INTENTION/OBJECTIVE
In each of my 4 Week Audition Workshops I teach a “6 Audition Tools Method” that when all of the tools are used together, they produce real results in conquering the audition process. Each actor often has an “aha!” moment when they realize when one or two of the tools is missing and that something is off in their audition. It might be an OK audition, but I always say, “Nice and Fine does not get the part.”
In my current 4 Week Audition Workshop, there seemed to be a theme going on that Tool # 3, “Intention”, was missing from a lot of their auditions. Or if not missing, their choice was off a bit or they were only playing one “intention” throughout the scene. The thing to remember is that whatever the characters initial “intention” is at the top of the scene, it almost always changes during the scene. That’s what makes the scene interesting, and usually why the Casting Director has chosen this scene to read for the audition… because something changes. And the Casting Director wants to see the actor change.
Maybe the actor has decided that their “intention” is to punish their boyfriend for breaking up with them and have made the choice to be “angry”. It’s possible the writer has even described the character as “angry”. The actor plays “angry” throughout the whole scene and it becomes tiring and uninteresting for the viewers to watch an actor play that one note. The scene becomes a scene about playing “angry”, and the original “intention” of punishing the boyfriend gets lost in the yelling. Remember that the characters “intention” changes based on circumstances or what another character says to you.
Emotions come up in dualities. Happy/Sad, Love/Hate, Angry/Calm. It’s the actors job to find the duality of the emotion in the scene, and make sure you not only understand that your character is “angry”, but to also recognize that “calm” is the flip side and needs to be explored. A writer has written these changes of “intention” into the script… something changes to further the action of the story.
So, when working on an audition scene, it is the actors job to identify what the characters initial “intention” is in the scene and where the “intention” changes…then the scene has a beginning, middle and end. Not a one note scene of playing “angry”.