BACK STAGE WEST

April 9, 1998

By Karen Kondazian (The Actor’s Way)

I studied acting with Milton Katselas in the 1970s at the Beverly Hills Playhouse, so it was good to catch up with this charismatic teacher and director in a recent interview at his Hollywood home, which he helped design.

During his long and distinguished career, Katselas has taught and/or directed many of the top acting talents in his country. He directed Blythe Danner in her Tony-winning performance in Butterflies Are Free, Eileen Heckart in her Academy Award-winning film performance in the same role, and Bette Davis in Strangers: The Story of a Mother and Daughter, for which Ms. Davis won an Emmy. Some of his students have included Anne Archer, Tom Selleck, Bob Urich, Jenna Elfman, Patrick Swayze, Michelle Pfeiffer, and George Clooney, among others.

Katselas himself was nominated for a Tony, and his three Los Angeles stage productions have all won L.A. Drama Critics Circle Awards for Best Direction. Katselas founded the Beverly Hills Playhouse 20 years ago, where he teaches. In 1996 he wrote the best selling Dreams Into Action, released by Dove Books. He is also active as a painter, sculptor, and architect.

Back Stage West: When you were a child, what did you envision yourself doing with your life?

Milton Katselas: I wanted to be a basketball player. I was running my father’s poolroom – I loved playing pool. Then when I went to college at Carnegie-Mellon, I tried acting. Right away, by the end of freshmen year, I knew I wanted to be a director. The acting was wonderful and I enjoyed it – I continued acting all the way through college and a little bit in New York – but directing took me into the sphere of costuming, architecture, design – visual concepts, which I liked. In my second year, I took the directing course, and I was hooked.

BSW: When did you first get to New York?

Milton Katselas: In the second year of college I went to New York for the first time on a visit, and I met Elia Kazan. I was walking in the street with a friend who pointed him out to me. I ran after him, caught him, and talked to him in Greek. He told me that when I finished college I should come to see him. I did, and he gave me a job as an assistant. So if you see someone you respect walking in the street, chase ‘em down and talk to them. Don’t be afraid. Kazan and I are friends to this day.

BSW: How did you start teaching?

Milton Katselas: On that visit to New York, I sat in on Strasberg’s classes and the Actor’s Studio – I just sort of wheedled my way in. Then when I went back to Carnegie, we formed a group. We would meet, I would teach, and eventually we did plays. And I’ve taught all through the movies and plays I’ve done. I teach because I enjoy teaching. It’s always been a part of my life.

BSW: You direct, teach, write, paint, sculpt, and now I hear you’re doing some architecture.

Milton Katselas: I associated with an architect in doing my house, and now we have a small firm and we’ve done an extensive renovation or two.

BSW: So you’re a Renaissance man?

Milton Katselas: Don’t say that so loud – the guys from the poolroom might hear.

BSW: In everything you do, what theme or dream or truth are you trying to communicate?

Milton Katselas: Well, the main thing is I try to have fun. But I guess one of the big themes, if you want to call it that, is rehabilitation. As a painter, besides doing work on canvas, I will take old doors and old wood and all kinds of things, and rehabilitate them, bring them to a new life. I do the same thing, hopefully, with actors. Often I take actors who have lost their zest or their push or their passion and try to rehabilitate them. (Please don’t tell them that’s what I’m doing.) And I will take young actors that haven’t gotten that passion yet and try to instill it in them.

BSW: What about your personal themes, or your personal search?

Milton Katselas: Well, when I was nine years old, my father said to me (in Greek), “Know thyself.” So that’s been a kind of search for me all my life: Discovering yourself through your work. But I think the other thing is passion. And risk. [TV and theatre producer] Joe Stern said to me once, “You’re not happy unless you’re on a high wire somewhere.” So: risk, the danger of it, taking a chance, passion, rehabilitation, self-discovery. Those are the kinds of things that I’m always looking for in my work.

BSW: Do these themes manifest themselves in your teaching?

Milton Katselas: Absolutely. Just take self-discovery: I try to teach that attitude monitors talent, so that your attitude about yourself as an actor and the way you feel about yourself in relation to the business is very important. It monitors whatever talent you have. That’s why sometimes you have actors who are less talented than others but have a greater attitude, so more of their talent comes to their work. Whereas another actor who has greater talent might have an attitude that isn’t that great and therefore he minimizes his own talent. He shipwrecks himself, puts himself on the rocks. It’s very important that an actor believes in himself. Confidence releases the juices, releases the life, releases the passion.

