Sanity In Acting

Auditioned for Batman, landed The Joker. How’s that for an identity crisis. I had the hair at least, if not the chops…

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Galina Boulgakova is one of Colorado Film School’s most beloved treasures. Educated at The Moscow Art Theater School, the woman exudes passion in every rolling syllable, every gesture, every graceful sway of her arms. She learned from the best. You can feel it.

Her book, Sanity in Acting (2014) is a blueprint for how to, in Galina’s words, “manifest parts of another person’s psyche through our own.” And, most importantly, how to disengage when the job is finished. (The part we never got to because of COVID).

You’ve probably heard the term, “Method Acting.” This is shorthand for “The Stanislavski method.” Developed over one hundred years ago, it is all about empathy. Understanding the psychology of a character. His or her wants and needs, and belief system. When you water these psychological roots, the whole tree springs up naturally. Not pretending, becoming.

The Moscow Art Theater brought Stanislavski’s method to New York in 1923. And in just a few decades Marlon Brando was using it On The Waterfront. Other western actors were too. It is now the basis for all modern acting.

Galina emphasizes the cool down phase. How to “disconnect from the character when the job is finished.” Method acting is very dangerous because it works. When we act we really do become somebody else. We think the character’s thoughts, feel their emotions, and behave accordingly. And this all bleeds into our personal life. That is, unless we disconnect through conscious choice and Cognitive Behavioral intervention.

I had the privilege of learning from Galina in 2020. Before COVID rudely interrupted us: Her teaching, and my Joker monologue. Yes, for acting class two of my peers and I were rehearsing the interrogation scene from The Dark Knight (2008). Of course, none of us were acting majors. And of course Galina didn’t pick The Dark Knight. Nor I. It was a classmate who had the bravado, the audacity, the nerve! To even attempt the legendary ensemble of Heath Ledger, Christian Bale, and Gary Oldman. And then to drag me and another friend into the foolish charade with him.

I went pale as a ghost when he named me “Joker” in front of the class. It was exactly the scene from Harry Potter 3 when Professor Trelawney peers inside Harry’s teacup and instantly collapses in horror. An omen of the highest magnitude. I would be cursed for years, no joke.

I wanted to be Batman. I can do the voice, was dating Rachel, and was even driving the literal Bat Mobile, 2020 Dodge Charger (in black) at the time. The three hundred and thirty horsepower beef supreme was a loaner, of course, while my flaccid four cylinder Saturn was in the shop because I wrecked it in the Mountains trying to make an extra buck.

So, Joker. One thing’s for sure, I thought – I’m gonna need a bottle a’ Jack, stat. And some smokes. Shit, maybe even some Lucy leww. Jeezus. Fuck, Hunter S. Thompson. I am a Post-production major. We’re the filmmakers who cower behind the computer monitor in the deepest dungeon of the furthest fortress. AWAY from the camera; not on the frontlines! “Doctor, NOT A POOL MAN!” Bruh, my baseline affect is Rain Man. My greatest aspiration in life is to trade this hoodie in for an invisibility cloak and wear it till I die. And you want me to perform THE Joker.

(shrouds face with a soft hand – “Annd, scene”)

(See, Acting👆)

It’s sacreligous. Heath’s performance is the greatest magic trick ever pulled. “I’m gonna make (myself) DISAPPEAR!” (I forget he is in the movie every time I watch it).

So when I say, COVID rudely interrupted? What I really mean to say is thank god it did. We were shut down mere days before we were to act the scene in front of the whole class and embarrass ourselves. The relief. I felt like Peter Gibbons when Initech goes up in flames. A real life deus ex machina. (Film school is another story).

I was saved from embarrassment. But there was a catch. I never disengaged. A couple months later I would begin making my epic passion montage, A Dark Night (2022), and I found myself incorporating the interrogation scene and The Joker character front and center. I had not, until this very moment correlated that to the acting assignment. But now it seems undeniable. They were linked.

I spent the next 2 years of my life making this montage like a possessed madman. What if it was all because I never got the chance to act this character out proper? Because of COVID. And what if, as a result this archetype lingered in the shallows of my subconscious like a virus all of its own. Spooky thought isn’t it?

My classmate told me he cast me for The Joker because I looked like him with my long hair (Who, Me? Daintily finesses bangs over ear). But maybe my classmate saw more than just the hair. Maybe he saw this character lurking in my soul. That I needed to face him artistically, and spiritually. Make peace with him somehow. He would have been correct. It sure has been a process these past three years.

E.F.