Do you believe that some celebrities were discovered by chance "in a restaurant"?

[Mister_Rik]

Huh. IIRC, I saw Pamela Anderson’s first Playboy appearance, and her “assets” weren’t so pronounced. I thought the boob job came later.

[Leaffan]

@HoneyBadgerDC

Not so, anymore than it is for writing, playing music or dancing. I signed up for an acting class after my divorce. I found a few type characters I could do well at but not very many. Most in the class were experienced but not very good. Good acting is not easy at all for most of us.

Perhaps not most of us, but really, I don’t think it’s that difficult to be good at acting. There are actors like Meryl Streep, Johnny Depp, Al Pacino, etc. who are top of class, but I think a lot of people could do very well in a supporting role. I personally think I could easily be convincing. I don’t see what the big deal is: draw on personal experiences and put yourself in the moment. I could do it.

[Voyager]

Here are some signs that you might get a callback from an agent

• You crush all your interviews. I’m sure if you’ve interviewed people for jobs some of them are just dull and some of them are dynamic and exciting. Those are the people who get the jobs, all else being equal. Most of acting is auditioning, which is more interviews in a month than most of us do in our lifetimes. 1/18 jobs is considered really good.

• you are not afraid of giving talks, and when you do people come into the room to listen to you. If you get evaluated, you get really high marks.

• you have the ability to turn on. By that I mean, when it is time to do it, you go to another level, no matter where you were before. I was on location once around midnight, and one of the kids, 10 at the time and pretty famous now, was apparently losing it like over-tired ten year old kids will do. But when they were rolling, she was right there and was perfect. I know it is a cliche about the star not being ready, but the average actor had better be or he or she is out on her ass. And bad behavior gets around.

Having these characteristics is no guarantee of anything - but not having them will get you out of that agent’s office real fast.

[The_Second_Stone]

@Leaffan

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: I don’t think acting is a unique talent. I think I am entirely capable of providing a perfectly decent acting performance. Acting is more about luck, looks, and being in the right place at the right time.

Most of us could eventually become very good at acting with some coaching and some exposure.

Some actors are exceptional. Most are just mediocre and any of us could do it with a bit of exposure.

So, it’s no surprise that you could discover someone with a photogenic appearance and coach him or her to be an actor: big deal. Marilyn Munroe wasn’t a particularly great actress, but she was sure easy on the eyes.

Monroe not a great actress? She shared the screen with a lot of big stars in her day and some of the best respected actors. You cannot take your eyes off of her and it wasn’t because she was botching the lines or wooden. She was very accomplished as an actress, but resented by her peers and looked down on because people think it was all about looks. She was more than a looker.

[Bridget_Burke]

@Leaffan

Perhaps not most of us, but really, I don’t think it’s that difficult to be good at acting. There are actors like Meryl Streep, Johnny Depp, Al Pacino, etc. who are top of class, but I think a lot of people could do very well in a supporting role. I personally think I could easily be convincing. I don’t see what the big deal is: draw on personal experiences and put yourself in the moment. I could do it.

Have you done it? There are a lot of actors out there–people with training & experience. This thread is about “discoveries”–the vanishingly rare instances of non-actors being recruited into acting. When this happens, really exceptional beauty is usually the reason. Not that that’s enough to sustain a career.

For all the other parts, there are plenty of pros available…

[FriarTed]

@Mister_Rik

Huh. IIRC, I saw Pamela Anderson’s first Playboy appearance, and her “assets” weren’t so pronounced. I thought the boob job came later.

That was when she was actually attractive.

[Nava]

@Mister_Rik

Talkies - I haven’t seen many silent films. But yeah, it did seem to disappear fairly soon, but not immediately. The one “big movement” that comes to mind is when an actress puts the back of her hand to her mouth to show “fear”. That one always struck me as a carryover from the stage. I know I’ve never seen anybody do that in “real life”.

That’s just the early 20th century version of The Scream. The Scream isn’t any more natural than that move.

[Marley23]

@Leaffan

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: I don’t think acting is a unique talent.

Even if that were true, and I don’t think it is, acting for a different media require specialized skills. You can be great at pretending to be other people and delivering dialogue, but that doesn’t mean you can stand on a stage and perform for the entire audience or act to camera.

I don’t know about discovering actors, but I’m skeptical of a lot of the claims about the claims about actors pretending to do jobs as research. Who is hiring them and how do they go totally unrecognized over that whole period?

[pancakes3]

@Voyager

Here are some signs that you might get a callback from an agent

• You crush all your interviews. I’m sure if you’ve interviewed people for jobs some of them are just dull and some of them are dynamic and exciting. Those are the people who get the jobs, all else being equal. Most of acting is auditioning, which is more interviews in a month than most of us do in our lifetimes. 1/18 jobs is considered really good.

• you are not afraid of giving talks, and when you do people come into the room to listen to you. If you get evaluated, you get really high marks.

• you have the ability to turn on. By that I mean, when it is time to do it, you go to another level, no matter where you were before. I was on location once around midnight, and one of the kids, 10 at the time and pretty famous now, was apparently losing it like over-tired ten year old kids will do. But when they were rolling, she was right there and was perfect. I know it is a cliche about the star not being ready, but the average actor had better be or he or she is out on her ass. And bad behavior gets around.

Having these characteristics is no guarantee of anything - but not having them will get you out of that agent’s office real fast.

I thought of all these things independently last night when I was watching Phil Hartman’s SNL audition tape.

Phil Hartman SNL audition

He was phenomenal. Of course I have no other SNL audition tapes to judge him and I’m probably biased in knowing how his career turned out. Yeah but still…