I tell actors, “I’m not out to destroy you. I may be out to destroy some part of the bullshit that you have or some part of your negativity, but I want to build confidence in you. That negativity isn’t going to bring your work and money and creativity.”

BSW: How would you work with someone who might come into your class with great charm, great personality, good looks, but no talent?

Milton Katselas: Charm, personality, good looks? I’d marry them. Look, I don’t believe there is anyone without talent. And above and beyond that, it’s not my job as an acting teacher to judge. As a director, that’s something else. In that case I’m casting them, so I have to judge their talent, their personality, and physical presence to fulfill a role. But in teaching, time and time again people surprise you with their abilities. I love it when the underdog wins.

BSW: What about actors who have problems with their looks?

Milton Katselas: Part of my job is to remove the prejudice they might have about themselves. There is as much prejudice against beautiful people as there is against the so-called unattractive. People think that if actors are beautiful they can’t act. And the actor himself may think, “It’s all about tits and ass and not about my talent.” Or you have the person who thinks they are not attractive and so can’t get the romantic leading parts. You have to teach them and show them that attractiveness has to do with attitude as much as anything else. We have some wonderful actors who are not conventionally beautiful, but convey sex, attractiveness, and romance with their attitude and talent. You have to get the person to really see themselves, deal with themselves, and stop making up all these phony stories about their limitations.

I mean, Bogart was not a conventionally handsome guy, but because of his attitude and manliness and talent, the unique way he handled himself and his voice, he was gorgeous. And one has to be careful what to change with an actor, because it may be the clue to their power. So maybe Bogie comes into an acting class and the first thing the teacher might tell him is, “Work on your voice.” Or Sandy Dennis. A lot of people thought her voice was too soft, but it was great for many roles. So one has to be careful when you start advising people.

BSW: How do you work with actors who may be really wonderful but can’t audition well?

Milton Katselas: In Stanislavski, there was nothing to do with auditioning. It is something I have always dealt with, however, because I want actors to work. There is no substitute for work: you can study and study, but you must work.

I think the audition process should be worked on with actors in a class, not just in a cold reading class, but as part of their acting journey, as part of their acting work. It’s very, very important. One guy in my class was not doing well at auditions at all. I got him up in the class one time and I said, “Dance. And as you dance, I want you to say some of these lines.” And he did. And he suddenly got free. So I said, “The next audition you go to, even though it’s not a dancing one, I want you to dance.” So he went and he did it and he got a callback.

BSW: So every actor has their own creative trigger.

Milton Katselas: Yes. It’s something different for everyone, but there’s a quirk, there is a trick, there is a lever – there is a way for each actor that releases them, and helps them with their auditions. Some like to rehearse a lot. Some like to improvise a little. Some like to be caught off guard, almost not prepared. You have to find what works for you. I have told actors that when you audition and you don’t feel good about it, go back that very moment. Don’t get in your car and go home sadly. Go back. Say you’d like another three-minute shot. But you had better make sure that the second time is definitely better, because otherwise it’s for the birds. You’ve got to come back with something fresh and new.

One other tip: They want you to give them the confidence that you can do this part, so get off the notion of “reading” for the part – you’re doing an acting. And use the script. When they hire you and pay you, then you can put it down. Let them feel, “If he’s this good with the script, then he’ll be great without it.” But remember, it’s not a reading, it’s an acting.

So the attitude is very important in the audition. And the feeling that you have something to offer. You’re unique, you see. There is nobody like you. No one. In my book, I have a chapter about “unlikely winners.” There are no likely winners. I mean, to think that Ronald Reagan would go from being an actor to being president! Or Mugsy Bogues, the five-foot-three-inch professional basketball player – a likely winner?

In New York, my gang and I thought Robert Redford was low on the totem pole because he was so handsome, we didn’t believe he could act. He’s handsome as hell, but also a fabulous actor and director. What schmucks my gang and I were! Is Linda Hunt someone you’d ever pick for a winner? She’s a small person, but when she acts, she’s a giant…People have to work on themselves. And there’s a uniqueness. And if you turn your back on that uniqueness you have lost the game.

