Roundtable

James Franco

The Limits of Control

Tags:

acting,

arts,

James Franco,

Marlon Brando,

movies,

soap operas,

television

Tweet

Most of us watch an actor’s performance and think that we are somehow getting a glimpse of the person behind the screen. In a sense we are, and in a sense I always try to bring something of myself to every role. I wasn’t always that way. Initially, back in my high school days, acting was my escape. I could jump into imaginary lives and temporarily be rid of myself. The invented circumstances of the play or movie evaporate inhibitions, as if one is liberated because the character he is playing isn’t him. He can embarrass himself, be a fool, be a villain, kill someone, rape someone, tell a girl he loves her, tell a guy he loves him, play someone of a different political party, a different nationality, a different religion, almost anything because, ostensibly, a performance doesn’t define a person.

I suppose one could look at an actor’s entire career and derive some enduring qualities of the person. But what if an actor was only cast in awful roles? What if we only had John Casavettes the actor and not the director? The actor Cassevetes was an entertaining and wily persona in movies like Rosemary’s Baby or The Dirty Dozen, but the wild, sexual, passionate intelligence that Cassevetes brought to the performances in his own films was something entirely different, derived from the freedom that comes with control. So an actor is his roles and he isn’t.

The actor is his role to the extent that his “instrument” is himself: his body, his movements, and his emotions and his voice and his appearance. He is intimately tied to his art in ways that other kinds of artists are not, so inevitably there will be vestiges of his real self in all the performances he plays. Brando probably revealed more of himself in Last Tango in Paris than he had intended, something that Bertolucci claimed he would pull out of him. Showing an incredibly vulnerable side of himself, some of the speeches Brando gave could have been about his own life. The character of Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire, a role that purportedly defined Brando and subsequent American acting, was almost the antithesis Brando’s true self. In reality he was a sensitive and intelligent artist, a contradiction that probably made his portrayal of the brutal and sensual Stanley all the more compelling. Of course Brando oozed sexuality—he couldn’t have delivered such a performance if he didn’t contain something of the primal libido that emanates from Stanley. But it wasn’t all of Brando.

An actor might be typecast if he is in a long-running series, plays a lot of roles of a similar type, or is so powerful, electric or just natural in a role that it is difficult to differentiate him from his characters. John Wayne wasn’t a cowboy. He grew up near Glendale and went to USC, but he became a cowboy after playing them for four decades in a hundred-fifty-plus films. He found that the persona worked off-screen as well as it worked onscreen and I’m sure this had an effect on his behavior, speech, opinions, political leanings and aesthetic taste. Who he became also had a lot to do with who he worked with. Director John Ford helped make Wayne into who he was on screen and he molded him off-screen as well. Wayne’s career was kick-started, nurtured and maintained by Ford. He gave Wayne his greatest roles and shaped the figure we remember.

An actor has very little control over a film and is usually beholden to the director, except for the few instances where an actor is also a producer on the film. A director has a ton of responsibility. He tracks the emotional arcs of the characters scene by scene; he makes sure that the characters are realistic (or unrealistic, whatever the needs of the film may be); he is worried about the mise en scène, the pacing, the sound, the dialogue, and a million other technical things, like the camerawork and special effects. Because it is a job that involves so much delegation and juggling, a director must depend on many people, and he wants them all to be cooperatively serving his vision. So if an actor has a conflicting vision, it usually causes problems. I suppose there are exceptions to this. If a director’s vision happens to be inferior to the actor’s and the actor persists in his interpretation and somehow the director allows this interpretation to make it into the final cut, then the conflict could be said to have been useful. But usually when there is a conflict of opinions, the director wins out because he oversees the editing of the film. Even if the actor rebels all through the shooting, the director will have control over how the performance is put together. In the worst-case scenario, the performance is a mess that resembles neither the actor’s, nor the director’s vision. Ideally the actor and director are in synch, so that the actors can deliver what the director wants—and sometimes what the director didn’t even know he wanted.

An actor is in a strange position of being the most visible component of a film with the least control over that final product. He provides a performance, and then the director, editor and producers cut, recut, test, and score. This is the nature of film. There are some actors that have such integrity and creative powers that they are doing much more than just saying lines. Performers like Daniel Day-Lewis, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Benicio Del Toro actually paint with the characters they create. Not only are they giving full-bodied and multidimensional performances, they are transcending the medium. The performances are larger than the films; they resonate beyond the story they’re embedded in. When a director works with actors of that caliber, I suggest the director just get out of the way. These men are creative forces, and a director’s vision of a character is never going to match the complexity of what those performers can bring.

