Acting tips: Practice makes permanent!

You often hear the phrase "Practice makes perfect." Buuut, that's not entirely true.  Practice only makes perfect if you practice "it" perfectly.  If you practice it wrong, you'll learn it wrong.  If you practice your acting like you're reading out of a book, you will act on stage as though you are reading it out of a book.

Many say to memorize your lines as soon as possible to get out of the book.  Good advice.  But equally important is when you are reading from the book to learn those lines, read with conviction and emotion and modulation as though you were doing radio theater and the only thing people experience is your delivery.  This way the voice becomes another actor within you.

Remember: Practice makes Permanent.  Learn it the way you want to do it, because you will anyway.

Ghosts of Christmas Wow

This past Saturday Kathy and I went to see a new adaptation of Dicken's A Christmas Carol.  This delightful version was adapted by Palestine Community Theater's best actor, Gerry Goodwin, who also directed.  He managed to keep all the most important points and touching vignettes.  His casting sounded unusual to me at first, but that's how much I know; things turned out quite well.  There were new faces and familiar faces (which I love to see both).  The young man who played Scrooge I thought did a very good job, although he did have the fairly common problem of us seeing the back of his head a lot.

One very effective aspect of the production was the use of a pair of "statues" that served as almost a Greek Chorus.  It really sparked the exposition and kept things moving when it would have been easy to be slow.  The Ghosts of Marley, past and present were charming.  Yet to come was a giant sort of muppet.  It worked.  Sarah King sang a beautiful semi-solo that was joined by other chorus members then each of them faded out until she was again in solo.  He voice has really matured.  Gage Concillio was, as always, a bundle of energy and charm.  I see great things for that boy. Many many others did a wonderful job.

There were good numbers in the audience and a good time had by all.  There was a number of other festive things going on as well: Ice Skating downtown, Santa's Workshop,Tour of Homes, Dogwood Jamboree, and Heismann watching parties.  Now called the "Frost Fest" in 75 degree weather, it gave us a real holiday feeling around town.  Fun for all.  Now the theater shifts into gear for "Ghosts" in the spring.  There's no business like show business!