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The Technique
Foundations & history exclusively founded and taught by Brad
The Heller Approach is a Los Angeles-based acting school that addresses the obstacles many actors find in achieving believability and authenticity in acting out a role. The Heller Approach offers a successful guide to actors wanting to convey meaningful performances without summoning past painful experiences advocated by the Method approach. Our technique is completely unique, giving actors tools that are simple yet practical and form a solid foundation to engage in any medium. The application for the Heller Approach is based on muscle memory, rather than the Method approach of dwelling on past experiences in order to evoke emotion. This truly frees the artist to access all feelings and emotions that are universal to humans regardless of past experiences. Heller, with its foundation in the teachings of original Group Theater member, Don Richardson. Richardson directed over 800 television shows and his legendary students include Robert Redford, Kirk Douglass, Grace Kelly, Anne Bancroft, Zero Mostel, and Spencer Tracy to name a few. The works of Richardsons former students and the Heller Approach current students (including Greys Anatomys Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Heroes Masi Oka, and Rescue Mes Natalie Distler) validate the authenticity of this incredible technique. Brad Heller was also mentored by academy award wining writer and director, Seth Winston. Winstons influence has also been incorporated into The Heller Approach in order to assist students in learning how to analyze a scene and create the most believable and authentic characters

The Heller Approach is

The Heller Approach addresses anxiety, a common obstacle with actors. The problem of nervousness, worry, and unease is a constant issue many actors face, but rarely find the tools to remedy their fears. The Heller Approach teaches actors how to cope with high-pressure situations and embrace their own fear. The technique addresses many of actors biggest issues, including anxiety when auditioning, lack of understanding how to evoke believable emotion, lack of technique that does not require one to dig into past experiences, and a misunderstanding of how to enact a character in a most engaging manner.

The Technique
Stage fright and anxiety can kill any actors drive, performance, and enjoyment in acting. If an actor can learn to cope with anxiety and fear, it will change not only their acting, but also a variety of different other aspects of life, including confidence, relationships, and income to name a few. Below, professional acting coach, Brad Heller, shares his story of how having the right tools for dealing with fear and anxiety changed his life and the futures of his students: For many years, I had debilitating stage fright and anxiety every time I performed. This unease manifested itself in a number of ways. The two ways it hurt me the most arrived in the forms of distracting, impeding thoughts that would not go away, and feeling withdrawn when performing in highpressure situations. It did not matter what acting technique I used, because my brain became so numb from fear that I lost the ability to think clearly. My acting mentor, Don Richardson, repeatedly informed to me Acting is like being an athlete. When he first shared this with me, I did not really grasp how this was possible. Although after working with him for a bit, I finally understood how the two are related: an athlete and an actor require the same training, the same principles of preparation, and the same muscle memory execution. I finally comprehended Dons metaphor; I wanted to be able to handle the stress and the pressure of a professional football player like a wide received who COULD catch the ball when a billion people are watching him in the Super Bowl. Except in my case, I wanted to be able to be an actor who didnt leave an audition with regret. I wanted to be able to leave an audition knowing that I had done the best I could, and that fear and anxiety didnt impede my performance. Because believe me, when you are a at fourth callback for a role any actor REALLY wants, and you see all of the producers, writers, and directors behind a bunch of tables, just waiting for you to impress them, the anxiety can hit you like a ton of bricks. Knowing how to handle the fear when it hits you is paramount to an actors success. The brilliant woman who gave me the tools to cope with anxiety and fear is Dr. Eda Gorbis. After decades of trying to find a mechanism to deal with the unease, I finally found a person who could help me. She completely changed how I handle anxiety, and without her, I would never have been able to achieve the success I currently enjoy. Dr. Eda Gorbis is world-renowned authority on the treatment and research of anxiety disorders, Associate Professor at UCLA, and founder of the Westwood Institute for Anxiety located in Westwood, CA. Dr. Gorbis is an author and co-author of numerous scientifically important articles on anxiety disorders, and has been featured on numerous televised programs and documentaries, including MTVs True Life, ABC News 20/20, NBCs Today Show, and Discovery Health. After my time working with Dr. Gorbis, I discovered that my anxiety had nothing to do with my childhood or how I was raised, but simply that I needed to learn tools to help me cope with high-pressure situations that all actors and performers alike face. I armed myself with tools to help me EMBRACE the anxiety and fear. Dr. Gorbis best advice was to invite your enemies to dinner. In my case, the enemies were anxiety and fear.