I’m not even close to those guys. I have been acting professionally for more than a decade. According to the acting teacher Sanford Meisner, I am halfway through my acting apprenticeship, and according to Ezra Pound I have finished the ten years needed to learn my art and now I need ten more years to unlearn it. I think they’re both probably right. When I try to bring my own interpretation to a role, it fails. So I am content if I achieve the director’s vision. If I do that, I’ve done my job. But when I do this, I feel like a craftsman more than an artist. I can never feel artistic exhilaration in that kind of situation. It’s not that I want or like control. I like working with others. But the actor is usually only collaborating on one portion of the film. This is why so many actors want to direct.

Recently, I performed in the soap opera General Hospital. It is easy to make fun of soaps, with their melodramatic plot lines, constant exposition, unnatural lighting, swelling music, and lack of action. Most of these aspects are due to the extreme speed at which soaps are produced. With five episodes a week, at least sixty pages need to be shot in a day. That’s a feature film’s worth of material shot every two days. This pace allows for very few takes, usually one. Soap acting is generally considered inferior to other acting, with the lack of takes cited as the reason. However, there are many fine film performances that are made up of just a few takes: Clint Eastwood is famous for doing one or two takes when directing; Robert Altman was very loose with his direction, always looking for spontaneity and truth; Gus Van Sant does very few set-ups, and very few takes. Innumerable directors of Oscar-winning films have used such techniques. The reason that soap actors look the way they do is context—how they are filmed, what they are saying, and how they are blocked. There is absolutely no way to act in a soap and pull off a performance like Daniel Day-Lewis in There Will Be Blood, Robert De Niro in Raging Bull, Meryl Streep in Sophie’s Choice, or Marlon Brando in On the Waterfront. These incredible performances are supported by the incredible filmmaking that is behind them. They are given the time, dialogue, space, and aesthetic of films made by great directors.

This isn’t to say that soap opera performers are worse than film actors, or that their performances are inferior. The soap opera performance should always be perceived in context: it involves actors working in a tradition that soap audiences have come to expect and love. Soap actors are delivering exactly what they are supposed to—they are in tune with their audience and they are not attempting to transcend it. If Brando had tried to play Terry Malloy in a soap, he wouldn’t have had the time to sculpt the performance into the brooding, tortured, nuanced emotional force that won him an Oscar. The contender wouldn’t have been a somebody, instead he’d just have been another mumbling dope with bad eye makeup.
June 11, 2010
- Email /
- Print /
- Comment now

Roundtable Archive

First Name Please enter a first name.

Last Name Please enter a last name.

Address Please enter an address.

Apt./Suite

City Please enter a city.

State Please select a state.

Postal/ZIP Code Please enter a valid
zip code.

Email Address Please enter a valid email address.

Country Please select a country.

Canadian subscribers add $10; All other international subscribers add $40.

Comments Post a Comment »

thanks for the insight james, i enjoyed reading your article. :D

Posted by tim on Fri 11 Jun 2010
WHAT AN EXCELLENT ARTICLE! It was very understandable, well-put together, cohesive! Mr. Franco, WHY didn't you do that with your short story in Esquire?!?!?

Posted by Dianna Trent on Sun 13 Jun 2010
having read this, i'd like to read your essay on the differences and similarities between Performance and Acting when you're ready to write it. (and no, the youtube vid did not cut it).

Posted by farmiga on Mon 14 Jun 2010
Mr. Franco you are a true artist and a great actor. You are at Brandon level but you need the right role. Play Heathcliff in a remake of Wuthering Heights! You certainly have the range!

Also, I can't wait to see the three short films you recently directed. I saw Good Time Max and I thought it was unique and a great start.

Posted by nya on Mon 14 Jun 2010
The dvd of The Ape arrived in the mail yesterday. I watched it and I loved it. You hit so many nails on the head! Great and unique movie.

Posted by nya on Wed 16 Jun 2010
[...] Acting, control and General Hospital [...]

http://www.berfrois.com/

Posted by Berfrois on Thu 17 Jun 2010
Nice comments on soap actors. We watched you on GH..there are many fans of Daytime out there that really appreciate your take on the genre. MOCA shoot should be interesting.

