The art of Substitution acting

Hey guys,

Before moving to Los Angeles I always very much believed in 'method' acting and using substitution in order to get into character. For all you non-actors or starting out actors out there who may not know what 'substitution' is I will briefly explain. Substitution in acting terms is when you take situation from your own life to replace the emotion within the scene or character. By replacing the characters situation with one from your own life helps to trigger an authentic emotion that assists you as an actor to feel and respond truthfully. My first semester at The American Academy of Dramatic Arts was dedicated to finding different activities and practices to initiate my substitutions. As a class we analysed this method through the book Respect for Acting by Utah Hagen, before putting the methods into practise. So, now for the big question.. Does substitution actually work?

Well, I believe that this question is a subjective because everyone is different and what may work for one person may not work for the other and vice versa. I'm going to explain my own personal experience of this method and what I found from using it in to get into character.

I have always believed in being authentic when it comes to acting as this makes me feel connected. By having a personal relationship with your character, the scene will usually naturally, like real life does, rather than being forced, so when I discovered substitution I was pretty excited about this. The first scene I was given at school was from a play called Picnic, where I was playing an older lady during the 1950s. In the scene she is absolutely desperate to marry the man she's dating even though she is aware that he doesn't want to get married. By the end of the scene she looses control ending with her hysterically crying at his feet. I had a little trouble with this scene at first and although getting to the emotion was easy for me, keeping it throughout the scene was the difficult part. I was overall happy with my final performance, however, I knew something was missing. I wanted the emotion to stick and I wasn't in control of this. As my first semester was dramatic acting many of my scenes were about using strong depressive emotions. The more I used substitution to get into this emotion, the more I struggled to let go of the emotion and the state of being after the scene was over. I ended up going home most nights feeling emotionally drained and depressed. For this reason I dreaded going to class and performing my scene.

Second semester was all about comedy acting and since I had struggled emotionally with using substitution in first semester I was hoping this  would give me a new perspective. After exploring different methods to stay in character I found that listening to specific music in addition to connecting a situation to my emotion really helped me. I found that music was a powerful and combined with my memories made my substitution so much stronger. My first scene in second semester was a love scene. In my real life I was dating a guy at this point who I was pretty smitten with. Every time we were together the song Love Yourself by Justin Bieber came on. I normally hate Justin Bieber but this song was constantly playing in my head and gave me a lot of positive memories.
Before my scene I would go outside the room to take my moment before, shut my eyes, listen to the song on repeat and think about him. I even remember telling him (whilst being drunk, oops) that I used him as a substitution for my scene. Now most men would probably think that girl was a psycho but when your an actor you kind of get it. Whatever gets you to the place you need to be for the scene is all that matters. Anyway, this really helped me to connect with my scene partner and it allowed me to follow my impulses. The scene felt very authentic and not like we were 'acting'. Two weeks before the final performance I found out he had been dating another girl too and I was devastated. He was no longer the guy I thought he was. He was a liar and I hated him. That weekend we broke up, which ended up with another dramatic story, which if you have read my previous blogs you will know what I mean.

The substitution was now ruined for me, I couldn't use it anymore as it completely changed the emotion I felt when first using it. I tried to change my substitution but nothing else worked the way that one had. The week before the final performance I didn't have a choice but to use him and the song as it was the only thing that triggered authentic emotions for the scene. I was surprised by how different this made the scene, although the underlying emotion of infatuation was still there it brought out completely different impulses for me. It was like watching a different scene. That week I was completely drained from being constantly exposed to this. It's all I could think about outside of class and now in classIi was constantly reliving it. I couldn't forget or move on as my substitution wouldn't allow me to.

I thought it was just me that couldn't deal with using memories of my own life, but after speaking to a couple of my other classmates, I found out I was not alone in this and there were also many others struggling with this method. Certain memories are difficult to let go of and it can be even more difficult to let go of ones that you have buried away. This was just one negative example of substitution, however, I do have many positive ones too. I'd say if you allow it and know how to let go emotionally in your real life by keeping the two separate it can be a wonderful way to get into a character and for me yes it did work. It is important to have a variety of different methods that you don't always have to go to the same place because for me I can't always let go, which caused me anxiety in my personal life. I will always keep this method with me, however, I like to use a variety of practices as this one can feel draining at times.

Every actor is different so try and find a healthy method that works for you without worrying about how other actors are reaching their characters.