Conquering Anxiety and Stage Fright

At first, the old principle keep your friends close, but your enemies closer, was really strange to apply to my battle with anxiety and fear. Although I was slowly able to understand what she meant. I was trying to push my enemies away, and Dr. Gorbis taught me how to keep them close, embrace them, and WORK AROUND THEM. It turned out to be a life-changing concept to grasp. After all of my years in acting, trying to push thoughts and fear away, and it turns out the key is to INVITE THEM IN. I was supposed to be embracing the feelings and thoughts I encountered when the pressure was high. Fear and Anxiety are two emotions that need to be accepted and embraced. At first, the feelings can become more intense, but after a bit of time, if you LIVE WITH THEM in you and accept them, their power starts to decrease. What I learned how to do for myself, as and actor, and also to pass onto my students is how to work around the uncomfortable thoughts and feelings caused by anxiety and fear. It truly is a life changing experience. We cannot push thoughts away. We cannot push feelings away. If we try to do this, they will only come back at you ten times stronger. Here is a little example: Try NOT to think if a pink elephant.Impossible, yes? Now, use this pink elephant as an example of thoughts or feelings you do not want to have when you are performing a scene as an actor. Now, if you have to perform a scene as an actor, and NOT think of this pink elephant, or you try to push this thought away it will come back at you 10 times stronger, yes? IT WILL NEVER GO AWAY. Instead, the approach I learned simply teaches you to work AROUND this thought. Do not push it away, but rather accept it and perform WITH IT. When I did this, the thoughts power and distraction ability weakened or simply disappeared. It is similar to a dancer who must perform with a sprained ankle. The dancer must simply accept the pain and do it anyways. The way we approach fear and performance anxiety is by slowly and safely learning to work with the fear in you to work around the fear and distraction, rather than running from it. To be able to act under any condition is one of the many very important principles I teach my students. My students can come through and perform exceptionally no matter the condition: good feelings, bad feelings, or distracting thoughts. They no longer mess up their auditions due to anxiety that causes them to freeze. The key is that my students DO NOT leave their auditions and performances with the worst feeling in the world regret. -Brad Heller

Passing the Torch

From One Generation to the Next

Charles Jehlinger (1886-1952)

Jehlinger was one of the most important acting teachers in America and taught for nearly 50 years at The American Academy of Dramatic Arts. Among his pupils were Cecil B. DeMille, Edward G. Robinson, Spencer Tracy, Hume Cronyn, Kirk Douglas, Anne Bancroft, and Robert Redford. The legend is that he taught Cecil B. DeMille in his first class and Robert Redford in his last. In his memoir, The Ragmans Son, Kirk Douglas dedicates three pages to memories of Jehlinger. Similarly, in Hume Cronyns memoir, A Terrible Liar, he tells the story of the day that Jehlinger approached him and said, Youre a fool, boy. Oil and water wont mix. You cant criticize and create at the same time. Youre a fool.

Don Richardson (1919-1996)

Don Richardson, whom Jehlinger mentored, was an author, teacher, and director. Don was an original member of the Group Theater, which was the nucleus of Acting in the United States. His fellow students include Sanford Meisner, Stella Adler, and Uta Hagan. Although Don was the only student from the Group Theater who said, The Method isnt what acting is about. He directed over 800 television shows in his time. Some of these include Get Smart, One Day at a Time, Lost in Space, The Defenders, and Bonanza. Don also directed theatre productions on Broadway, won numerous Emmy awards, and taught actors for over 40 years. Some of his legendary clients include Grace Kelly, Anne Bancroft, Zero Mostel, and Spencer Tracy, to name a few

Brad Heller (Present)

Brad Heller, who was mentored by Don Richardson, is an actor, teacher, and director. Brad was Dons protg and after his passing, Brad began teaching and coaching this revolutionary technique. He spent five years teaching as a professor of Acting at UCLA; afterwards, he began coaching privately in his own school. Brad built a very successful acting and producing career, appearing in hundreds of TV shows, commercials, and films. Most recently, guest starring in a very well received role on Criminal Minds, and in the Academy Award Nominated film, Most . Brad feels compelled to carry out Dons legacy. He has effectively taken many actors from beginner to master in a very short period of time.

