that will be used for the camera. Part two we're going to talk about the physicality of the actor, and that is really about how can you discover more about body connection and script. Body connection in narrative arc, body connection and emotional states. Part three is scene work and text, and part four is how to flip. Do we self-tape for an action scene? So, for example, if a casting director or your agent is sending you a script and you realize, oh amazing. So, number one, I have a weapon. Number two there is an explosion on the side. Number three the roof is falling over my head. Number four somebody attacks me, and how do you translate that in a self-tape, which is a very different way of trying to portray all this madness, with just you in the frame and having no other body to work with. So we will talk about that in this podcast too.
Speaker 1:Every industry works a little bit differently. So I speak four languages. I speak English, french, dutch and Spanish. I have worked a lot in the English speaking markets, in the Spanish speaking markets. I have not worked that much in the French speaking market and I have never been booked on a Dutch speaking production. And obviously I'm based in Europe. So I'm going to talk more about the European side of things. In the United States things might be different, but just be aware as well that every single market slightly works differently in regards to networking, in regards to expectations of what they have of actors and so forth, in regards to how casting directors work. But I hope that what I will be providing you in this episode will at least give you some food for thought and some pointers, or if you can come and join the Action Actors Lab when I'm teaching it.
Speaker 1:Okay, let's talk about part one Fighting choreography. So, as an action actor, of course there will be a lot of fights and you will have probably two possibilities of gaining skills in screen fighting. Either you join a course that is specifically aimed to actors or some sort of stunt course made for performers that will be performing in front of the camera. Another option is to enroll in a martial arts practice or a combat sport or some self-defense classes and gain knowledge there. There are pros and cons to both, and I'll explain. If you want to register for a class that is all about screen fighting or that is really focusing on stunt work, usually speaking, these classes will be more expensive.
Speaker 1:The thing is as well is usually these classes are like a one-off workshop. So these one-off workshops are great because you learn some skills, but then it doesn't stay in your body. You don't do it on a weekly or a daily basis and your body forgets. The pro is that one of the main things in fighting choreography is action reaction. The reaction of the character that is being hit is extremely important, both in regards to how your body reacts, so that it looks real, how your face reacts so that it looks real, but also the timing, because obviously the camera needs to be able to capture all of that and so that in the editing, when we have the reaction of the character that is being beaten up, it feels real, so the audience can really dive into the pain of what is happening. So screen fighting courses are amazing, stunt courses are amazing, but it will probably require a bit more money. Usually it's quite pricey, usually it's not a regular class. It's very difficult to find, like weekly classes or something like that.
Speaker 1:And number three is the positive things. You're going to learn those action reactions. Also, you're going to learn the choreographic part of it. That is four, which is very important. You're going to really learn what a choreography looks like. Some fighting scenes are shot in, like they're just going to shoot it from A to Z, and some fighting scenes they just want to have three moves, shoot it in different angles, and then we do another three moves and then another three moves and like it's bit by bit. It really depends on you know what the the director has decided how to capture the fight, if it's going to be a wide shot, a close-up, all that kind of things. So, but the choreographic part of it you will also learn in these specific courses.
Speaker 1:If you decide to go for a real martial arts practice or a combat sport or some self-defense classes so I'm talking Krav Maga, I'm talking boxing, I'm talking any sort of martial arts. So the pros is that it's very easy to find affordable classes that you can go to on a weekly basis. This means that your body is really gonna work on a particular skill and it's gonna be so used to it that the day you are on set is just a part of your DNA, right? If you've been boxing like three times a week for that many years and they ask you to play a boxer like, it's so easy for you to get into the physicality of this character, so it's more affordable. You can do it on a weekly or daily basis, depending on the club that you're joining. The only thing is you will probably not work on action, reaction, the reaction part, the realness of how we react to being hit or being beaten or that sort of things. You will not see that in any of these classes, so that work is really the work of the actor. Or Krav Maga.
