IT’S NOT YOUR IMAGINATION
I’ve fallen behind with my newsletter publication dates, partly because of extensive international travel in connection with Acting for Animators, and partly because of obligations I have to publisher’s deadlines. I’m working awfully hard on updating and revising “The Ultimate Scene and Monologue Sourcebook” for a new 2006 second edition, and it is mighty labor intensive. Anyway, I apologize for being behind and promise to try and do better. This newsletter will cover August and September, and I’ll do my best to get another out for October.

CLIFF OSMOND’s new website. I’m always happy to recommend my friend Cliff Osmond to Hollywood and San Francisco based actors. And he’s been spiffing up his website. Take a look:

http://www.cliffosmond.com

HOOKS ACTORS WORKING
Josephine De Jesus (all classes ’99-03)has been hired as an understudy in the Chicago hit show “Jewtopia”. Avondina Wills (s.stdy ’02-03) is playing Creon at the Cabrillo College Theatre in Aptos, California and will open in 'What The Birds Carry" at the Pear Avenue Theater in July. Eleanor Prugh (f/tv ’93) appeared in “Zoo Story” and “American Dream” at Marin Classic Theatre. Larry Guli’s (f/tv ’01) film"Moses" will screen at the Venice film festival. Also, Larry has a new feature entitled “Livewire”. Eric Swartz (s.stdy ’99) appeared in “Oppenheimer and the Atomic Bomb” and “ Edison and the Electric Chair”, both productions part of the History Channel series – “Man, Moment, Machine”. Eric has also shot indie shorts entitled "Poetry Portraits", “The Audition” And “Things Done Changed”. Mega-congrats to Taku Hirai (s.stdy ’00) who appears in the film “Dance Mania Fantastic” which won Best Student Visionary Short Award at the Tribeca Film Festival this year. Deborah Biron (s.stdy ’03) shot a national spot for E-Loan. Brett Sharenow (s. stdy & prvt coaching '03 & '04) will be playing Frank Strang and Jason Thomas (s.study '04) will be playing dual roles of the Horseman and Nugget, both in the same production of "Equus" at the Asbhy Stage in Berkeley, CA later this summer. Brett and Jason are founding members of the East Bay Theatre Group in Oakland, CA. "Equus" will be performed from August 25 through August 28. Haguy Wigdor (F/TV ’00) is playing one of the Israeli athletes in Steven Spielberg’s new movie “Munich”, about the massacre at the ’72 Olympics.

ED HOOKS'S UPCOMING SCHEDULE
(Most of these dates are in connection with my Acting for Animators workshops. If I am in your area, however, and you would like to arrange a private coaching session, I often have time to do it. And of course, if I am teaching an Acting for Animators workshop that is open to the public, you are welcome to join us.) 

Sept 17-18 Loyola Marymount University, LA

Sept 30 Vancouver Film & Trade Forum

Oct 1 Vancouver Film School

Oct. 13-16 Projector Fest, Dundee Scotland

Oct 22 College of Creative Studies, Detroit

Nov 21-26 Swansea Animation Days, South Wales

Here's a Yahoo map to the The Audition Studio

It is easy to reach The Audition Studio on the CTA red line. Exit at Grand Street and State. Walk two blocks south on State to Hubbard. The #36 Broadway bus also stops very near the school. 

PRIVATE COACHING
I'm always available for private coaching. My rate is $75 per hour. We can work on cold reading, career strategies or whatever you want. Call 773-929-1667, or send an e-mail to edhooks@edhooks.com.

CRAFT NOTES
“Actors and the Concept of Evil”

How do you play an evil character? Let’s say you were cast to portray Hitler or a female equivalent… How would you approach the job? What is the face of evil? Where do you start?

I don’t much like the word “evil”, mainly because it doesn’t instruct. What’s its opposite…”good?” Then what is “good”? Every villain is a hero in his or her own life. A few months ago I read a book about the nature of evil, and that author suggested that the opposite of evil is “hope”. Makes sense to me, though I tend to favor “love”.

Evil is on my mind today not only because the word has been overly used to obfuscate by our politicians ever since the tragedy of 9-11, but because of the recent trial of the Kansas City BTK (“Bind, Torture, Kill”) serial murderer, Dennis Rader. The relatives of the man’s murdered victims mostly referred to him as evil, which I can understand. But the media is not in personal grief and has a tacit obligation to objectivity. It’s not okay that, across the board, on-camera media pundits described Rader as evil. I presume they mean only that his crimes are so heinous that they are almost unfathomable. That much is true, but it still is not instructive.

Dennis Rader is among the worst of the worst of serial murderers, right up there with Jack the Ripper and Jeffrey Dahmer, but if we are to learn anything from his terrible deeds, it won’t help to label him evil and toss away the key. The same goes for Hitler.

If we want to rid the world of so-called evil, we have to look at it in the light of day, examine it closely – not turn our head the other way. We have to be dead certain what it is so that, when we see it, we recognize it.

Like it or not, Dennis Rader – again, like Hitler -- is a human being. He is a broken and misshapen part of humanity. His is an upside down world of values, where pain equals pleasure and where empathy doesn’t exist and where murders are “projects”.

IF I WERE CAST TO PLAY HIM

I’d start with two things: First, as I just observed, he is a human and, like all humans, he acts to survive. I would start right away trying to understand what there is in the act of murder that would feed Rader’s perception of survival. He has to be getting something out of it.

Second, I’d review what I saw of his behavior at his televised trial. He didn’t look like my idea of a murderer, especially when he had that goatee; then he reminded me a lot of James Lipton (“Inside the Actor’s Studio”), and he displayed a similar kind of unctuous arrogance. Rader also clearly considered himself to be something of a media star. I was fascinated by the way he worked the cameras and would make an entrance into the packed courtroom at his trial. It was almost like he was going to sign autographs. Confidence manifests itself as weight, and weight manifests itself as centered-ness. We read it in others as a kind of charisma. Dennis Rader, like the Florida serial killer Ted Bundy, almost has charisma.

Where would you start if you were cast in the role? When an actor acts, he is saying to the audience, in effect, “I understand this about what makes this character tick.” When the audience applauds, cries and laughs, they are saying, “I see what you mean. I didn’t look at it that way before.” Would you say, “This is an evil man. Look at the way I twirl my moustache and kick babies down the stairs…”?

When I was took my first acting classes thirty-five years ago at New York’s Academy of Dramatic Arts, I remember being taught that, no matter what, you must love your character. Frankly, I thought it was a crock at the time, but that is because I didn’t know any better and was too arrogant. Time and experience have worn away my resistance and hopefully given me wisdom. I know now what it means: Begin with love. Don’t begin with evil.

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