Posted by KDMask on Mon 21 Jun 2010
We're all really lucky to have James Franco, both his insights and his performances, thanks for a really great read.

Posted by Chris Horan on Mon 21 Jun 2010
seriously, this must have been written for a high school newspaper.

he needs to stick to acting because nothing he writes is of any importance/originality.

Posted by Rancor on Mon 21 Jun 2010
Thank you, Mr. Franco and keep illuminating the screens, large and small.

Posted by Frank on Mon 21 Jun 2010
It nice to see that the privileged, famous elite can still buy as many degrees as they would like while people who truly deserve spots in these schools can't afford to go. Franco sends his assistants to class to do his work while he is out shooting soap operas, so I'm sure that makes it much easier to have so many MAs. Ah, the Ivy League...

Posted by Mary on Tue 22 Jun 2010
It seems James Franco will never understand the soap genre, and he's not even trying to. Soap opera actors give "brooding, tortured, nuanced [and] emotional" performances all the time, and they certainly aren't "mumbling dope[s] with bad eye makeup." It would be nice if he looked into the performances of David Canary, Ruth Warrick, Louis Edmonds, Judith Light, Robin Strasser, Jonathan Jackson, Eden Riegel, James Mitchell, and many more. These soap opera actors have places in the hearts of their fans for the sheer brilliance of their performances and their understanding of the characters they play(ed).

In contrast, film actors as a group are certainly not transcendent. It baffles me how an actor known for a role in comic book movies is constantly belittling soap operas under the guise of understanding them. Guests on soap operas have ranged from the lovely Elizabeth Taylor to the humorous Snoop Dogg to the genius Warren Buffet. Thankfully, these wonderful guest stars were positive and never demeaned the performances or artistry of others working in this genre.

Posted by imasoapfan on Thu 24 Jun 2010
Well, the only thing that matters is that he can think critically. An actor who needs to be intellectually stimulated should be praised or at least appreciated. Thanks James.

Posted by Bill on Tue 13 Jul 2010
He sent his staff to class for him? or his profs gave him his grades? I dont think he wrote this article at all....it looks like it was written for him..more staff, I think. He will be found out.

Posted by suzie on Mon 19 Jul 2010
I think some of the stuff that Brando revealed in Last Tango was about his own life. Interesting article, I suppose it's a question of whether a performance in anything, soap or movie, means something to the actor and the viewer/audience. Btw, I first saw James Franco in City by the Sea, a few weeks ago and thought he was electric. I've since seen Milk, Tristan and Isolde and Pineapple Express. Franco is always a totally different person. You have to hand it to him for delving into exciting artistic pursuits. Also I think he does attend class, people are always posting how they've met or seen him at various universities. One other thing, a recommendation for James Franco-if you dont already-read Truman Capote!!!

Posted by Mary on Thu 2 Sep 2010
Mr. Franco, if you're reading this comment, I want you to know that there are many people who are supportive of your interest in academia and "eclectic" (weird! crazy!) artistic pursuits. Why do people need to demean others when they don't know the first thing about that person? In fact, I commend you for doing what you love and lead your life your way. The great actors you mentioned were great and larger than life due to the persona that the studios and/or directors help create. They make enduring heroic figures or Hollywood stars, but what does it do to the actors themselves? No wonder the actors feel empty and turn to drugs. Speaking of drugs, if all the naysayers can say about you is that you looked stoned (since you're tired from all the classes you've taken) then that's a good problem to have. You have actually inspired me to go back to school and pursue a PhD. How many actors can inspire their fans to do that?

Posted by Za'ba on Sun 5 Dec 2010
Here's my observation of Mr. Franco: During his interviews his face and tone of voice is usually so expressive, they are analogous to a finely tuned instrument - they are so precise and accurate that acting seems like an exercise of imagining how something feels, and his face will simply project the feeling without the need to act. The best example of (what I call) the "not act, but feel" method is his brilliant portrayal of Aron Ralston in 127 hours. In the movie, he can look bewildered in one moment, mildly confused in the next or completely nuts. While I usually watch a show to find out how a story unfolds, in this story, Mr. Franco's expressions became the movie.

Posted by Za'ba on Sun 5 Dec 2010

Blog

Roundtable

James Franco

The Limits of Control

Comments Post a Comment »

Post a Comment

Vague Premonitions

The Great Beyond

Content on this page requires a newer version of Adobe Flash Player.