Irreverent Acting [Paperback]

Eric Morris (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1992

Eric believes that this book is the "craft bible," since it focuses entirely on the craft an actor must acquire in order to fulfill dramatic material. The book explores the seven major obligations related to material--time and place, relationship, emotional, character, thematic, historical, and subtextual--and from there goes on to define choices and explain how to use them to fulfill those obligations. The third element of the craft, the choice approaches, is the practical work the actor must do to create the choices. Out of the current thirty-one choice approaches, only twenty-two are explored in this book. The remaining nine are investigated in subsequent books.

--This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 252 pages
• Publisher: Ermor Enterprises (June 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0962970921
• ISBN-13: 978-0962970924
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #504,152 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best books on acting ever written., February 20, 2002

By 

D. Goldberg (LA , Ca) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Irreverent Acting (Paperback)

Once, in Eric Morris' Acting class, I mistakenly referred to this book as Irrelevant Acting. Nothing could be farther from the truth. This is one of the best books on acting ever!

The exercises and work in this book have enhanced my acting tremendously, given me a way of working that is unmatched by any other acting book I've ever come accross (and I've read a ton of em) and has made me a powerful teacher and director in my own right.

It explains Eric's Technique of Freeing the Instrument (Explained in great detail in his No Acting Please which should be read prior to this book.) It explains a new way of looking at material and personally connecting it to the actor through choices and choice approaches. It truly helps make the actor an artist in that he creates and is truly using himself.

If you utilize this work and combine it with some common sense of your own (if you don't combine it with some common sense--some of it can get you into trouble) your acting will take on a new dimension; you will be more open as an actor artist and human being.

You will learn how to free and tap into your emotions. How to make personal choices for your material. How to make Choice approaches or tools to connect you to the work and more! Read this book. Do the exercises. I can't recommend it enough.

Do read No Acting Please first and follow it with this amazing masterpiece.

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Acting that makes sense..., December 13, 2005

By 

Doron Toister "dtoister" (Hollywood) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Irreverent Acting (Paperback)

I'll admit that at first glance Eric Morris's System can seem scary and misaligned. But I believe it to be a very misunderstood system.

I too was skeptical in the beginning, but after studying this technique (with Eric, but mostly with Anthony Vincent Bova in NYC, Eric's protégé), and after seeing the difference from "acting" and what this Work creates, there's no way I'd ever go back to the "acting" form.

Eric Morris teaches the actor how to react honestly and in the moment, including everything that's going on inside and out-the other actor, the props, the imagined objects that one might be working for-that impels you to "do" whatever the character is required to "do", but out of a real reaction, not just because you're doing it.

I've studied Adler, Strasberg, Meisner, and with Robert Lewis. I've hashed through the process of verbs, actions, objectives, obstacles, and onward; and they're all good and dandy for figuring out what's going on in a script, what the characters are doing and why; but other than that, these techniques never helped me figure out HOW to make it real to ME... How to get to a place where I'm actually functioning from a real, organic, truthful state ... How to get to the point where I am "doing" all the script tells me to do, fulfilling the "actions," out of an honest REACTION to what's going on.... Not just "playing" as if I am; how, in essence, creating the realities of the character....

No matter where you go, all the great teachers (and actors) say the same thing, "Acting is reacting." Even the most used and cherished word in the actor's language, LISTENING, is about focusing outside of yourself and REACTING to what is there. This Work trains the actor to create the stimuli that will fulfill the demands of the piece, specifically, wholly, and with Truth.

For the most part, plays and movies are imagined circumstances, and we as actors, have to create stimuli to react from, so we're not just faking, or indicating our performance. I'd rather watch two people have a relationship on film or on stage, than two actors reciting words, no matter how well they "act" it. If they don't believe it, I won't. This System trains you to create those stimuli and REACT to them honestly, fully and truthfully.

A crucial part of Eric's System is based on Instrumental Work, which is the process of identifying blocks and fears and tensions to expression and, one-by-one, through the use of hundreds of exercises, eliminating them. It's really about self-awareness-learning about yourself and how you function, so you can "get out of your way" and function truthfully on stage or film and get to where you need to get to in a scene. I think this is the aim of every method, but I feel that this System is the only one to address the issues of the actor on a personal level. If I'm tense and depressed (in real life; me the actor), I'm not going to be able to REACT truthfully in a scene where the character has just won the lottery and is jumping with joy. If I push for the emotion, I'll be faking and will "act" that I'm joyful. If this is enough for you, then Eric's work is definitely not your thing. But if you're looking for creating reality and REACTING with truth, nothing surpasses this Work.

I know that Meryl Streep, Brando, Ed Norton, Johnny Depp, Jack Nicholson, Al Pacino, Robert DeNiro, and a handful of other amazing actors don't fake it, don't just indicate the realities of the character and the circumstances. They create them. Be it imagined stimuli they are creating, or through the available stimulus around them, they open themselves up and REACT truthfully to everything -the other actors, the set, the space, the props, the object or person via Sense Memory, etc. I KNOW they do this for a fact! They've talked about it for years.

Eric helps you get to the place that they do-where you can function truthfully, where your instrument is accessible and available, where you are open and are willing to go where the character needs to go, emotionally, psychologically, and physically.

My advice is read Eric's books. If they pique any interest in you, if they strike a cord, study with Eric or Anthony, or at least contact them for further information about the system. I think you'll be quite surprised and utterly amazed at the tools this Work can provide you as an actor.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Morris is a genius, October 13, 2007

By 

Chris M. Crandall - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Irreverent Acting (Paperback)

This is the greatest book written by the greatest acting teacher of all time. The content is amazing and overwhelming to digest all at once. Irreverent acting is the actors Bible in my opinion.

Eric is a genius.