Meisner acting method, jazz and judo

I’ve been practicing Meisner method for some time. In a nutshell, it’s about living a truthful moment in an imaginary situation. The key difference between this method and other famous ones (eg. Method acting) is that you don’t have to torture yourself to go through real situation to get yourself ready for the scene (eg. Not sleeping for 48 hours to play a super agitated and anguished person). Method actors basically live as the character for the duration of the filming, but Meisner actors make the most out of imagination to bring out truth from the scene.

Another notable principle of Meisner technique is that it is more about reacting than acting, meaning actors are asked to be truly affected by other characters’ actions and words vs. just exchanging lines and actions mechanically. Because of this trait, every take feels slightly different from one another.

This reminded me of a couple of other hobbies that I pursue: Jazz piano and judo.

Jazz is all about being in the moment, listening to others play and reacting to them and harmonizing with them to co-create a beautiful moment for the audience and for themselves. Judo’s randori (sparring) and matches also forces the participants to be present, reacto to the opponent and stay flexible.

All of those three domains (Meisner acting, jazz, judo) highlight the same thing. Being in the “flow” state, which is also an important aspect of Zen.

Being in the “flow” state is all about losing oneself. When I act, however, many times catch myself that I’m in my head. Being self-conscious and think about my perception (ie. what would others think of my acting, and me as a person?) that I always second-guess myself and don’t dial up my emotion too much whereas the key to creating great scenes is to raise the stakes and bring a sense of urgency.

As I pursue these hobies further, I will keep this in mind and will get out of my head and place myself in the moment and participate in genuine interactions with others, bringing out the truth from every moment of reality I get to live and co-create with everyone else.