Vision

Actors can achieve their goals through two pathways. By going from project to project – from stage production to stage production, from film to film – the freelance route, or by being a part of a permanent group in order to get a breakthrough together – in a manner of music bands. Beatles members would probably never be able to achieve their level of fame, skill, artistic identity and success if they went from project to project in a manner that corresponds to what is most common for actors in DK.

It is possible to go both ways with CAMaC. Those who would like to be “soloists” can get the coaching, training and connections they need, while those who want to be part of a solid lasting team can get to be in CAMaC’s acting company Deniva.

In order to ensure the coming breakthrough the formation of a theater company should be based on a clear artistic vision and unique working method. I.e. a new approach to the art of acting – unique artistic profile, as it has been e.g. with Moscow Art Theatre, Group Theater, Grotowski’s Laboratory Theatre and others.

CAMaC provides its unique approach (which stands on the shoulders of theatre history’s giants) to actors who want to grow and realize their talent with a group of chosen players.

One of the main goals that lies ahead CAMaC is the establishment of an international touring actor company Deniva with the actors who have trained at the center.

Acting Company Deniva is

• an ensemble producing theater and tv;
• an actor’s studio, forum & workshop dedicatied to development af acting technique and actor’s craftsmanship,  on-going actor’s training;
• a workplace and
• a different form of theater that focuses on:
  How masterly actor’s technique and work should be to produce theater that is so entertaining, intense, gripping and moving that it wins hearts and minds of the audiences.
• what happens hvis will be if it explores the acting part of the theater deepest possible. Cuts to the bone compared to the ‘how little’ there need to be ‘around’ if the story can be created as supreme as possible through the acting art as the driving factor.

Background

Over the years, I have launched several projects aimed at creating an acting company where players deliver virtuoso acting; with ultimate freedom, intensity and sincerity. Various actors with experience from 0 to 30 years were involved in it.

It went with mixed success. There were some excellent results and some quite mediocre. Since the dramatic art is very subjective, I use, of course, my own assessment, and that of those whose judgment I respect and trust.

The experience put together has shown that what has primarily influenced the results was the actors’ readiness to work with their Emotional Mastery. I.e. their emotional freedom, spontaneity, intensity and sincerity. The “holes” that their technique had and the places where their actor instrument was rusty, was in the way of doing a job of undeniably high quality. The actors’ readiness to work with their feelings has determined how much artistic and personal satisfaction they got and how many new doors have opened professionally for them.

Many actors take it for granted (especially those with many years in the industry) that they are professionals of emotions.
“Because the able actors are masters of emotions by definition. By virtue of their education, or talent, or experience”, – they say.

During the work, it happens repeatedly that the actors often do not realize what feelings stir in them on the moment-to-moment basis. All too often, an actor is experiencing one feeling, but the actor’s voice expresses a different one and therefore sounds false and breaks the flow and believability of the acting. Some feelings are taboo and anxiety provoking for actors.

However, the most common challenge is that it is all too easy for an actor to trick oneself to believe that emotion is honest and experienced while it is pretended and put-on.

At times it is a tough task to get an actor to realize that one is never “done” as an artist. Especially that one’s instrument requires continuing training and maintenance. Some actors look at their skills as either-or: either one is trained and thereby done and just should be widely used by the industry, or one is an embarrassing amateur. They will usually not put it so directly, but their attitude reveals itself during the work and conversations. Such actors often think black / white about their level of skills – instead of using e.g. 0 to 100 scale, where 0 is the worst that we have seen and can imagine, and 100 is the best.

Skuespillerne

To be a part of the Acting Company actors need be able to speak a common working language, have confidence in each other’s and their own technique, be interested and committed to grow professionally. That can be clarified and reached during and through joint work and training.

Like Attracts Like. Here understood “like” as a shared vision, artistic values, approach and attitude to the art of acting and work ethics.

There are actors of many different “confessions”. They believe in different things in regard to the art of acting and the actor’s work process. E.g. what belongs and doesn’t to the rehearsal process. Some as a matter of fact only rehearse without exploring the material. Already from the first reading they are trying to hit the bull’s eye (as if it exists) and regard it as a sign of being top professional. Already here if an actor who wants to explore and try things, gets to work with someone who will just begin to make arrangements and agreements, both will be unnecessarily frustrated.

