Not so sure line readings are a bad thing anymore

C

c.g._eads

Veteran
If there's one thing I've heard over and over as a director, it's "don't give your actors line readings. They hate it and it makes them worse." Now I haven't directed many actors, so because I've heard this advice so many times, I blindly assumed it was true.

That was until I read an interview with Rob Reiner.

Rob Reiner ALWAYS gives his actors line readings. He claims it's one of his biggest tools in extracting a performance. I was kind of like, "yeah, but". But the more he talked about when he used them, the more I started paying attention. Then I started thinking about Rob Reiner's films

This is Spinal Tap
Stand By Me
The Princess Bride
When Harry Met Sally
Misery
A Few Good Men

This guy is personally responsible for many of these actor's best (or most memorable) performances. I mean, fine if it happens once. Twice could be a coincidence. But Billy Crystal, Meg Ryan, Kathy Bates, Cary Elwes, Mandy Potankin, Jerry O'Connel, River Phoenix among others... That's a serious list there! From a guy who's giving his actors line readings.

He's personally responsible for the Meg Ryan orgasm scene in When Harry Met Sally. Meg Ryan wasn't doing it right because she didn't feel comfortable so he came in there and did it for her. The next take is the one you see in the movie and one of the most memorable movie moments of all time.

I just have a suspicion that this whole "line readings from directors are bad" phenomenon was conjured up by some famous actors who had a bad experience (with a bad director), made an official complaint to the studio-heads and overnight "line reading" became a bad word.

Rob Reiner is incredibly pompous and just the fact that he goes around telling people that he's personally responsible for Meg Ryan's orgasm scene is classless to say the least. But you can't argue with results. The dude gets the job done. And I'm having some major second thoughts about using line readings in my first feature.
 
c.g._eads said:
He's personally responsible for the Meg Ryan orgasm scene in When Harry Met Sally. Meg Ryan wasn't doing it right because she didn't feel comfortable so he came in there and did it for her. The next take is the one you see in the movie and one of the most memorable movie moments of all time.
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I'm really tempted to make a tasteless comment on Rob Reiner being an expert on how fake orgasms sound.

Line readings have their place but really should be a last resort, IMO. Sure, Meg Ryan's fake orgasm is iconic, but who knows if it might have been equally amazing if he had helped her get comfortable with her character and perform instead of just giving her something to parrot.
 
Well that's what I'm saying. If the Meg Ryan scene was the only case, it'd be a valid argument (I just used it cause it's such a well known scene). But he does this all the time. And with so many of his actor's performances being iconic, I don't think it's a coincidence. His directing style works. And line reading is a staple of that style.

And as far as making a tasteless comment about Rob Reiner doing anything, you should have. He's earned it.
:)

(unfortunately every time I hear the name "Rob Reiner" I can't help but think about that South Park episode)
 
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c.g._eads said:
I
Rob Reiner is incredibly pompous and just the fact that he goes around telling people that he's personally responsible for Meg Ryan's orgasm scene is classless.
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I wonder how Billy Crystal feels about that. Crystal wrote the scene.
 
c.g._eads said:
Well that's what I'm saying. If the Meg Ryan scene was the only case, it'd be a valid argument (I just used it cause it's such a well known scene). But he does this all the time. And with so many of his actor's performances being iconic, I don't think it's a coincidence. His directing style works. And line reading is a staple of that style.
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Maybe. But he's also working with some really great actors. Maybe he's just taking credit for great performances that they did on their own, with nothing more than a crummy line reading to guide them.
 
Luck can only take you so far. How many directors do you know with four great movies? Five? Six? It's a very short list. I'm going to go ahead and venture that his directing style has something to do with the success. Just a guess though.
 
The orgasm scene was difficult because Rob Reiner's mom was in the scene with her and it made her uncomfortable. He had to give her the line reading bc she was so self concious. Reiner's Mom is the old women who drops the killer line, "I'll have what she's having."
 
c.g._eads said:
Luck can only take you so far. How many directors do you know with four great movies? Five? Six? It's a very short list. I'm going to go ahead and venture that his directing style has something to do with the success. Just a guess though.
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I would say it's more likely got to do with wise casting than with great directing.

If you cast the film properly, your job as director is practically done as far as the performances go.

To kind of bounce your point back at you, it's not like only one of those films has A-list actors in it. It's not like he's spinning gold out of inexperienced actors with nothing more than line readings. He's dealing with professionals who know what they're doing and can hold their own without much help from a director if need be.

So just because all Reiner does is line-read at them, that doesn't mean they owe their performance to him, or that he's a great director. It almost sounds like his films are great in spite of his directing style, and that again is probably due to the professional grade of the actors he casts.

Like you, this is all speculation. But my feeling is that the job title is director, and not dictator, for a reason. You're there to make sure the performances are going in the right direction for the emotions of the scene and the arcs of the film, and as long as they are, get the hell out of the way and don't worry about micromanaging the emphasis of every syllable.
 
c.g._eads said:
Luck can only take you so far. How many directors do you know with four great movies? Five? Six? It's a very short list.
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??? there are dozens, maybe hundreds. for starters...