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How we are Different & The Issues we Address

There are many acting techniques existing in todays

you must create a character that has a lasting impact on the viewer. With regards to scene study, the students bring in a prepared scene that they find on their own, rehearse it outside of class, and then perform it in class soon after. The instructor will give notes on how to improve it, and the students work on it the next week, and bring it in again.

world, many of which claim to have their foundations lie in the teachings of a variety of original Group Theater members. His fellow students include Sanford Meisner, Stella Adler, and Uta Hagen. Although Don Richardson is the only founding student who admitted that The Method isnt what acting is about. The technique further maintains that acting should be fun not a self-dissecting experience. This technique gives you a very simple, structured way of working without making acting a complex, traumatic, or painful experience. Furthermore, this technique will help you learn how to analyze a scene and to create the most believable, entertaining characters possible in a very short period of time which is required in todays fast paced Hollywood entertainment industry. The basics of the Heller Approach lessons include Styles of Entertainment, Believability, Scene Study, Emotion, Comedy, and Cold Read/Audition Technique.

Emotion
One of the main principles of the technique pertains to evoking emotion. Emotion is the intensity you feel in your body when you are angry, sad, happy, anxious, etc.. You feel it in every pore of your body when you experience a certain feeling. We teach actors how to create this quality on command, in a very quick and reliable way.

Comedy
The art of comedy is one of the many teachings we specialize in. Many actors and comics come to us to learn how to get laughs in a scene when they are playing a believable character. There are specific principles to comedy ranging from how to set up a joke, to specific tools to get the audience laughing exactly where you want them. Comedy is similar to science, in that it must be precise. The timing of a joke can make or break the moment. Acting in a comedic role can be a lot of fun when you have the necessary tools; otherwise, it can be very intimidating. Most of the shows on T.V. are comedic, and if you cant play a comedy, youre eliminating a significant amount of potential work. The important thing to remember is that once you know the tools of comedy, its very exciting to plan your performance and get the crowd laughing at the right moment!

Styles of Entertainment
There are many different types of entertainment we play: Drama, comedy, farce, modern tragedy, mystery, etc.. We have only named a few, but as actors need to know how to play them all. In fact, all different styles of entertainment have a different purpose in how they are to affect the audience. There are specific tools we give you to help you mold the audience and get the crowds laughing where you want them to, or move them to tears at a specific dramatic moment.

Believability
As actors, it doesnt matter what we do to jazz up a scene if it is not real and believable. Being real is acting. Its not about doing

Cold Read/Audition Technique

a tap dance. Although we address creating interesting moments How to WOW the casting director & leave a memorable in a scene to get laughs or create suspense, even more focus is impression requires some very important tools. We emphasize placed on being a real person in the scene. You will wow them the necessity in taking risks in the choices you make, how to by bringing yourself to the role and really believing that you are react and listen in a scene, when to look up from the scene and the character youre playing in the given scene reacting to given circumstances as a real human being. when its ok to read the lines, how to prepare for the audition, learning the role in order to perform at your potential under duress, bringing yourself to the role, taking over the room and enticing the casting director to want to know you, and how to

Scene Study

rehearse for an audition when you dont have a scene partner to After you book the job, you will need to build the roll. To do this, practice with, and making the scene real to you.

