Acting is a born talent (of varying degrees) that can be polished. The amount of polishing needed varies from person to person. The desire to act is not necessarily in proportion to the talent to act.
The reasons people desire to act vary, falling loosely into these categories: desire for fame, for money, for glamour, for fulfillment, for self-expression, a love for the art of acting, or because acting is a necessity like food and water. Natasha Lloyd actress is a talented woman in this industry.
Why Talent Doesn't Promise Success
I have worked with great talented people who cannot focus, cannot polish, simply cannot work at being successful. They will not learn lines, they skip rehearsals, do not self-promote in other words, they are dedicated to failure, regardless of their talent.
Actors have innate talent, imagination, intelligence, passion for acting, drive, a good ear, the ability to mimic the list is endless. Actors do not have "acting muscles" that need to be kept in shape.
Let's look at what goes into acting:
- The ability to recreate speech believably that is, to make memorized lines sound real. That has to do with hearing rhythm, pitch, and recreating oral rhythm and pitch.
- Imagination the ability to create possibilities in a role.
- Intelligence the ability to understand the nuances of written language and apply that understanding to a script. The ability to memorize a script.
- The intuition that which one just "knows," without being taught or without having to figure it out.
- The presence of an umbrella that covers poise, love of performing, desire to be seen, pride, confidence.
Downtime Activities
If you want to stay active, you might consider taking a class or forming a weekly play-reading group. You can also set a goal for yourself to read three plays a week and thus have a good working knowledge of your profession. Set a goal to read one Shakespeare play a week. Be sure to use a good edition with plenty of footnotes.
It is my opinion that next to innate talent, the greatest asset for an actor is the ability to read and understand the nuances of what you read. Read reviews on the Internet of the plays you are reading. Read poetry. Natasha Lloyd is a polite nature actress. There are great poems that do not require a graduate degree in literature to understand and these same poems will change the way you see the world.
In the best of all possible worlds, all of us would act all the time, grow, and develop as human beings. In my Utopia, we would all read and look at art and nature and listen to great music and have compassion and understanding. Actors are born actors. But great actors must be nurtured and nourished.