Suiting the Actor to the Word

A number of weeks ago I took part in my first casting director workshop. "The workshops are kind of a racket," said the actor who turned me onto them, "but it is a good way to be seen by casting directors and to network with other actors." I haven't shopped extensively for acting instruction, but I've done enough looking around to know that most classes are at least a few hundred bucks and usually lead to more classes in the same price range. At $35 a pop, casting director workshops seemed to be the most affordable way for an actor to keep his teeth white. I audited a workshop before deciding to participate. It appeared to be an awkward hybrid of a professional resource class and a practice audition...and as good a way as any to get started in LA, so I signed up.

The night I attended, a casting director for The Office was running the workshop. She was pretty and polite. She spoke briefly about her agency and then grouped actors into twos and threes, assigning different sides from The Office for each group to rehearse. I assumed I would read for the nerd character. To my surprise, I read as the boss.

In the scene I was given, the boss has gotten himself in trouble with his staff by indelicately broaching the subject of a subordinate's sexuality. He goes through a series of hilarious and painfully insensitive explanations of just exactly what he means by the word "gay." I felt I knew exactly how to play the scene. After we had rehearsed briefly and watched a few of the other groups perform, my two scene mates and I headed to the front of the class and showcased our scene. I felt pretty good about it. The casting director complimented the choices we'd made and had us read the scene again. The second time around I felt a little exposed by some of the lines, but it actually went better than the first time. She gave us a few notes and asked us to read again. As I started the scene for the third time my mind began to stir. Did the casting director know I was gay? Did she care? Did I care if she did know? Was this particular workshop the Universe's way of directing my willfully dim consciousness towards the problems I could face as a gay actor in Hollywood? Did I have a plan for contending with the industry and audience at large and their moodiness about the sex life of those who entertain them?

This stuff's gonna, like, really, truly matter when I'm, like, a total star.

How about my hair? Too gay, or not too gay?

Not two weeks after he arrived, another actor friend of mine was told by several LA types that he should remove his sexual preference from his MySpace page. He did. He also removed his age. He said that since moving to LA he's started using MySpace as a promotion tool for his career and that revealing his sexuality on his page was like putting that same information on his resume. It's a good point. I go back and forth on the issue of making personal information public. I've recently chosen the "no answer" option in every category that MySpace allows because it keeps my inbox from getting clogged with spam solicitations and because employers are more and more in the habit of Googling potential employees before hiring them. Revealing personal information online can be liberating. But there is something to be said for having to earn personal information through actual contact.

Recently, I was watching a popular TV show with a friend. One of the actors on the show (whose character is straight) had come out the week before. While watching the show my friend said, "They should just give him a gay story line. I don't believe he wants that girl now. I just see a gay guy when I look at him." The actor is one of the better actors on the show and, at least for me, his previous work was not suddenly negated by this revelation about his person life. But I fear that my friend's comments represent the feelings of a few too many TV viewers. These are feelings I don't share. In fact, I feel that the difference between an actor and a character can serve to enhance a performance. Javier Bardem's performance in Before Night Falls and Daniel Day Lewis' performance in My Beautiful Launderette are good examples of this dynamic. And its not just sexuality that can benefit from a difference between actor and character. I read an interview with the director of Dangerous Liaisons where he said he purposefully chose an American cast to play Europeans because American actors possess an emotionalism he needed for the film and that he found lacking in European actors.

While simple, agreed-upon characteristics can denote gender and sexuality; those characteristics usually have little to do with reality or the creative art of acting. The way in which we identify a man or a woman or a gay man or woman, outside of the biological facts, fluctuates with experience and exposure to more people.

In terms of their craft, actors are advocates of misperception. Technically, what an actor does is real (movement, voice, and arguably emotion), but the context, intention, and special effects render those actions a fiction. Redirected perception is an agreement between actor and audience, a tactic for exploring human behavior, for holding the mirror up to nature. As long as the performance is believable or emotionally true, the audience will accept it - even if the actor is not really an Eskimo or does not really live on Mars or is not really the Queen of England.

Or will they? Sexuality seems to be one of those characteristics for which audiences dislike suspending their disbelief. When it comes to sexuality audiences insist on identifying with the actor as well as the character. And when the performance is convincing, the actor is expected to resemble the character in ways that not only deny the art of acting, but also infringe on the life of the actor outside of the craft. How does an actor contend with the need for misperception in his craft and the demands for authenticity that audiences make on his personal life? Historically, the only options that have led to success have been extreme discretion and calculated deception. No matter the choice made, an actor loses something either personally or professionally. Any choice, even being public about sex, brings compromises that question the fundamental point of acting.

Personally, I wouldn't mind if, due to my sexual preference, I was cast in gay roles for the rest of my career. Hey, if I had a career, I would be thrilled. But the idea of playing a character like the one Steve Carell plays on The Office is a painfully attractive. Would I have that opportunity as an openly gay actor? Or does the fact of my sexuality o'erstep the modesty of the popular audience's nature?