A peculiar peace descends onmy mind, as if I partially cease to exist andsomebody else’s soul is living in me insteadof my own.
Connection to how an actor's craft is connected to her soul. When a successful act is performed, it is as if all the souls of the audience is living inside the actor, experiencing the emotions firsthand.
(She giggles. Another sign of a trainedactor. It doesn’t matter how deep emotion isin acting, with the return to life it snaps offand is laid aside with no perturbance.)
A skilled actor can:
Perform an action Create the necessary emotion Communicate it convincingly Stop Return to normal
That's another reason the author emphasizes action rather than simply emotion.
The actor doesn't have to suffer endlessly in order to portray suffering. They need to understand what they're doing and why they're doing it, perform it fully, and then be able to let it go.
Not only the character of thepart, but also the individuality of theactor who plays the part.
So the actor needs to consider two people:
The character they're acting against The actual actor playing that character
That second part is especially interesting. Two actors might play the exact same character, but they have different personalities, reactions, and ways of responding. Therefore, your approach may need to change depending on your scene partner.
Yes. By your character rather. Toconvince you in anything one mustapproach you through emotion. Coldreasoning is inaccessible to your type ofmind— the mind of an artist who dealsmostly with his or other people’simaginations.
Dramatic action isn't just about expressing an emotion; it's about deliberately doing something to affect another person, and the action you choose should depend on who you're trying to affect.
Lack of technique, that’s all
And I think the larger point of this section is that acting for film requires a different technique from acting on stage. An actor can't simply rely on the continuous flow of a theatrical performance; they have to understand the goal, intention, and dramatic action of their character deeply enough to pick it up even when filming is fragmented.