“The skills that make up a classical mime’s bag of tricks can be of tremendous use to any actor who may be called upon in a play to tell a story through gestures, to trick an audience into “seeing” something that isn’t there.
Imagine you are in a play, and your character has to come onstage as if walking in from a rainstorm. Even though you and your costume are completely dry, you can shrug out of your coat, shake imaginary water droplets from it, “dry” your face with a handkerchief and then use it to “mop up” the puddle by the door. All this is done “in mime,” because there never was any real water. But if done well, the audience would swear that there was.
Onstage, I’ve opened doors that weren’t really there, “flipped” a light switch that was painted onto a flat, been struck by an imaginary bullet, consumed non-existent coffee from imaginary cups and eaten an “air steak,” all in plays that are considered representational or realistic. In Pioneer Drama Service’s hit comedy Twinderella, a baseball game is enacted on stage without a ball! These are all examples of using the skills of pantomime within a regular play.
Keep it simple. Don’t “muddy the air” with meaningless movements. Finish one movement before going on to the next. Then be consistent. Once an imaginary object is established, make sure that it remains there until moved. If you set a “cup” down in one place, be sure to pick it up again in the same spot. Otherwise the audience will think there are two cups on the table. I’ve seen shows using imaginary doors where the doorknob magically moves up and down, depending on the height of the actors. Finally, there’s “the bump.” When you pick up a real cup, your fingers simply wrap around it. But with a mimed cup, you have to very slightly exaggerate the grasp, the lift, the setting down and the release. Don’t overdo the exaggeration, but think of it as a series of visual punctuation marks. This helps the audience recognize the moment of contact, the beginning of movement, the end of movement and the letting go.
Every actor can benefit from some training in pantomime.”
- Patrick Dorn, Acting Coach
#mime
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Love mime and pantomime!
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I really felt the "eating the air steak" and the "stuck by an air bullet" - those are fun exercises to do at home, too, just to invoke your creativity chops as an actor.
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I have worked with theatre in Taiwan and many actors here have mime, dance and different kinds of movement training. Once when I was a cow in a children's play, one Chinese Opera Mime Master spent many hours to teach me exactly how to move so that the cow's tail would move a certain way when I danced. Such an ancient, deep and exact knowledge! I admired the Master very much and felt very honoured to learn from him!
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"A mime is a terrible thing to waste." Sorry, bad joke. But fully agree with this post, Tammy Hunt. In the TV/Film world, you often are handling empty props for safety reasons, requiring you to "mime" the perceived weight.
Also, I had an interesting VFX experience about 18 months ago on a movie. I was playing a character that will be enhanced in post. I won't be recognizable. Without violating my NDA, let's just say I'll have exaggerated facial features. A VFX guy showed me a "pre-vis" of what my character would look like, which informed me on how to mime certain gestures. That, in turn, will give the VFX team "something to play with" in post.
And then in commercial auditions, you're almost always having to mime certain props or other environmental factors.
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Fantastic advice! Thanks for sharing, Tammy Hunt!
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Great points, Tammy Hunt! Another great one to practice is drinking something that isn't there! The actual act of pretending to hold something in your mouth and then swallow naturally seems so simple but is so easy to do wrong if you're not being intentional. Also, holding something that is meant to be heavy or has some amount of heft to it.
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Took an improv class last year and we did an exercise on performing simple kitchen tasks - opening the fridge, taking something out, and using it. Really fun and helps you learn to control your body movements, then work at getting them to feel natural
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This is great advice @tammyhunt. I've had to act as if many a time and I don't think in any acting class has pantomime ever been something we've done. It seems to only come up in rehearsal.
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Funny enough, the first commercial I was ever cast in required silent acting. I had never done it before, but I was good enough to get offered an additional role by the director the day of shooting.
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Maybe this is a little silly of me to tell a memory. Lol! Anyway...I was performing at a theatre in Reus, Spain in 2004 during an Art festival and Marcel Marceau, the great Master was there. His group performed on Saturday evening and our group (from Taiwan) was performing in this huge old fashioned theatre in white and gold on the Friday evening before. After their performance on Saturday, we had a party together because our director had been one of his favourite students a long time ago. He was very humble and kind. And I remember that I thought it was amazing that he still could perform even though he was over 80. So! Acting is for all ages! Especially in the theatre! I wish the film industry could be like that too. :)
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What I love about your tips is that it also involves commitment to action which is absolutely needed even when an actor is working with an actual object and/or doing a physical action. It's the clarity and commitment to the movement that accentuates and can also create nuance giving dramatic or comedic weight to a moment.. So many examples of this on stage and screen.
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Thank you for sharing this cool tip!
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Susanne Palm are you still based in Taiwan? I've lived there for 10 years.
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Hi Terrence! Yes, I live in Taiwan. Maybe we have friends in common? :)
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Hi again Terrence! I just checked your Facebook and we have friends in common. Just connected with you here on Stage 32.
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Susanne Palm I just accepted your connection request.