About this item
Highlights
- Acting Action provides a foundation for how to get started and build the core of a performance.
- About the Author: Hugh O'Gorman is an actor, director, teaching artist, and co-executive director of the National Alliance of Acting Teachers.
- 290 Pages
- Performing Arts, Acting & Auditioning
Description
About the Book
Acting Action provides a foundation for how to get started and build the core of a performance. More precisely, it provides a practical guide for actors, directors, and teachers in the technique of playing action, addressing a void in the world of actor training by illuminatin...Book Synopsis
Acting Action provides a foundation for how to get started and build the core of a performance. More precisely, it provides a practical guide for actors, directors, and teachers in the technique of playing action, addressing a void in the world of actor training by illuminating what exactly to do in the moment-to-moment act of acting.
Review Quotes
A book for breakthroughs! It presents comprehensive techniques and tools with warmth and humanity; myriad diagnostic and performative keys are shared in a thoughtful, approachable, and deeply relatable manner. A compelling read that translates into practical, dynamic touchstones for building an active and fulfilling craft--all illuminated by the joy the author so clearly finds in delving into the ineluctable, elusive magic of stage and screen performance.
A comprehensive and clear-eyed distillation of some of the core tenets of acting technique, O'Gorman's primer beautifully demystifies the craft for young actors. Finally someone has re-articulated some of the substantial contributions of Lloyd Richards and Earle Gister to our understanding of what acting is. This is an important addition to the canon of material for actors in training.
Acting Action: A Primer for Actors is a gem! O'Gorman distills such complex information into learn-able (and teach-able) bites. The result is a delicious meal for anyone who wants a real technique to guide his or her path to artistry as an actor.
Hugh O'Gorman has pulled together his lifetime of experience as actor and acting teacher--not to mention as a soccer player--into a wonderfully comprehensive, eminently readable book on acting in general, and on acting training and work on scene and character. The synthesis between Stanislavsky, Earle Gister, and Michael Chekhov is truly remarkable, and the progression of the exercises is just right. It is a tremendously rewarding treasure house of professional guidance for actors, teachers, and directors alike.
I wish I'd had this book when I started teaching acting thirty years ago. Hugh O'Gorman is omnivorous. I've never known someone so hungry to understand--and explain in the most practical terms--acting technique and training from every possible angle. He's read everything remotely related to the field, and he's developed an approach to training that's broadly comprehensive and cohesive, analytical and intuitive--one that honors the wisdom of master teachers, many of whom he's studied with. Acting Action is practically its own syllabus. In 10 chapters, its author lays out every aspect of actor preparation--all adding up to a highly effective approach to playing action onstage. This book is one-stop-shopping for teachers of acting.
About the Author
Hugh O'Gorman is an actor, director, teaching artist, and co-executive director of the National Alliance of Acting Teachers. Since 2002, he has been the head of acting at California State University, Long Beach. His acting credits include Broadway, Off-Broadway, and over a dozen of the nation's most respected regional theaters. His many television credits include AMC's Emmy Award-winning show Remember WENN (SAG Award nomination) and HBO's John Adams. O'Gorman is the author of The Keys to Acting.
