THE SHORTCUT TO SELFISHNESS

(This chapter is a bit more complex than others, so I thought I’d begin by summing it up in advance:

“Nice Guy” actors can short-circuit the psychological process of insecurity by allowing themselves the freedom to hate the audience which will release their “need to please” and allow them to be “selfish actors”.

…Don’t worry, it’s simpler than it sounds. Enjoy!)

So, we’ve established that being a “selfish actor” is a good thing.

But how does an actor with a strong “need to please” become a “selfish actor”?

Consider this:

I heard a story that, before his stage performances, the great actor Richard Burton used to peer through the curtains at the audience and say-

“Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck you!”

Sounds crazy, doesn’t it?

Why in the world would he behave like that?!

Actually, what he was doing make perfect sense.

He was taking “the shortcut to selfishness”.

Mr. Burton was simply doing what he needed to do in order to stop caring what the audience thought about him.

It worked as a kind of “affirmation” to release his “need to please”, so that he could have a selfish experience.

You might think that saying, “Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck you!”, is a mighty strange affirmation…but sometimes just saying, “I release my need to please,” isn’t quite enough.

…Sometimes you gotta bring out the big guns!

And if reminding himself that he can hate the audience frees him to play, then what’s the harm?

Sadly, this strong “need to please” is epidemic among actors.

So, like a medical condition, I have named it.

I call it “Nice Guy Syndrome”.

Hmmm…Doesn’t sound like such a bad condition to have, does it?

“What’s so wrong with being a nice guy?” you might ask.

Well, what does it mean to be “nice”?

“Nice” - pleasant, agreeable, satisfactory.

…Not very exciting, huh? I’d go so far as to say that it’s kinda “blah”.

I mean, nobody ever won an Oscar for being “pleasantly satisfactory”.

It’s just not that attractive of a quality to have.

I believe that practically every actor has the “Nice Guy Syndrome” to some degree.

I know I do!

You needn’t be ashamed if you fall into the “Nice Guy” trap, for it shows that you are, at heart, someone who cares about people.

However, I hope you will realize that being a “Nice Guy” doesn’t serve you as an adult artist.

“Nice Guys” may have a deep desire to please their audience, but, more importantly, they have a deep fear that they won’t!

The problem is that you can’t truly please an audience if you are coming from a needy place of fear that you won’t please them.

The way to please an audience is to release your need to please them. When you do that, you will relax, you will be joyful and you will please them.

Any energy spent on pleasing the audience is energy not spent on having a full, selfish experience in front of the audience, WHICH IS IN FACT WHAT WILL PLEASE THEM!

Some information on extreme cases of “Nice Guy Syndrome”:

There are some actors who, based upon their background, find it extremely difficult to be a “selfish” actor.

These actors feel that they need to be charming, and to make their audience feel “comfortable”.

So where does this concern for the audience come from?

When a child plays “pretend” he certainly isn’t coming from a need to please anyone. So where do we pick up this need?

One way is in our acting training, which is built on impressing our teachers. Trained actors have spent years doing scenes then eagerly awaiting feedback from their teacher.

But, I feel that the worst cases are born in the actor’s childhood and upbringing.

In general, pleasing people is a survival tactic we use since birth, and throughout childhood it is regularly greatly awarded.

However, very often, an actor’s strong “need to please” is based on very specific childhood circumstances, for instance:

· A sibling was a problem child and therefore you felt that you needed to be perfect.

· Your parents were unhappy so you felt you needed to not add to their problems.

· A gay child fought to make up for his perceived imperfections by pleasing everyone.

Conditions like these can create a crippling “need to please” that can take all the joy out of acting.

Even though these actors are no longer living in their former situation, they are still finding their lives governed by the same old rules from that time.

They are letting these old demons affect their performances.

They are having a “hysterical” reaction to something in the present, due to something “historical” in the past.

(These actors should read “FINDING YOUR INNER CHILD” and “IF IT’S HYSTERICAL”.)

To ALL you “Nice Guys” out there (whether you have an extreme case or just a mild one), I quote “Little Red Riding Hood”, from the musical “Into the Woods”:

“Nice is different than good.”

Stop wasting your time being “nice”.

You should only be concerned that you are a good person.

…And you ARE a good person!

Are good people always nice? No!

But, that doesn’t change the fact that they are good.

(Bad people can be nice. …Hitler had a dog for goodness sake!)

So, stop wanting to be “nice” in your auditions. That energy will run counterpoint to the selfish experience you should be having.