BSW: Can you talk about the difference between stage and film acting?

Milton Katselas: There’s more money in film. To me, acting is acting. If I take a stage actor and we go into a small room and we have an audience of eight people, the performance he does won’t be the same as the one he’ll do in a 3,000-seat house. It’s a matter of judgment – how you use yourself and where you minimize and where you contain the energy because of the space you are dealing with. But the moments remain the same to me – the acting moments.

Many of our best movie actors are stage actors. Aren’t they? Glenn Close, Vanessa Redgrave, Al Pacino, many more. They’re the best. These are stage-trained actors. Stage actors know the whole circle of how to put on a three-hour play. They know the beginning, middle, and the end. So when they get a movie script, they have an understanding of that full circle that allows them to break the script apart and do it out of sequence. That’s part of the benefit of being a stage actor.

BSW: There’s a big difference between stage and the camera though. The camera really gets close and gets into your secrets.

Milton Katselas: C’mon – you see as many secrets on the stage as you do with a camera. The secrets are there, personally and acting-wise. Weaknesses and strengths. They all come out.

BSW: What would you suggest for conquering a fear of the camera?

Milton Katselas: On the set, during a lunch break, go and touch the camera, look at it, look through it, operate it, see what it is. Stand in front of it. Feel its presence. Get close to it. It’s not the enemy. It’s your friend.

BSW: You’ve spoken about the actor’s personal connection with a role.

Milton Katselas: Bobby DeNiro spoke in my class once, and somebody asked him, “What’s your career concept?” He said, “Self-expression.” That’s very personal to him. He’s done everything from gaining weight to shaving his head to express more of himself as an actor and as a person, and I think that’s part of his thing. Actors have to learn to understand that the work of the actor has to be personal. Why did this script come to you at this time? What’s the personal connection? An obvious example is that in the middle of a divorce, I received a script for a four-part miniseries called The Rules of Marriage. Needless to say, I felt compelled to do it. After editing, my soon-to-be-ex sat in a darkened theatre and watched it with me, but that’s a small movie in itself…

BSW: What do you say to someone who might wonder whether they should study acting or not?

Milton Katselas: Classes not only get you ready for the moment, acting-wise, but as Gurgiev, an Eastern philosopher, says, “The job of the teacher is to wake up the student. Make him aware he is asleep, then wake him up.” Many people want to be actors, but they’re asleep – sitting in cafés and badmouthing the industry or their agent or something. Badmouthing themselves. So don’t just stay in slumberland – get into a class and do. Do, do, do. It’s very hard without a teacher. You can do it, but it’s very hard.

BSW: I want to read you something and get your response. The director George C. Wolfe said that theatre is “people sitting in the dark watching people in the light showing us what it means to be human. Actors give us feelings of being alive, and if we can’t do it in our relationships and our work, we’ll do it in the darkness of a theatre. We dearly hope that they will entertain us and give us light and show us the way.”

Milton Katselas: That’s beautiful. What are you wasting your time with me? Sounds as if you should interview George Wolfe. What he says is hot. The world is going to be saved, if it is saved, by artists – not by scientists, not by politicians, not by doctors. Those people extend our life, they affect it, no doubt, and we owe them a debt. But what we’re interested in is the quality of our life. Theatre and movies bring us understanding – that is the bottom line. To love and understand one another no matter what differences there seem to be.

In Ancient Greece, farmers walked for miles and miles to come to the theatre, to look and see and experience and have this catharsis, as they called it, which brought them understanding. So study life; it’s the key to being the best actor you can be. Actors don’t go out and study life enough. Don’t be caught up in money. Get into the real craft and understanding of the acting. Observe all the time. Life is right there looking at us, square in the face, ready to teach us what we are trying to convey. When you sit in a car and a person walks by, you can see their whole life. You see their economic position. You see their sexuality. You see their political views. You see everything by observing their behavior, manner, clothing. Study all this. As artists we have to convey an understanding of behavior and life. Theatre and film are very powerful, but they need life to inform them.

BSW: Do you have any final tips, any last comments for actors?

Milton Katselas: Be an artist in your life. Make your life work. Make your life sing. Don’t be downtrodden. This is your time to learn. This is your time to celebrate. Have fun. Enjoy.

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