About Actors

So, you need to know something about actors. There are lots of reasons to get into acting. Some people enjoy the challenge. Some enjoy the attention. Some enjoy being good at the work. Some enjoy making art. Some enjoy making people happy. Some see the obvious next step in their celebrity career, and those people frequently suck at acting.

But for some people, the reward in acting is the chance to be someone other than who they are for a brief period of time. Being someone who isn’t them is better than the alternative. There’s very little in the culture or industry of acting that’s set up to solve that problem, just a lot set up to use it. “Entertain me, and I will pay you to escape for a short time.”

In order for this bargain to work, the actor has to be good enough to entertain us but not so good that we make them a celebrity. When an actor reaches the status of celebrity, we demand that they be “themselves” in order to entertain us. “Talk to this reporter and reveal something about the *real* you. Tell us what you *really* think. Tell us stories that allow us to feel that we know the *real* you.”

Don’t fall in love with those actors. Don’t make them celebrities. You’ll hurt them. They’ll break your heart.

Good luck telling which ones they are.

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About Actors
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4 thoughts on “About Actors

  1. 2

    I have always felt that way, Do not want to be familiar with the actor as a real person. to me it distracts from the performance. For example, even though to kill a mocking bird is a great movie, to this day I only remember watching Gregory Pectk don’t recall his role name (classic greek or roman name I think, oh yeah Atticus) I have less interest in their personal lives than I do of casual acquaintances.

    Another reason I don’t like celebritization is that it stems from the same impulse that makes us want heroes and gods. It’s time we got over that.

    Recent ly, famous actor overdoses, all over the innertubes bemoaning our lack of drug sense, no concern at all about the street persons who probably overdosed the same day. wtf.

    Another thing celecritization deprives other good actors of roles and deprives us of enjoying their skills

  2. 3

    And another thing, celebritization is a good part of the GRRS, Great relentless rating system. where everyone every thing is rated, number one, two etc till hell won’t have it. Last Sunday’s ball game, case in point, academy awards and there many offshoots. Why don’t we just line everyone up according to their rating in whatever category. Start with the gods, oh shit, which one should be first. Let me volunteer to be last just to save one bit of the argument.

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