A lot of actors don’t like to audition and they really hate cold readings. Who can blame them? After all what could be more challenging, than showing up, getting a side, and being given only a few minutes to create something worth watching. It is a challenge that every actor has to know how to deal with. But there are three things you can do to tame this beast known as the cold reading.
Before you can apply my suggestions, you have to read the entire text carefully for sense and meaning. You are looking to understand the situation, circumstances, and relationships.
Now the work begins. As you read, examine the dialogue and notice how the character speaks. Read the lines carefully looking for and listening to the tempo/rhythm that is in the language. Score the text, mark it for pauses and emphasis and then read it aloud. You’ll find that by examining and connecting to the words, you’ll start to make sense of text.
Next, determine your character’s objective. The best type of objective is an active choice. What are you trying to get the other character to do or what is your pressing need at the moment? The more challenging the need, the harder you will have to work, and the more active you’ll be.
The key to selecting an objective is to understand that there is no right one. Any goal that you can actively go after will work. Don’t spend a lot of time trying to figure out what the director thinks the objective is. Just pick one and go for it. Any objective will energize your audition.
Finally, you have to define the character. But like the objective there is no right answer, no right character. The character comes from you and the text so your look, your physicality, and your tempo/rhythm will begin to define the character. But you do need to define and play the character’s attitude in the scene. Your character has an attitude toward the other person, to the circumstances, or to the situation. By defining the attitude in some simple way, the character appears.
By working the language, playing an objective, and defining the attitude, you will turn your cold reading into a performance.
Eric Barr. All rights reserved