ROBERT ALTMAN
PAUL THOMAS ANDERSON
MICHELANGELO ANTONIONI
INGMAR BERGMAN
ROBERT BRESSON
JOHN CARPENTER
JOHN CASSAVETTES
JOEL & ETHAN COEN
FRANCIS FORD COPPOLA
JEAN-PIERRE & LUC DARDENNE
RAINER WERNER FASSBINDER
TERRY GILLIAM
JEAN-LUC GODARD
CHRISTOPHER GUEST
ALFRED HITCHCOCK
HOU HSIAO HSIEN
KRZYSZTOF KIESLOWSKI
STANLEY KUBRICK
AKIRA KUROSAWA
MIKE LEIGH
SERGIO LEONE
DAVID LYNCH
ERIC ROHMER
MARTIN SCORSESE
ANDREI TARKOVSKY
FRANÇOIS TRUFFAUT
ORSON WELLES
WIM WENDERS
WONG KAR-WAI
ZHANG YIMOU
 
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well if you look at those films, Meg Ryan was nobody at the time. Cary Elwes was nobody (and still basically is just a working actor, futhering the liklihood that Reiner's directing got the best performance out of him), Mandy Potinkin was nobody, John Cusack (in The Sure Thing) was nobody, The Spinal Tap guys were nobodies. Even Billy Crystal wasn't a proven film actor at that point. Obviously everyone in Stand By Me was a nobody. So he was, in effect, working with unproven talent. In fact, he was the one who made all those people stars.

As for whether they owe their performances to him, I think we're going in circles on that point. I mean any actor who has a great performance owes a lot to the director. And my point that he's more consistent getting these great performances than 98% of the directors out there seems to be flying right past you. I believe a track record gives you the benefit of the doubt. You seem to think it makes it more likely that he's getting lucky and the actors are delivering their performances in spite of him?? A little confused about that. Oh well, what are you going to do? Communication breakdown.
 
It's hard to say if Reiner's "line readings" are the reason for these performances. These are incredibly talented people, with great material, in these roles. And Reiner is good at directing comedy (putting the line reading question aside for a moment) Whether they were "nobodies" or not is not relevant. Did line readings hurt their performances? obviously not. But did it help them? (and I am not saying it didn't) I don't think we can really judge.

I heard Reiner make this claim as well and I said to myself at the time, well he was an actor, so I guess its not as bad. I would say though, as most realize, acting is an internal thing and trying giving a line reading is asking an actor to do the opposite of that.
 
c.g._eads said:
As for whether they owe their performances to him, I think we're going in circles on that point. I mean any actor who has a great performance owes a lot to the director.
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I don't agree with that, at least not the way you mean it.

When you get a certain caliber of actor, the actor can thank the director for creating a nurturing environment for his craft and for the trust that the actor knows what he's doing. The actor is the one who creates the performance ultimately, and it's the director that owes a lot to the actor and not the other way around.

c.g._eads said:
And my point that he's more consistent getting these great performances than 98% of the directors out there seems to be flying right past you.
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No, it's not flying past me, I just don't believe it's relevant. Correlation is not causation, and the fact that he's getting good evidence is not proof that line readings are an effective way to go about it.

Even if they are, the best you could argue is that Rob Reiner's line readings are career-making, which still doesn't say that you or any other director should make that your own primary MO.
 
I'll echo what others have said. You should be careful about making this a rule. Even though you say Meg Ryan was a "nobody," it doesn't mean she was an experienced and skilled actor. She had been acting for at least ten years before that film.

What I've found is that I can use line readings more with experienced actors, because those actors know NOT to parrot what I did, but to use it as an example when I couldn't get my meaning across any other way. But they know how to make it their own.

But I would be very careful about making some kind of rule out of this.
 
Mark Harris makes a good point. I'll add.
Exactly what do you mean by line reading? Personally, as an experienced actor I welcome direction that demonstrates the physical line, emotional line and even the kind of energy to imbue the text with. But if you give me a line reading that you expect me to parrot, you might just have me focused on the result rather than what I want, need and am trying to achieve in the scene. As I see it, your job as director is to guide me to fulfilling the role as YOU see it (unless you give me free rein) - using MY sense of truth. That said, there are plenty of cases of great directors successfully giving very specific line readings.

Acting is both internal & external, and you can attack the problems you face by both internal & external techniques. The focus on the internal in American acting probably comes directly from Lee Strasberg. Cheryl Crawford, I believe the only original member of the Group Theater/Actor's Studio to actually study with Stanislavski, maintained that Strasberg put much more emphasis on the internal than Stanislavski intended. And indeed, Stanislavski's writings bear this out.
 
