I hear people sometimes say, oh,his or hers acting is lousy and wooden, but how do you tell, so far this talent to find these wooden actors has eluded me, can you guys help me out here?
what is your definition of wooden acting, and why does it happen?
On any given Wednesday, at 10 pm, turn your television set to your city’s NBC affiliate. You will see an Emmy-award winning program titled Law & Order.
About halfway through the show, you will see this blonde lady make her entrance. Her name is Serena Southerlyn and she is played by an “actress” known as Elisabeth Rohm. She should answer any questions you have about this subject.
So I guess you’ve never seen a Kevin Costner movie?
Non-wiseass answer:
Wooden acting means about what you’d expect it to mean- stiff, lifeless, artificial, and nonemotional.
It’s a bit of a catchall term, to be applied to anyone who’s not chewing scenery and isn’t the describer’s cup of tea.
It looks like “acting”.
Jake Llloyd in Star Wars episode 1–the Phantom Menace.
“Anakin Mannequin” was a well deserved title.
[hijack]
On the ST: Phantom Menace DVD extras, you actually get to see some clips from the last-round audition pieces of the three finalists for the young Anakin. One of them was rather schmaltzy-sweet, but the third one - I seem to recall his name was Devon - was, well, not brilliant, but a heck of a lot better than Jake Lloyd.
And then you get to hear Lucas acknowedge that this kid is the better actor, and pick Lloyd anyway because he’s more “genuine” or some such nonsense.
I’d like to see the movie from the alternate universe in which Lucas picked this other kid.
[/hijack]
Example of wooden acting: David Byrne’s acting in True Stories is deliberately wooden (and woodenly deliberate, but that’s another thing).
Okay, I fully acknowledge that my next question is stupid, buy hey I’ll ask it anyway. If the actor is turning in a wooden performance, why can’t the director have him/her do it over and over again until they get it right? I understand there’s a time constraint with TV, but in a movie they should be able to get a decent performance out of a decently trained actor.
There are different kinds of acting. Some people “ACT”, some people [sub]act[/sub], and some people are real.
It is almost impossible to change an actor’s style from one of those to another, unless they are really really good.
I would say less than 5% of actors currently (or ever) in show business would have any kind of skills beyond the one style of acting they have.
As an example, Steven Seagal can’t play anything but himself. Ray Romano is not talented, and barely qualifies as funny, so he sticks with his own hangdog misery schtick. Madonna is a waste of space. This is because they cannot go past the one style of acting they are aware of, which is to imitate other bad actors, or to read lines in a ‘I’m reading my lines’ way.
Then you get middle of the range actors. That’s most of them. They’re people who can do more than just the one style, but they still aren’t behaving or speaking like real people do, they’re just reading their lines out in the appropriately emotional way. As these are the majority of actors, most viewers, Directors included, either cannot tell that this is bad acting, or are perfectly okay with the acting provided as it is what they intended and imagined their production to be made up of anyway. They’re thinking: “it’s how most movies are, so that means it’s acceptable.”
Then there are the tiny few actors out there who are truly talented, who can play any role effortlessly, who have perfect comic timing, or can switch on at any time the exact balance of real, emotional intensity that makes you believe that they are real people going through these experiences. These are rare in practice, but there are thousands more who never get a chance to show their stuff. They’re so rare, that people don’t realise that it’s possible to have acting of this calibre in a production. Usually such actors are working alongside others in their same range of skills, making for an incredibly amazing production - about a boring subject, so nobody watches it, though it still gets a lot of awards.
IMHO
Like ‘about Schmidt’ then?
Please refer to the heading Reeves, Keanu in your bad-acting handbook
I think I get it know,is it when they play the same role in every movie? For example I watched ‘Big fat liar’ recently, it starred Frankie Muniz, and I thought he just played the same role as he does in Malcolm in the middle, the same neurotic self, is that what wooden acting is?
Avery Brooks in Star Trek Deep Space Nine until they let him look like Hawk (from Spenser: For Hire) was very wooden. Once he got the Hawk on, it was like a different actor had stepped into the role.
No. That’s typecasting (if the actor is capable of more but doesn’t get parts that allow for it) or a lack of dramatic range (if that’s all the actor can do). Wooden acting is, as has already been said, stiff, emotionless, and unconvincing. Lines delivered as though they’re being read off cue-cards, accompanied by a lack of appropriate facial expressions, are signs of a real block o’ wood actor.