Speaker 1:There is a lot of choreography, so to speak, that is being rehearsed. It's not the same as creating a piece of choreography where action-reaction is the most important element of the choreography. In Krav Maga, for example, there are choreographed parts, let's say, where you really learn to drill certain self-defense mechanisms. But the thing is, the aim of the exercise is to drill you that if somebody attacks you with a weapon or tries to catch your bag or whatever, you have like an automatic response to self-defend yourself in that moment. But the aim of the exercise is not a piece of choreography that needs to be captured on camera. So the con of these kind of classes is that you're not learning the reaction part that we would want in the world of cinema. The other thing we want to talk about is what do we do in a real combat? What do we do when something really happens to us? To defend ourselves is very different of how we're going to transpose that in the choreographic world of cinema. So of course, we want to make it look as real as possible.
Speaker 1:However, for example, in boxing, you want to protect certain parts of your face. You want to have your elbows in why? Because you need to protect your sides to make sure that you are not hit. You want to make sure that your hands, your wrists are like next to your face so that you don't get hit by your opponent. For example, in boxing, you want to make sure that when you're going to jab like the punch is going to come out in such a way that your opponent can't even see it coming. In the world of cinema and choreography you don't want to have your fists right totally close to to your face and the camera can't see anything, so maybe you will have to lower them. However, you don't want to have to have your elbows up, because you would not look like a boxer. So you want to have some elements of reality, for example, the elbows down, but you might have to lower your hands so that the camera can capture your face.
Speaker 1:When it comes to the jab, in a real combat sport, the trajectory of the jab is done in such a way that is efficient, effective. Your opponent can't see it coming. In the world of cinema, you want to have a moment where your opponent, your fictional opponent, can see it coming, so that nobody ever gets hurt. So instead of going straight to your target, you would have some sort of calling oh, the other one can see it coming, and then you hit and then your fictional opponent reacts. There is also an element of safety and distance. So that is another thing that you don't particularly learn in real combat sports or martial arts or Krav Maga settings, because you really want to attack. Yes, there is an element of safety and there is an element of keeping distance. Of course, nobody wants to get hurt. No teacher wants people to get hurt, but in cinema there is way more distance that is being held just because the camera angle can fake the fact that you are 10 or 20 centimeters away from the opponent's face. So, again, there are pros and cons in enrolling in any of these classes, and I think both are definitely worth looking at.
Speaker 1:Then, when it comes to fighting choreography, we also want to look at which type of character are we playing. Are we a character that knows how to fight? Is it a person that has been military trained? Is it a person that went to a police academy? Or is it a ghetto person that was hired by some sort of narco-trafficants and that basically has been in the criminal world since being a teenager but never really learned of how to use a weapon, but just learned on the job and miraculously stayed alive? For example, I am at the moment going to the gun range, the shooting range, because I'm doing my license, my sport license in gun handling, because I want to make sure that I can really understand how a gun works. If I had to play the role of a police officer, right, but a police officer will hold his or her weapon in a very different way than somebody that never learned it a certain way but just was handed a gun when they were a teenager, right, and that are then a part of a drug gang.
Speaker 1:Again, thinking about your character, is your character drunk? Is your character totally lucid? Is your character scared of weapons? Let's say that you are a woman that gets in a lot of trouble and all of a sudden she's running away from something and then all of a sudden she's in a warehouse, there is a gun on the floor. She grabs the gun, but she has never held a gun before in her life and she's, like, scared to death to even shoot with it. Very different from somebody that you know is a part of the FBI or is a part of the army and has been trained to use these weapons. So even though you know how to box, even though you have some martial arts skills, even though you know how to do things, maybe your character will be somebody that doesn't really know. So then you have to be able to physically adapt your body as a dancer, using this new knowledge, but breaking the rules. But at least by knowing the rules you know how your character would then look like he can't or she can't box. So, for example, if you know that a boxer needs to have their elbows in and the character you're playing is just trying to box but doesn't know how to do it. Boom, go elbows out and have your fists in the air and you know that you're breaking the rules and you will look like a person that is absolutely unaware of what to do in these situations.
Speaker 1:I think another pro of doing real combat sports, a real martial art or something like Krav Maga is that it triggers your nervous system. Like, for example, I've done a huge amount of Krav Maga with a teacher. I did 17 hours a week for a year and it triggered my nervous system so much because there are sparring sessions. There's a lot of role play where you have to, there is obviously a sense of safety, but you really play it as if you were being attacked and the body doesn't really make the difference if it's a real attack or not. At the end of the day, there is adrenaline and there is stress. At the end of the day, there is adrenaline and there is stress.
