#21 & #22: Acting and the Edge of Madness

Creation #22: A Rumination
An actor friend of mine often rails against what he calls "safe" actors. A safe actor is one who does a lot of homework, has a pretty clear sense of how the scene should go, and delivers a consistent totally usable performance. When thrown into a scene with little time to prepare, they deliver a very restrained performance. In my mind being a safe actor isn't a horrible thing, Harrison Ford once said that on days where he doesn't feel in it, he does "as little as possible," capitalizing on the Kuleshov Effect.

Then there are the... bold actors? The unpredictable? The risk-takers. The dynamic, charismatic, cornered animals of the acting world. When I think about my favorite film-acting performances, they came from risk-taking actors, often early in their careers. Some Examples:

Robert De Niro in "Taxi Driver"

Daniel Day Lewis in "There Will Be Blood"

Dustin Hoffman in "Midnight Cowboy" or "The Graduate"

Heath Ledger in "The Dark Knight"

If there's one thing I most enjoy about these performances, it's the sense that in the next moment anything could happen. These are actors existing on, what at least appears to be: the edge of madness. And if you hear anything about their process, you wouldn't be faulted for thinking that at times they've tipped over the edge.

If you look at recent efforts from De Niro and Hoffman, it seems that at some point they lost their edge. Their performances are still charismatic and enjoyable, but they no longer seem wholly unpredictable. Comparing early interviews with more recent ones, they also appear to have mellowed as people. I'd much rather have a beer with De Niro in his 60's than De Niro in his 20's.

The question, at least for myself is: Is is possible to lead a safe, happy, sane, restrained, pleasant life and still turn in a compelling performance that hints at a life on the edge?

Creation #21: A (Micro) Adventure

Okay, while not technically a creation, I feel like it counts as my homework for the day as it explores the question posed above. This was a recent status update "In a possibly ongoing experiment in risking rejection I asked a stranger out to coffee. 30sec of conversation later, I desperately wished the person had refused."

Yes, my version of living dangerously is asking someone on a totally innocuous coffee date. I get a similar jump in heart-rate when I write a strongly worded email that I never send. I suspect that if there is a correlation between an unpredictable life and an unpredictable performance, I've got a lot more growing to do.