Crying and acting?

Question

Have any of you tried to cry for acting? I am thinking about it but I never really cry and I noticed the really great actors have a big problem crying in a scene.

Answer 1

You can buy something called a tear stick which you rub under your eyes just before a crying scene. Vicks under the eye can work well too.

Answer 2

I mean no hostility, but these crying questions [and the myriad "techniques" offered up by well-meaning answerers] drive me batty.

Here's the scoop, from a longtime actor and veteran of over 200 projects: You should never, ever be concerned with trying to produce real tears in a stage production. No one in the audience will see the moisture -- they're simply too far away. Tears in film obviously can be seen because the camera is so close, and in those instances a drop of glycerin is usually used right before the camera rolls.

The few times I have seen actors literally cry, the results have been awful. When someone cries, their voice usually gets stifled due to their throat constricting -- and this buries the text because the actor's diction becomes blurry. What's the point of all those emotions if the audience can't understand what you're saying?

Also, because theatre is live and the audience and actors are obviously in the same room, authentic crying makes the audience uncomfortable. What I [and, frankly, some highly reputable acting teachers] firmly believe is that the audience wants to see someone fighting NOT to cry -- that's where pathos and tension are created. Watching someone struggle to not "give in" is far more interesting than watching someone just blubbering away.

There's an old saying in acting: "Excess within control." What it means is that no matter how much emoting and flailing about an actor does -- no matter how "out of control" they appear in a scene -- the actor cannot just literally be out of control. They have GOT to be precise in what they're doing. It doesn't mean to be stilted or held-back, but rather that the out-of-control stuff has to actually be deliberate combinations of actions/expressions. Watch Stanley Kowalski charge at Blance DuBois in "A Streetcar Named Desire" -- Brando's ferocious, but his movements are still delineated. Or for a more pleasant example, look at Gene Kelly dancing in any of his films, particularly "Singin' in the Rain" -- he looks like he's just making it up on the spot and dancing with abandonment, but you know that he rehearsed for weeks until each step and gesture looked natural and organic -- but obviously each movement was deliberate.

Answer 3

First of all, don't try to do it by thinking of something sad. That will distract you from your lines. And don't do the onion thing, it doesn't work all the time, you just have to go out there and hope it works and if it doesn't you end up lookin' stupid. Just try to keep your eyes open for a while before you have to cry and sometimes it helps to stare at the spotlights if you can without breaking character. If you find you can't actually cry then you can always put your face in your hands and pretend to be crying and it will make your face red as if you had been crying. Hope some of that helped. Good luck!

Answer 4

You dont need a tear stick or an onion, or an emotional memory. What you need to do is to learn to act. When you are doing what and actor is supposed to be doing (reacting to stimuli like the character would) if the character is supposed to cry, you will cry. If you do not, it is because you are getting between the stimulus and the response.

Answer 5

I haven't, when I would, it would depends how much the character's crying is. It's like, as a Harry Potter reference, I think it's like producing a patronus - producing a memory where I was crying a lot. I would make it so powerful that you are able to express that emotion of crying into the character.

Answer 6

Here we go again.....

You cry because your character cries. No tricks, no onions, no tear stick. How you channel your character's emotions is up to you, and only you. There are no shortcuts.

My method is music. I "hear" a musical piece that connects me to my character. Music is Emotion. It is not a trick. It is what is called Acting 101. Perhaps you should look in to it.

Answer 7

Coffin monolouges. It made me SOB! Close your eyes, and imagine that the most important person in your life is dead and you are loooking into their coffin. Think about what you would say to them if you were standing over their coffin.

Answer 8

Put a piece of onion in a handerkerchief, or something like that will make your eyes tear, think of something that really makes you sad.