This ebook, An Alexander Technique Approach to Acting (Actors’) Technique, is published on this website in a PDF format. It is very detailed and practical. It will give you the physical tools you need to take the limits off of your ability to create the acting technique you want without sacrificing your body.
This ebook is also for sale on all AMAZON websites in a KINDLE format.
Located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, U.S.A. (MOVEMENT THERAPY)
What makes the Alexander Technique teacher so extraordinarily good at working with actors is our ability to work outside of the box, whether the Alexander Technique teacher has ever acted or not. In fact, the Alexander Technique teacher who has never acted may be able to give the actor what he or she needs in a way that is way outside of the box. What do I mean?
When I was an aspiring concert guitarist, I went to an Alexander Technique teacher, because I was causing carpal tunnel syndrome to my left wrist, practicing the guitar hours and hours every day. Because the Alexander technique teacher I worked with was not a classical guitarist, she effortlessly got me to question everything I did on the guitar from head to toe.
It was extraordinary for me after years of playing and after many fine guitar teachers, to dismantle everything I thought was necessary to be a concert guitarist, and create my own personal guitar technique. (I do the same with my Alexander Technique clients, not letting my personal classical guitar technique override my Alexander Technique training.)
I kept what worked, let go of what didn’t work, fined tuned what almost worked, and added whole new ways of accomplishing for the first time what I was truly capable of on the guitar.
What I bring to the actor are the eyes of an Alexander Technique teacher. I assist the actor in being able to consciously use his or her whole body in a completely elegant, balanced, and coordinated way. I teach the actor how to act with extraordinary control without paying a physical price with excess tension in collapsed or hunkered down roles when playing the elderly etc.
How do I do this? I went through a three year training, and in my Alexander Technique training I learned to use my whole body with ease and balance in everything I do, from running, to brushing my teeth, to playing the guitar, to teaching the Alexander Technique.
My training also taught me to look at any activity, from walking to acting, and to spot when the person is sacrificing his or her body for the activity. What does this mean? It means when I work with an actor, I can clearly see when the actor is hunkering down with too much tension paying a painful physical price to act with control and emotion. I can see when the actor is not connected to his or her torso and legs when acting, no matter how poor the posture that is needed for the role. I can see when the actor is not integrated from head to toe when he or she acts, and because of this whole body imbalance, is using too much upper and lower body muscle to act.
What I also bring to the actor is that I embody whole body good use in a difficult posture as I assist the actor in creating his or her personal effortless and safe acting technique. This means, even if the actor doesn’t know it consciously, I demonstrate to the actor with my own posture how to act without pain, strain, and compression. I also use verbal directions and directing hands on the actor’s body to communicate what is needed to create a pain-free acting technique.
SINCE I AM NOT SACRIFICING MY BODY AS I TEACH THE ACTOR, EVERYTHING ABOUT MY POSTURE, WORDS, AND HANDS COMMUNICATE TO THE ACTOR HOW TO DO THE SAME AS HE OR SHE ACTS.
An Alexander Technique teacher is extraordinarily unique in the world of postural teaching, because the Alexander Technique teacher is teaching the actor to do as the Alexander Technique teacher EMBODIES and says, rather than doing only as I say. Simply, if I tell you to act without locking your neck, and I tell you this with a locked neck, you will have one heck of a time learning to act with a released and lengthening neck and decompressed spine, no matter the posture necessary for the role.
You won’t know why acting with a free neck seems so hard, but it is because unconsciously you are receiving conflicting messages from me talking about decompressed posture and exhibiting compressed posture. A certified Alexander Technique teacher can truly say do as I do, do as I say, and do as my hands are communicating to your nervous system through my free nervous system.