The best way you can be “good” at your audition is to have a fully selfish experience. If you’re feeling it, the audience will too!

And now…THE SHORTCUT TO SELFISHNESS!:

I had a very talented student with a serious case of “Nice Guy Syndrome”. His performances were always very smooth, pleasant and polished.

However they were safe.

His acting was “nice”, and therefore…”blah”.

He was always “taking care” of his audience, and making sure they were comfortable, safe and entertained.

But this runs against what an audition should be. An audition should feel dangerous and exciting, like a rollercoaster!

He had made his audience feel so comfortable that they were rarely excited by his work. There was no true danger, tension or element of surprise.

So how did this actor break his “Nice Guy” habit?

I explained to him that, not only did he not have to love his audience, but that he was free to hate them.

He was free to be “an asshole”.

(He didn’t have to “behave” like an asshole; there’s no need for him to be rude or show the slightest contempt. He simply was free to stop doing all the unneeded “nice” things he was doing.)

I told him that before each performance, he should remind himself that he can hate everyone who’s watching. That he should say the affirmation-

“Fuck them. I can hate them.”

And when he did this, he finally took on the qualities of a selfish actor. He was thrilled with the results!

And, I explained, once he gets used to having a selfish frame of mind, he will be able to return to loving his audience again, but in a healthy way.

So many actors try to make the audience feel safe and comfortable.

“Don’t worry”, they seem to be telling the audience, “I’m controlling the scene, and making sure I give you what I think you’re expecting. I’m entertaining you like a good little boy.”

Fuck that! BE A BITCH! BE AN ASSHOLE!

Don’t forget the audience’s experience can only be your experience. So if you’re striving to make everyone comfortable, then that is what they will be. And they don’t want to feel comfortable when watching a scene. That’s boring!

The opposite of “comfortable” is “vulnerable” and “tense”. Sounds like much more exciting and appropriate words for a performance, wouldn’t you agree?

I was personally unaware of how strongly I needed to please people until I began reminding myself, prior to auditions and performances, that I could hate my audience.

When I did, the change I felt was so tremendous and freeing that I finally realized how deep my “Nice Guy Syndrome” went.

Suddenly I looked back on all the years of missed opportunities in which my sweet-natured “shyness” caused me to clam up and squelch my light.

But now, I remind myself that I can hate the casting director who brought me in. I can hate the director who is behind the camera. I can even hate the other actors on set.

But please notice I’m not saying I DO hate them.

Of course, I don’t really hate them, and never will!

I am simply reminding myself that I don’t have to LOVE them and NEED their approval.

By reminding myself that I CAN hate them, I free myself from being needy.

How it works:

The idea of “hating the audience” may still seem peculiar to some of you, so allow me to explain, in detail, exactly why and how it works.

In order to be a “selfish actor” we must rid ourselves of INSECURITY.

“Insecurity” – to feel uncertain and anxious.

Insecurity is a feeling of general unease or nervousness that is triggered by perceiving oneself to be unloved, inadequate or worthless.

It is our insecurity that causes our “need to please”.

Insecurity is insidious because it quietly dwells within us, growing so gradually and subtly that we don’t even question or challenge it.

We don’t ever realize the extent to which it controls our lives.

We take for granted the fact that we worry what others think of us, so we never stop to ask ourselves why we do all that worrying.

We worry all the time, but we don’t understand why we worry.

So WHY do we feel insecure?

Let me remind you that there are two voices in your head; two sides of your personality.

There is your ego (or vulture), which wants you to live in fear,

and your true self, which wants you to live in love. 

Your ego doesn’t want you to figure out why you feel insecure (or how he makes you feel that way).

It knows that if you did figure it all out, you might choose to stop feeling that way.

So your ego found a tricky way to make you feel insecure…

But here’s the truth; the REAL reason you feel insecure:

(drum roll please…)

You’re not worried what other people think of you.

You’re worried about what you think of yourself!

Case in point, you have a terrible and negative thought (insecurity) about yourself, like-

“I’m a lousy actor”.

Your ego/vulture put that thought there because it wants you to be unhappy; to live in fear.

But -

Your ego knows that if you were to become aware that it’s YOU who put the thought there, then you may realize you have the power to STOP thinking that negative thought.

So, this is where your vulture/ego does something brilliantly treacherous and crafty.

It utilizes a psychological device called “projection”.

In simple terms, your ego projects your negative thoughts upon other people.

