Kim Stanley: The Charlatans of Acting
“Now, the charlatan will only attract people who can’t get in or stay in a real class, so they aren’t going anywhere. But they are not becoming actors."
“You know, Uta [Hagen] was so wise to name her book Respect for Acting, because we often spoke about the shocking lack of respect there was for acting, its study, its application. She would call me when I was out in Santa Fe [teaching, briefly, at the College of Santa Fe, in the 1970s], and she would say, “You’re not going to believe who’s teaching acting now,” and she would give the name, and I would howl. “But he, or she, is a lousy actor!” “I know,” she would say, “but the students love him. They feel so free and seen.”
“Well this is lunacy. It drives me crazy. I know the need to make a living is intense, but there is so much charlatanism in the teaching of acting, it just makes me violent.
“I’m a fat woman. A few years back a director, a good director, but an asshole [this would probably be John Dexter] reached out and said he was going to direct The Way of the World [by William Congreve] and he said he would like me to be either Millamant or Lady Wishfort. Well, I knew what he was saying: How fat are you? How fat will you continue to be in four months or whenever I’m doing this production? If I was fat, I would need to be Lady Wishfort. If I got into shape and found a good girdle and the right costumes, I might, might, be able to play Millamant.
“Now, my mind might have raced to spot-reducing: Where can I go to get this fat under my chin removed? How much shadowing can I put on my face to thin it out? Well, it’s stupid. I’m fat, too fat, and fat is not only something that gathers around and under your face: It’s something that encases your entire body and alters the way you move and breathe and sound. We aren’t fat in places. We’re fat entirely.
“Well, spot-reducing doesn’t work, and neither does spot-coaching. A lot of people, with no experience whatsoever, people who’ve read books and can memorize what people like Uta or Lee [Strasberg] or Bobby Lewis or Michael Chekhov have put together, will gather together a group of dumb, ambitious people and stick this stuff in their minds, which is okay, but they’ll add some mystical bullshit in there—you know, meditating and looking into the flames of candles and ‘seeing’ the work manifesting—and these dummies will become totally addicted to the creep running the class. A charlatan.
“Now, the charlatan will only attract people who can’t get in or stay in a real class, so they aren’t going anywhere. But they are not becoming actors: They are being trained in attitudes that might work at a casting call or reading. They’re pumped up, blazing with misplaced confidence. Jessie [Lange] told me about being at a casting meeting for a film she was doing, and she was there to meet some of the aspirants, and she found people in hallways chanting, yelling, eyes ablaze and uttering a single word over and over. They came in aflame and entirely bad.
“I wish there were a means by which we could regulate these classes. You can disagree with me, with Uta, with anyone, but we have bodies of work. We have experience. We didn’t just read the books—we worked with the people who wrote or inspired them. Am I always right? God, no. But when I’m at my best, I can help someone become a better actor. Not for an audition, but for a lifetime. Not for the run of a play,, but for a lifetime. The foundation of all teaching is a respect for the art, the craft, of acting. This study never ends, but it cannot be conducted by someone who hasn’t done anything, or who hasn’t done anything well.
“I wish we could arrest them.”
From an interview with Kim Stanley, conducted by James Grissom, in Los Angeles, 1992.