Actors can tolerate and want different degrees of improvisation, which is allowed in the show during the playing period. (The kind of improvisation that is based on the story and the here-and-now of the act, and intents to enrich the performance.)

Some actors want lots of “air”. They want to feel free as a bird, and wish only be bound by history’s course of action, momentary sense and the physical environment on stage. Others will prefer to drive along the once fixed rails of arrangement and interpretation.

It’s almost like as if a person with claustrophobia tendency (in the case of acting – the fear of being put into rigid form and inflexible staging and agreements) meet someone with agoraphobia tendency (fear of open spaces, and in the case of acting – the fear of the unforeseen and unplanned during the performance). One will have more freedom, the other will have more control. It’s alright, each taste. But to play together?

Different “confessions” can be a matter of different tolerance and ambition levels regarding sensitivity (emotional availability) and personal power in the acting. Different attitudes about whether the inborn talent and clear speech is enough for an actor. To what talent is and whether it can grow or shrink. Different understanding of what does it mean to be honest during acting and whether it is necessary and so on.

Since being a part of Acting Company Deniva can compared with participating in a joint journey and a venture it is of outmost importance to answer to a number of questions such as: what the goal is and why it is important to reach it and what criteria participants must meet.

To make sure you reach your acting goals either as solo traveler or as part of team, read om Master Plan to Reach Your Acting Goals here.

Different working methods give different results

Acting Company Deniva’s two working methods Complete Acting Technique and Free Flow Acting allow to reach the tricky and elusive balance between the two conflicting requirements which the actor’s work is subject to. One is a requirement to comply to and meet the obligations of the fixed text, story line and directors vision, the second is a requirement to play I such a way as if the action unfolds here and now for the first time.

These two methods, while working together, bring the refreshing improvisational element that provides ultimate believability, unpredictability, spontaneity and suspense into the framework of the fixed story, characters, instruction and cooperation with other production departments. Thus, this improvisational aspect in acting, used correctly, allows actors to reliably deliver the story while they both improvise and simultaneously meet the technical requirements of the production. This improvisational aspect of acting becomes the crucial aspect that makes the acting to the wonder of art that it can and should be.

(Read more about it in The New Acting Paradigm).

The word “improvisation” is a tricky one.

Most see improvisation primarily as a way to compose dramatic stories and characters often from a few single words. As a rule, when the actor improvises under these conditions, the actor does playwright’s and director’s work as well. I.e. actor’s improvisation aims very much at creating and deciding the situation, characters and the story itself. It is noteworthy that typically the more the actor knows about the situation and the characters, the harder it is for the actor to improvise, for then the actor is tempted to produce the feelings, intonations, facial expressions, gestures and actions that the actor thinks are right and appropriate. The freshness, credibility, immediacy, excitement that characterizes good improvisation disappear.

With FreeFlow Acting improvisation method actors can improvise over the character, the moment’s and interaction’s content and meaning, while they are true to their real inner life on moment-to-moment basis and while they meet all of that, which the director has “ordered”. The more an actor knows about the plot, scene and characters, the more virtuous technique must the actor possess. In this way, the actor does not compose a new work, but improvises over how notes and not least pauses can be played. Just as the brilliant pianists are able to play the most demanding pieces, and the audience really feel that music is born here and now and appears before them for the first time.

In order to for the audience to be mesmerized, captured and surprised by the action is it necessary that there is an element of newness for actors, who let themselves to be surprised by themselves, each other, the moment and the story as such, despite playing it again and again. The Complete Acting Technique and Free Flow Acting are the tools that allow it to happen.

For the sake of fairness, it is appropriate to mention that improvisation can also be used to understand the nature and situation. This process comes mostly from Stanislavsky method of Analysis Through Action.

Acting Company Deniva’s approach to acting as art is more fully described in The New Acting Paradigm and The Actor’s Theatre Manifesto. (Read more about it in the New Drama Paradigm).