In other words, you imagine that you know what people are thinking and that it’s terrible things about you.

Under the spell of projection, you tell yourself-

“I’m not thinking that terrible thought about myself…they are!”

It is in this way that your vulture has tricked you into allowing that terrible thought to be there; in the air around you.

You allow it because you don’t think you’re responsible for it!

Here is a more thorough explanation of “projection” (from Wikipedia):

Psychological projection is a defense mechanism in which one attributes one’s own unacceptable or unwanted thoughts to others.

It has been described as "the operation of expelling feelings the individual finds wholly unacceptable—too shameful, too obscene, too dangerous—by attributing them to another."

To understand the process, consider a person in a couple who has thoughts of infidelity. Instead of dealing with these undesirable thoughts consciously, he subconsciously projects these feelings onto the other person, and begins to think that the other has thoughts of infidelity and may be having an affair. In this sense, projection is related to denial. Those who project deny a part of themselves that may otherwise come to the surface. In this case, they cannot face their own feelings of infidelity and therefore project them onto the other person.

So you see, it’s in this way that the mind allows terrible thoughts to be there without having to take credit for them.

It seems to say, “Here’s a horrible thing about yourself, but YOU’RE not thinking it. THEY ARE!”

So if an actor has the thought, “I am a bad actor”, rather than acknowledge that he feels this way, he will imagine that everyone who watches him perform feels this way.

And from this simple trick sprouts your insecurity and, consequently, your “need to please”.

But there is a simple solution; a shortcut!

Allowing yourself the freedom to hate your audience SHORT CIRCUITS this psychological process!

After all, why would you care in the least what other people think of you, if you’ve already established that you are free to hate them.

It’s not that you are doing something new (like behaving rudely, for instance).

It’s that you will stop doing the things that you don’t need to do; the things that are hindering your performance.

You will STOP worrying about what they think of you! (…But, you and I know that the truth is, you will stop being interested in the negative thoughts about yourself, which you are projecting onto them.)

Remember the Richard Burton story?

Well, when I was in high school, sometimes I would peek through the curtain, excited to see who I might know in the audience.

However, as soon as I saw a friend or family member, it always hurt my performance because I would worry about all the judgmental things they might be thinking.

Another way to put it is, that I would spend the show seeing myself through their eyes.

The truth is that, of course, I couldn’t know what they were thinking, therefore the judgments which I felt - were coming from me!

To this day I never invite anyone I know to a show in which I am doing comedy improv. The reason being that, for me, it is the kind of performing that causes me the most anxiety.

But the difference is that now I’m aware that I’m not really concerned what THEY will think; I just don’t want someone out there on whom I can project my insecurities and judgments.

I experience it as though - if a friend of mine is in the audience than I am in the audience. And I don’t want to be sitting out there judging myself!

A sidenote:

I think the technique of hating your audience is especially helpful when you are playing a character who is either angry or any form of a “jerk”; two very difficult things to play if you are involved in being a “Nice Guy”.

Some of you may be thinking-

“Wait a minute! I know that some of my insecurities aren’t coming from me, because so-and-so told me that I was a lousy actor.”

Look, I’m not saying that we haven’t been scarred by real people’s opinions of us in the past.

Worse comes to worse, maybe there was even a seed of truth in it what they said…at the time.

But times change.

You’ve grown; gotten better.

And that person is gone.

So who’s voice are you hearing in echoing in your head? Yours!

Let it go! They may have handed you the baton, but why are you still running with it?!

(Check out the chapter “WHEN SOMEONE DOESN’T LIKE YOU,” and remind yourself that when someone doesn’t like you, it’s about them, not you.)

If you still have your doubts of the appropriateness of this approach, then please understand that the reason it’s perfectly alright to hate your audience is because-

(the same way that releasing your need to get the job actually leads to getting the job)

- allowing yourself the freedom to hate your audience is actually the thing that leads the audience to loving you.

When you have a selfish and joyful experience in front of them, they will love you in return.

In summation:

In the past we may have denied ourselves happiness due to our own self-hatred.

We have needed people to love us, but have unknowingly projected all our self-hatred onto those very self-same people.

And all the while, our egos have kept us in the dark about our own self-destruction.

But, we needn’t be victims of our egos any longer!

The whole point of this chapter is to give you back the power; to make you realize how much power you have!

There’s only one thing that actors can control in their lives, and that’s their thoughts!

Let’s be dedicated to doing what we need to do in order to be joyful!