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rsbush said:
Acting is both internal & external, and you can attack the problems you face by both internal & external techniques. The focus on the internal in American acting probably comes directly from Lee Strasberg. Cheryl Crawford, I believe the only original member of the Group Theater/Actor's Studio to actually study with Stanislavski, maintained that Strasberg put much more emphasis on the internal than Stanislavski intended. And indeed, Stanislavski's writings bear this out.
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Stella Adler and Harold Clurman studied with Stanislavsky in Paris. Adler came back to the Group Theater and deemphasized the importance Strasberg had put on the affective memory (remembering an emotion filled real event) but instead focused on the internal emotions that come from the imaginary human circumstances of the play. Strasberg left the group theater over it and Adler and Sanford Meisner remained faithful to Stanislavski's ideal. It makes sense bc a true memory loses its power over time, and imagination is less limited. These techniques are not easy (which I found out the hard way) so the external, which mostly comes from the british school (Olivier, Burton and so on) is another way to feel it. Those were great actors who didn't need the internalizing.

The famous contrast of the new "method" and the old was in the movie "Marathon Man" where Hoffman and Olivier acted together. It was before the "is it safe?" stuff and Hoffman stayed awake for 2 days to inhabit what the character was going through. When he arrived on set Olivier looked at him and said "you look like death" Hoffman started talking about his method and Olivier looked at him shaking his head and said, "but that's why they call it acting, my dear boy."

It all depends on the actor I guess
 
DorkmanScott said:
When you get a certain caliber of actor, the actor can thank the director for creating a nurturing environment for his craft and for the trust that the actor knows what he's doing. The actor is the one who creates the performance ultimately, and it's the director that owes a lot to the actor and not the other way around.
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I don't necessarily agree with a lot in this thread, but I'll disagree with that point specifically. Look at Samuel L. Jackson -- when Tarantino has him, he turns in an Oscar-worthy performance. When Lucas has him, he turns in a terrible, wooden, awful performance. Same actor, different director.

Look at Natalie Portman. I read somewhere that Luc Besson said "this little girl has more acting ability in her little finger than most hollywood actresses" (or something like that). She was nominated for an Oscar and a BAFTA, and won a Golden Globe and the NBR award for best actress for "Closer." Also nominated for a Golden Globe for "Anywhere But Here." When George Lucas got a hold of her, she earned two Razzies, one for worst actress and one for worst on-screen couple.

Look at Hayden Christensen. In "Life as a House," he was nominated for a Golden Globe for "best actor", won the National Board of Review "breakthrough performance by an actor" award, was nominated by the Screen Actors Guild for "best actor". He won "best actor" at the Las Palmas film festival. George Lucas got ahold of him, and instead of "best actor", he wins two Razzies for "worst actor" and is nominated for a Razzie for "worst on-screen couple."

I love me some early George Lucas, but come on, he took three exceptionally promising actors and had them turn in arguably the worst performances of their careers. That's not coincidence.

Great actors are not great in everything, a lousy director can absolutely ruin a great actor's potential, and a great director can pull an oscar-winning performance out of a great actor, and probably pull the best performance possible from a mediocre actor.
 
Barry_Green said:
I don't necessarily agree with a lot in this thread, but I'll disagree with that point specifically. Look at Samuel L. Jackson -- when Tarantino has him, he turns in an Oscar-worthy performance. When Lucas has him, he turns in a terrible, wooden, awful performance. Same actor, different director.

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Disagree. Pulp Fiction won best Original Screenplay at the Oscars. I say it's the script. Very difficult to transcend weak material.
 
You missed the point though. The point was that it was the same director that ruined all those actors.

Did Closer win the Oscar for best Screenplay? Not even nominated at the Oscars, although it did at others. Did "Life as a House"? Not even nominated, at any contest or awards program, for screenplay. Did "Leon/The Professional"? Not nominated at any festival or awards program for screenplay.

Sam Jackson has won or been nominated at various festivals and competitions for awards as "best actor" in Pulp Fiction, The Negotiator, Eve's Bayou, The Incredibles, Jackie Brown, Coach Carter, Changing Lanes, Shaft, Unbreakable, A Time To Kill, Jungle Fever, Against The Wall, SWAT, The Long Kiss Goodnight, and Sydney. How many of those were Oscar-winning, or Oscar-nominated screenplays?

Obviously screenplay is vital, nobody's disputing that. But the point is, Sam Jackson is a brilliant actor in the right hands. And a bad director can make him turn in a horrid performance.
 
bosindy,
Good information. I added that because I feel there is a common misinterpretation about an inner based technique.

"providing ONLY that what [the actor] does is justified from within and in accordance with the eternal laws of nature which are binding on all" - Stanislavski, the Actor's Studio pg. 166

"the twisted interpretations put on my so called 'system' which, in the way it is presently being taught, can put young actors on quite the wrong path." - Stanislavski, the Actor's Studio pg. 166

These quotes are from Stanislavski on the proliferation of his ideas and the many ways they were interpreted. My experience has been that young actors studying the 'method' are often very quick to label any external approach as simply the "wrong" way. The ability to take a so called 'external' direction and use it to inform your inner life is a good quality to possess but it usually comes with working experience. "Say it like this" could be the best or the worst direction you give, depending on who you say it to.
 
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