Screen Acting Skills: A Practical Handbook for Students and Tutors

Description

Whether you are a young actor seeking to land your first screen role or a workshop leader looking for relevant exercises that won't involve vast technical support, this book belongs on your shelf. Many screen actors begin their careers lacking the appropriate pre-shoot preparation and knowledge of studio protocols. This book helps actors new to screen performance to be fully prepared artistically - and technically. Screen Acting Skills augments existing theoretical and academic studies by offering practical, focused exercises that can be explored in low-tech workshop situations. Written in an accessible, jargon-free and often humorous style, Screen Acting Skills enables creativity on the workshop floor, allowing young - and older! - actors to access their own talent, and to hone their skills. This book offers students and tutors a straightforward approach to acting for the screen and how to prepare for studio work. The book is published alongside online videos of workshops with screen acting students.

Roger Wooster has worked in theatre, radio and television during his career. He went on to work in FE and HE teaching a wide range of performing arts modules including screen and radio acting. During his career he has had the opportunity to observe the different styles of Mike Leigh and Ken Russell at work. He has given papers at many international conferences and has been widely published in a range of academic journals. His Contemporary Theatre in Education was published in 2006 and in 2016 a major study of educational theatre, Theatre in Education in Britain, was published by Methuen Drama. Paul Conway (PGCE, Diploma in Speech and Drama, Brendan Smith Theatre Academy, Dublin) has spent his career working in film, television, stage and radio as an actor, director, devisor and published playwright. As a young actor he worked on the TV series Inside and was writer-director of The Last Shout for Sahara Films. He has also worked for directors such as Ken Loach, Ken Russell, Desmond Davis and Gerald Stembridge. Since moving into academia he has specialised in teaching screen performance. He is currently Senior Lecturer at the Film and Television School based at the University of South Wales, Cardiff.

What really makes this book worth picking up is that it is littered with useful and appropriate exercises as well as links to video clips to illustrate points. ... Any actor wanting to explore the world of acting on film should definitely give this a read before setting foot on a film set and then keep it as a handy guide to refer back to. * National Drama * I think that the book sounds like an extremely useful addition to screen acting practice and would not hesitate in recommending it to the screen acting school at which I work. It seeks to contextualise screen acting and offers an intriguing methodology to explore ... As the authors rightly point out, although there are some notable competing titles, [this book] would address an important gap in the market. There isn't a single title that comes to mind which aims itself at those individuals looking to explore screen acting in their late teens and early twenties. Given the huge success of TV and film content streaming sites, and their particular accessibility to younger generations, I am sure that a screen acting book, targeted in part at them, should do well if it succeeds in its aims. I think the proposed book's strength lies in offering the trainee screen actor a consistent methodology, properly contextualised, and explained in a way that engages and excites the reader. Screen acting publications can sometimes be a little 'top-down' in their approach - offering the actor tricks and overly proscriptive directions in addressing challenges when working in front of camera. The authors certainly tick an important box in looking to provide a more bottom-up solution to the challenges faced by the camera actor, whilst hopefully providing the screen acting trainer with practical exercises to help actors understand the methodology and integrate it into their craft. * Philip Wolff (Head of Screen Acting at The International School of Screen Acting) * I think this book is great! It is clear and flags up all the rules and business that we actors have to know and be aware of. I wish I'd had this book when I was starting out. I can't tell you how many times I was scared, puzzled and ignorant of all the do's and don'ts. To have this sensible guide would have been great. * Alison Steadman, Actor *