Speaker 1:But I think something that I learned about myself is that I was so scared to hit somebody, I was so scared to hurt somebody During the sparring sessions or when I was paired up with a person that was way smaller than me. Sometimes for me it was really hard to just play that role and use all my strength. It was terribly confronting as I even started crying in class because I was so scared to to just hurt somebody. The other way around as well, during sparring and stuff. Sometimes during Krav Maga we had to wear like a big helmet and obviously teeth protection and stuff. And for me, because I was often paired up with men and bless them seriously, bless those men in Krav Maga, because I think they were as terrified as me. They were scared of hurting other people. That's not why they did the class for it but they had to play the role of the bad guy so that I, as a more tinier person, could be ready to face anything that could happen in the street. They had to play the role of the bully or use their strength, and it must have been very confronting for them too.
Speaker 1:But when we did the sparring sessions, I was so scared of really being hit in the face Like I didn't care to be hit anywhere else on my body, like I would be bruised up after certain sessions and I didn't care, but being hit in the face was something that was so triggering for me really triggering. It would bring me to tears, I would sometimes cry and even I had a couple of times had to step out of class. So these kind of experiences you will not have it in a screen fighting workshop, in a stunt workshop, because everything is made to be safe. You have a distance between your fictional opponent and yourself. With a real martial arts practice, with a real combat sports practice, you could be triggered. But it is actually a good experience for you as an actor or an actress to know what it feels like in your body when you're scared scared of hitting another person or scared of being hit, and I think very often people talk about the fear of being hit, but hitting somebody else is terribly nerve-wracking. So again, there are pros and cons to both. You will make your decision, but fight choreography obviously is essential for any action actress or actor. But also think that it's not only very well trained fighters that get a role in a movie. You have the drunken person. You have the person that is a victim of domestic abuse. You have those people that are very goofy and don't know how to fight and somehow miraculously get out of the fight because they did something unexpected. But the thing is that the more knowledge you have, the more fighting skills you have, the more you can break the rules to understand why your character looks goofy or that sort of things.
Speaker 1:Part two of what I'm exploring in the Action Actors Lab is the physicality of the actor. So the physicality of the actor is really the understanding of how the body can inform us, stepping into this new world, stepping into the life of this character. I could talk about it for hours, but I will just try to give a couple of pointers. For example, the first thing is balance. So balance, two feet firmly in the ground.
Speaker 1:Story happens and emotional states happen when there is imbalance Falling forward, falling back, falling to the side, leaning to the side, leaning forward, falling forward, falling back, falling to the side, leaning to the side, leaning forward. So even a very slight leaning forward or a very slight leaning back can already inform your character where it's at. Leaning back is usually whoa, no, I'm okay, I'm not doing anything. Leaning forward is really like more of ready to attack. But it is within imbalance that something happens. Any story happens because something gets out of balance. Right, somebody loses its money, somebody gets a lot of money. Somebody loses a lover, somebody gets a lover, somebody falls into trouble, somebody falls into love. So within the body all of that is translated. Sometimes a very subtle imbalance in the shoulders one shoulder front, one shoulder back makes a whole difference of a character that would be nonchalant or trying to turn around because they don't want to face this conversation. A slight tilt in the face can make everything very comedic.
Speaker 1:Then a very big chapter in a lot of physical theater schools is being an animal. So your body transforms into an animal. You could be a cat, you could be a bull, you could be a gazelle, but there is everything from the tip of your fingers through your spine, through your legs, through the tip of your toes. Everything transforms into how this character moves. So now imagine being a bull, really being a bull, and having sort of those horns and wanting to attack and everything. Every time you see the color red, aka somebody's triggering you in a bar or whatever, you want to just like attack it and face it, then you're going to lower that percentage in your body. So let's say that first you're going to really embody this bull 100%, then you're going to have 50% of bull, 50% of human. Eventually you will find the right balance of the bull and the human in you, but so there is a certain percentage of bull in you. This could be 5%, 10%, 20% and the rest is human. But this informs of how this person is actually walking through the street, walking into the bar, interacting with whoever he wants to fight. Same thing could be with the squirrel. Your body is a little bit of a squirrel and it'spsy and looks around. And it's looking around. It's fearful of what is here. Oh, something is there. I'm running away. So first you embody the squirrel fully and then you reduce the percentage of the squirrel in the body until you find this thing, human being that is very fearful of the environment and tries to keep itself small and is ready to run away no matter what, because every sound or every person or every shadow is making them fearful.
