Even if you're not an actor, you've probably wondered what it would be like to get up on stage and completely forget your lines.
Or maybe you've just asked yourself what that would feel like … To go completely blank in front of a crowd.
It does happen, even to the best. For example, Matthew Broderick once had to call for his lines many times during a play. In this case, it was due to multiple dialog changes shortly before the performance. But just imagine the pressure one tiny slip up must bring!
And think of how much energy it must take to hold all those lines in the mind, sometimes for months if it's for a play. It must be mentally and physically draining.
Unless of course you've got top-notch memory techniques. Doing my research, I was quite surprised by the range of activities actors use. And yet not all actors use straight-up mnemonics, making each of these memory tips interesting in their own right.
1. Don't Memorize Your LinesSounds weird, right? After all, Peter O'Toole famously said that he and most of his colleagues get paid to memorize lines. The acting they do for free.
But many actors forgo memorization, at least at first. Instead, they read their scripts again and again. Anthony Hopkins, for example, talks about reading his scripts several hundred times.
But if they're not memorizing the lines, why all the repetition?
It's because they're looking for intentions. Motivations and the emotional experiences their characters go through. As we know from mnemonics, emotions are very memorable and build a lot of connections.
And if you think about it, the most memorable scenes from movies all feature hugely exaggerated reactions based on emotional states.
In sum, all of this repetitive reading builds associations at a microscopic level. The smallest detail in the dialog can make the lines much more memorable to the emotional being of the actor who must react from feeling just as much as from memory. And it's the smallest twitch of a facial muscle that can make the difference between a blockbuster flop and an Oscar-winning movie.
2. Use Location and MovementActing takes place in time and space. It is an art of change, and as Plato and Aristotle pointed out about memory, change is always movement.
And just as actors link their lines to emotional states, they also link them to movement. Knowing where a character says something, in which emotional condition and in response to what context all provide powerful cues.
This cool technique resembles Memory Palace work in many ways. But instead of using a familiar home as a Memory Palace, the film set or theater stage becomes a specific-purpose Memory Palace designed to accomplish a specific task.
Both Mark Channon and Scott Gosnell have talked about different ways of making Memory Palaces like this on the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast before. As an actor himself, Channon has used the technique just described. And Scott told us about going to an examination room before you take a test to install your imagery.
This "immersion" technique works extraordinarily well because you've got a real representation of your Memory Palace in front of you. This immediacy lets you focus on the memory triggering power
Published on 10 years, 10 months ago
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