When Milton and I reworked the Acting Class book in 2008, we flirted with the idea of moving “Who’s The Author?” to the top of his famous Actors’ Checklist for Takeoff. The reason for this contemplation? The proper understanding of the traditional first item on the list, the Event – what’s going on here? – is so strongly affected by the author’s sensibility and unique voice. A marital fight in a Sorkin script is a different animal from a marital fight in one by O’Neill, which is different again from that fight written by Tennessee.
Another aspect of my recurring actor-as-plumber metaphor: you’ve got to know whose story you’re in, and how that awareness may help you figure the choices that will help the author out. Picture asking a plumber to fix the leak on your kitchen sink and you return later to find he’s built a small, beautifully artistic waterfall cascading into your sink. I’m sure you’d be, well…. What the hell? Right? It’s not that the guy wasn’t very talented to be able to build a waterfall in your sink, but it just has nothing to do with what you needed or wanted from him, and it really interferes with doing the dishes.
So for those occasions where you’ve watched a comedic treatment of Schindler’s List, or perhaps a version of Marty wherein the actor angrily assaults that girl when they come home from the date, or a plodding, emotional, pause-ridden scene from Sports Night…. These are usually not an issue of the actors’ inability to create a realistic circumstance, or lack of courage in making a choice, but that of their improper analysis of the tone of the script, leading to choices that did not fit the story.