Speaker 1:Another example is in scientific studies they have shown that if you feel sad, for example, smiling, like basically giving your body a smile so you smile and you smile for several minutes. Eventually your body will feel happy. Right, so it is not per se the intellectual, mental activity of thinking I am happy that will give you a smile. It also works the other way around Smile, give the body the smile and eventually it will create a neurological effect that makes you happy. What does that mean Is that if you take any sort of body posture, it will inform the emotional state of your character. For example, somebody that is more confident will have their shoulders down and back. Somebody that is carrying the weight of the world has their shoulders falling slightly front and their heart sinks in, and they're small and they just walk differently. And they're small and they just walk differently. This will inform anything that you're feeling inside, aka what your character is feeling. So, for example, if your character is falling in love with somebody in the script, how about you just put your chest a little bit more front, have one shoulder a little bit more off. The chest is front because the heart wants to connect, but the shoulder is a bit turned because it's scared to actually connect and ask the person out, and the chin is down, and then from here you just move the eyes up a little bit and you try to get the words out and ask them out.
Speaker 1:So there is a huge amount of work that can also be done for the actor in general and that's not just for action actors, of how the body can be the starting point of a lot of things. Your character has a certain amount of power and authority or has a lack of power and authority. Again, that can be worked on in the body. For example, we talked about being an animal. Let's say that we are going to embody being a dog. Now a german shepherd or a Rottweiler has a very different body posture, a very different way of walking than a tiny little Chihuahua. Right, and the little Chihuahua, we know it. It is just barking a lot more because it's trying to defend itself, but it can't really. Or it's scared and it hides between the legs of its owner to be protected because it can't do much, and from the Rottweiler. So you could also embody a dog, rottweiler or Chihuahua. Diminish the percentage of the existence of the body of the dog Within your human body and then see how your character is bringing the text on from there.
Speaker 1:Part 3. Scene work and text. Within an action movie you might have text. During a fighting scene, you might have no text at all, it's just the fighting. And maybe you're going to have text during the chasing, right. So you're in a car and you're being chased by the police, or you are hiding in a warehouse and the only thing you have is a cell phone and you're communicating with your partners through the cell phone that sort of things.
Speaker 1:First of all, I'm speaking four different languages. Each language I do sound differently. There is another Cindy, that people have access to. It's just a normal way of life. I think every language we own it in a different way, we associate ourselves with a different way, but also the way people perceive us is very different, depending on our accents. So, for example, my accent in Spanish I sound like a foreigner with a French accent. I make a lot of grammatical mistakes, but I know there is something that makes me a bit more childish in Spanish. I don't perceive it that way, but I know that when native Spanish speakers listen to me, it's going to be very complicated them to imagine this accent being a very strong woman with authority that went to the army, because in Spanish I do not sound the same as I sound in English or in French or in Dutch.
Speaker 1:Like literally, in every single language we have a different way of expressing ourselves. But also you have to remember that it's also the way people perceive you and it's okay. But so accent reduction and or tonality is very important for us to incorporate that in our voice work, especially when doing action movies, because also the way a drunk person talks and a person with authority talks is very different, and I just want us to be very aware of that. So, for example, in my Action Actors Lab it's a multilingual workshop, so we're also working on what does it feel like to be this or this character in another language? And then there is also the work of what if I have to do a lot of movements and talk at the same time. That is again a very specific kind of work that we do a lot in theater, in physical theater. I've also studied mime and so it is worth looking into doing mime classes or physical theater classes to really have this dexterity to be able to walk and talk kind of thing, or walk and fight, or walk and carry objects or that sort of things.