In my opinion, someone whose acting is wooden is more or less just speaking the lines instead of becoming the character. Check out Heather Graham in the 2nd half of the 2nd season of Twin Peaks. The log did a better job of acting than she did.
Most directors today are good at command-and-control of the movie set, and lousy at getting the best acting from actors. Examples include John Woo and James Cameron.
There are a hundred waiters who are as good-looking as Tom Cruise and have better acting skills, but Mr. Cruise is a star and will bring in the money, so he gets the roles.
Combine a heartless director with a mediocre star and you have Hollywooden acting.
Most directors today are good at command-and-control of the movie set, and lousy at getting the best acting from actors. Examples include John Woo and James Cameron.
There are a hundred waiters who are as good-looking as Tom Cruise and have better acting skills, but Mr. Cruise is a star and will bring in the money, so he gets the roles.
Combine a heartless director with a mediocre star and you have Hollywooden acting.
I think astro hit it more on the head. If you can tell they’re acting. Their emotions are forced, they’re dialogue isn’t voiced right, they are stiff, and generally not believable as their character. Simply because they don’t legitimatally become their character. (Not to be confused with somebody who is just miscast. Good actors can be put in roles that they just can’t play, for whatever reason. They don’t look the part, or they’re too gruff for the character and even though they’re fine, its not real… whatever. This can do a lot with our perception of the actor as well. A lot of people are mis-cast, simply because of their public persona.)
Here are a few examples (not great ones, but here you go).
1>Wooden-- Actually, I really hate to pick on the boy. Especially since he was just a kid. But I’ll go with Jake Lloyd, because somebody mentioned it earlier, and I can’t think of anybody better. (“Whats a metachlorian?” <shudder>) Maybe Lucas was trying to have him be subtle, or wise beyond his years. But he just comes off dorky. You don’t see him show any real emotion, and when he does it is just very fake. (“OK, Jake, go to the corner and pretend to be cold… because its space.”)
2>Miscast-- Keanu Reeves in Much Ado About Nothing or that one about Hinduism… I don’t remember. Either way, Reeves is good at what he does. He’s fine in movies like The Matrix or Speed he was even fine in BATEA. But he wasn’t going to tackle Much Ado… just wasn’t going to happen. Now he wasn’t wooden, just put in a role he couldn’t/shouldn’t play.
(Some actors are able to overcome this in a big way. Robin Williams, as an example, was in danger of being typecast like this, but has broken out of it in a pretty big way.)
On the other hand…
3>Jack Nicholson in As Good As It Gets. Big name actors have the hardest job. They have to get you to forget that you’re watching JACK NICHOLSON and start believing in their character. I think he does a great job in this movie, is perfect for the role, and by the end you’re just into the movie and the characters created by the actors.
Another question from the OP-- Yes, part of a directors job is to visualize the script and make it come to life. If an actor is doing something that the director doesn’t want, he should challenge them to change it. But the actor still has to sculpt the character and make it live.
The best analogy I can come up with is a pitcher and catcher. The catcher calls the game, but the pitcher still has to throw a good pitch. If you get my meaning.
This has gone on way longer than I intended. Its just my opinion from the acting classes/plays etc. that I have done. (None of it professional, so I am by no means trying to toot my own horn here.)
Wooden acting doesn’t look real and natural. The movements are stiff and over-rehearsed. The words sound emotionless.
When I read the OP my first thought was “Mel Gibson in Hamlet.”
He takes one of the most sublimely tormented characters in the history of theatre and plays it like he’s ordering hotcakes at MickeyD’s.
Hamlet comtemplates betrayal, fear, his own mortality, suicide and murder- but Mel Gibson’s way of playing it comes off like Jessica Fletcher in an episode of “Murder, She Wrote.”
Where is the angst? The darkness?? The fear and loathing??!!
The best he can do is look like his butt is itching.
GAH!! I hate you for that Mel Gibson!! Hate you, hate you, hate you!!! pant, pant, pant
::ahem:: Sorry, got a bit carried away. From what I remember the rest of the cast did alright. It’s worth a watch (if you can stomach it) for being a good example of “wooden acting”.