By C. Andrew Garrison

Introduction
What do people really DO to each other? When you´re talking with someone, are you just talking? Are you just listening? Or is there something more going on?

Interior Action is an approach to acting intended to help actors identify and play their purest impulses, from which our social conditioning can often separate us. Lifetime habits of denying and suppressing impulses can actually put us out of touch with them altogether. As individuals living with others we may find denying our base impulses useful, even necessary. As actors, however, if we´re not accessing and allowing our own instinctive and unique behavior to come to the surface unhindered, un-judged and uncensored, we run the risk of stifling the very source of our own creativity.

At its most simple, Interior Action is a method for describing, in physical terms, what´s happening between characters on several levels - an intentional level, an emotional level and a physical level. Interior Actions makes use of physically active verbs on a beat-by-beat basis to chart the interaction between characters. If you´ve ever felt like bad news felt like "a punch in the stomach" or an insult was a "slap in the face," - or you´ve ever felt the warm caress of a sincere compliment or let a joke "tickle" you, you´ve had experience with Interior Action. Even without physical contact, the impact of the intention sent and received, is powerful and tangible.

The benefits of Interior Action to the actor can resonate throughout his or her work. Using this powerful approach, actors can:

• Bring a higher level of specificity to their work.
• Connect with their emotions more consistently and tangibly.
• Respond to their acting partners more actively.
• Bring more immediacy into their work.
• Bring a vibrant physicality to their work, regardless of whether the scene is actually active, physically.
• Analyze even complicated text in a more intuitive way.
• Know exactly what they´re doing in a scene, every step of the way, without "calculating" the results.
• Find and use their own uniqueness to their best advantage in their work.
• Develop and fine-tune their movement for performance.

Perhaps most importantly, the actor has a means by which he or she can actually, physically test a tactic, thus providing the actor, director or coach a tangible barometer for the specificity, power and connection of the actor´s intention - in language free of jargon. How often have you seen actors argue that they´re REALLY "going" for their objective, but what you see is limp and effortless? Interior Action keeps the actor honest.

Setting the Scene for Interior Action
What does the actor need to know or do to use Interior Action? There are several elements of an actor´s toolset that facilitate optimal work with Interior Action. The actor´s ability - or willpower - to make choices that excite his or her mind, body and emotional state is a great start. The ability to relax the body and mind, so that impulses can be perceived and allowed is also a plus. A working knowledge of sense memory and its application is useful. Comfort with your own body and with coming into contact with others physically will significantly enhance your experience with Interior Action - one reason those with backgrounds in athletics, dance, martial arts, yoga and other disciplines involving the body readily take to this approach.

And yet, none of these skills or experiences is necessary in order to take advantage of Interior Action. Actors that make boring choices, are bound up physically or emotionally, have no notion of sense memory and are totally uncomfortable with anything physical can still make use of Interior Action.

That´s not to say that the intellectual can be ignored using Interior Action. There is thinking to be done and there are choices to be made. Analytically, the actor needs to make choices regarding at least 4 elements of the scene being played:

1. Who am I talking to?
   What´s the nature of the relationship between my character and the character (or characters) I´m in this scene with?" It´s not enough to know the surface relationship between characters - dig as deeply as necessary to come up with specifics that not only give you a solid handle on how these characters interact, but provide you with something that excites or compels you as an actor.

2. What are the given circumstances?
   You´ve answered the "who" (am I talking to), now answer "what" of the scene - what´s going on? What are we talking about? What´s the "event" that´s compelling us to have this exchange? What are the other circumstantial elements - where does the scene take place? - when is it? - what time of day, season, period, etc. What are the other factors the playwright has given you that has you at this point, talking to this person, dealing with this subject matter.

3. What´s your objective?
   What do you want from your partner - the other character in the scene? What action do you want them to take? What will that do for you? What will happen if you don´t get it? Try to state your objective as clearly and specifically as possible and make sure that it´s something you need your partner to do for you. And make sure that your objective is something that can be achieved as immediately as possible. Going for something that benefits you 10 years down the line won´t have quite the urgency that an immediate payoff will.

4. What´s the obstacle to getting your objective?
   Define this so that it balances your objective as closely as possible - where the conclusion could go either way. An obstacle can be derived from the other character´s objective, from your own character´s inner conflict, from the given circumstances as set by the playwright, whatever. Just make sure that it matches your objective in power. Otherwise your objective is either too easy to achieve - it´s much more exciting to watch someone really have to struggle for something than to achieve it effortlessly. Or your objective´s impossible - less of a problem, since watching a person go for something they think is impossible can be compelling. However the latter is a choice best saved for the most extreme of circumstances.

The actor needn´t limit his or her choices to these, but they are the essential choices necessary to approaching Interior Action.

© 2000 C. Andrew Garrison

(For the complete article on Interior Action, contact Andy Garrison at andy@actortrainingstudio.com)