Speaker 1:Then the last part self-tapes. So self-tapes for action movies. Do you want to be an action actor, action actress, so you want to be good at acting. So, in regards to showreels, a lot of agents and casting directors will recommend to have two different showreels one where you showcase your physical skills and one where you showcase your acting skills or you have some sort of blend, but then make sure that it's very balanced, like we really need to see you acting even though you have extra physical skills, for the self-tapes.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of rules that apply for any self-tapes, such as having good lighting, having a neutral background, framing it well, making sure there is not too much space between the top of your head and above, making sure that the sound is good. Making sure that the sound is good, making sure you avoid black or white clothes but have t-shirts of some sort of neutral colors. Remember that if you use very bright colors, usually it's more associated with comedy. But have a couple of things that you can use for self-tapes. You don't need a full-on military outfit. You don't need a full-on FBI outfit but, for example, have a navy blue jacket or something that is a bit khaki in your wardrobe, or have some earthy tones and t-shirts or maybe tank tops where you can see the shoulders and the fact that you have muscular shoulders or something like that. It can be useful for your self-tapes.
Speaker 1:Some of the complications in self-tapes for action movies are the action parts. So, for example, if you have to use a weapon if it is specifically indicated that you are using this or this weapon in the self-tape. This or this weapon in the self-tape, let's say you're using a sword, or you are using a bow staff, or you're using a joe staff or you're using some callies or right, so you're using a baseball bat or something like that. If you're too much in a close-up it's going to be distracting you moving that weapon around. So I generally for my self-tapes, if I have to use a weapon, I like to zoom out a little bit and have it more from my waist up and have a bit more range where I can move this weapon around. If, for example, you're just using a gun and you're about to shoot somebody, maybe you have a gun like for cinema, but this gun is not moving, you're just like holding it right. So there you can go more in, a bit more close up if needed, because you're not moving around with this weapon. But be very aware that you can have a bit of this I mean a boat kind of thing when you're moving around with this weapon.
Speaker 1:Then there is this element of things are happening around me. For example, there was an explosion on the right hand side. There is the roof that is falling apart, that sort of things. Just make sure that, the same way, you would have a very precise eye line. So, for example, if you're talking to two characters, you know that this particular character is on the left-hand side of the camera and the second character is on the other side of the camera and you're so specific with your eye line when you're going through the script. Have the same thing in place with any sort of things that are happening around you. There is an explosion, there is a window that smashes. Have it clear in your head. The window is there, the explosion is there, the person that is being murdered is in front of me. Be so precise that there is no shadow of a doubt when you're doing your self-tape, that you are seeing it because you know exactly where these things are happening.
Speaker 1:Personally, when I have a self-tape where it's a bit more of you are being strangled, or you are strangling somebody, or you are being attacked or you are being stabbed, I personally prefer, instead of filming myself from the waist up, I'd rather for it to be a bit closer. Why? Because if I'm going to fake being stabbed and my stomach is in the frame, it looks fake. It just looks so fake, whereas if I'm in a real close-up, they will have the reactions to the stabbing which they want to see, which is my facial reactions, but also there is no, which is my facial reactions, but also there is no. They don't see the miming of it. Now, when I say the miming, I really want to make this very clear. I studied mime. I'm extremely precise. I can fake it because I studied mime. A lot of actors are not trained in miming and so they will look fake, really fake. So, in that case, have a real table in front of you if you're self-taping, even if it's not in the frame, have real whatever paper knives and pens in front of you, because it will help you not to fake it and it will look realer, right? But yeah, if I'm being attacked or if I'm being strangled or if I'm being stabbed, I prefer to have a closer frame so that it doesn't look fake and the casting director or the director will see my reactions in my face.
Speaker 1:Again, everything that I've said in this episode is really based on my personal experience and having interviewed a lot of people on this podcast and having worked with different people in different countries in the world of action movies.
Speaker 1:Things that I've said might be true for certain casting directors or for certain productions. For other productions, specific directors, specific casting directors they might disagree with me, so it's always like a little bit of a searching or a little bit of an adapting to different industries as well. France might not be working the same way as Spain or the UK or Belgium there are different artistic, creative approaches to it as well, but I hope that this will at least give you a lot of food for thought and a lot of new things to think about when you want to work on your skills as an action actor or prepare for castings. I am teaching the Action Actors Lab. Feel free to send me a DM if you want to be a part of it in person, and if you live far away and you can't absolutely can't travel to where I'm teaching, definitely send me a DM to let me know how this episode landed for you, wishing you a huge amount of movies to make and see you in the next episode.