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The Technique

Acting is Like Being an Athlete:

A Technique Based on Muscle Memory
Don Richardson taught the principle: Acting is like being an athlete. This statement may seem confusing at first, but after some thought, it is clear how the two are related: an athlete and an actor require the same training, the same principles of preparation, and the same muscle memory execution. In order for ones acting to be believable and true, the actor must not be thinking about what he is supposed to do next, or be watching himself to ensure he is doing it correctly. Don often reminded his students that the character doesnt know shes in the story. To create convincing human beings we must obey natural laws. In life, we do not go around constantly thinking about who we are, and neither should the character. After our brains have memorized the lines, the rest of the tasks in acting are turned over to our body, which through practice, can learn to do things without thinking, just as we learn to catch a ball without thinking about it. The greatest aid in acting is that our body remembers. The technique used at The Heller Approach relies on muscle memory. Just as a professional tennis player does not think about how he is going to hit the ball on the tennis court, an actor needs to be able to trust his body to remember the preparation done prior to filming or being on stage. Similar to athletic training, there are two phases in acting: Preparation and Execution. Preparation is the step where you learn everything, and execution is where you let go completely allowing your body to remember what it learned during the previous step. Your muscles will remember if you have done the preparation. A professional athlete trains every day in order to prepare for the big match, and once he is on the court, there is no more thinking about what he is going to do he just does it. In acting, the answer lies in making everything we can a conditioned reflex so that we dont have to think about it. You cannot criticize and be creative at the same time.

The Team
Brad Heller
Brad Heller began his career at Boston University School of Theatre Arts, where he received his theatre degree. Hollywood was his calling, so he moved to Los Angeles, where he began teaching, as well as producing films, while continuing a successful acting career. Brad enjoys teaching the lessons that he uses in his own professional acting career and has a strong passion to pass these tools on to help actors perfect their craft. Brad has students who have studied with him for nearly 15 years; from Judge Reinhold and Mary Gilbert, to David White and Masi Oka, Brads students have successfully created acting careers, and constantly keep their acting tools sharp with the Heller Approach. His students have booked roles on hit shows like Criminal Minds, The Unit, CSI, Las Vegas, Malcolm in the Middle, and Monk to name a few.

Evan Arnold
Evan Arnold is a Los Angeles native, with over 25 years of acting experience in television, film, commercials, and theater (Member: Buffalo Nights and Troubadour theater companies, both award winning). His father was an award-winning member of the DGA who worked on such films as The Godfather Part II, Bladerunner, Sixteen Candles, War Games, and The Jerk. Having met and watched directors on the sets of his Fathers films, Evan has seen a vast cross-section of Hollywood styles in action. His own acting credits include regular roles on Growing Pains, Just the Ten of Us, Close to Home, and The West Wing. Arnold is an alumnus of the prestigious Harvard School (now-Harvard-Westlake) and U.C. Berkley,

Sean Nepita
Sean Nepita began his career when he was cast in the blockbuster hit Titanic, and has since appeared in countless television shows and feature films, including Best Laid Plans (also starring Reese Witherspoon). He has since been in literally hundreds of commercials and televised campaigns. You may recognize him from his numerous Quiznos and IBM commercials, and most recently McDonalds and AFLAC. In addition to acting, Sean is stand-up comedian performing regularly in the Los Angeles stand-up circuit.

David White
David A.R. White has been a working actor and producer in Los Angeles for over 10 years. At the age of 19, David landed a three-year reoccurring role on the Emmy award winning sitcom Evening Shade. David continued to book roles on a number of shows, including Coach, Saved by the Bell, Sisters, Melrose Place, and Martial Law. In 1999, David produced and starred in the feature films The Moment After and Mercy Streets. In 2001, David was nominated for The Movie Guide Awards Best Actor for his dual roles in Mercy Streets. His competitors included Mel Gibson in The Patriot, Denzel Washington in Remember the Titans , and Will Smith in Bagger Vance. In addition, David continues to produce and direct at least five films a year, and students are often cast in his work.

Kerry Stein
Kerry has been an actors since age 16, and has appeared in countless network television shows, commercials, films, and stage plays. Having studied acting and directing for eleven years with the legendary Don Richardson, Kerry has been teaching actors for the past 20 years. He is thrilled to be associated with the academy, as his greatest joy is helping actors use their own presence fully and effectively as the character.

Testimonials
Brad has been coaching my clients for years now, and manages to bring them to a whole new level. I work very hard developing my actors for television and film, and I am always confident sending them to Brad. He has challenged them not to do what every other actor will do with the same dialogue. Whether the project is drama or broad comedy, he is there to help them make strong choices. Many have hailed Brad as being one of the best coaches in Hollywood, and I have to agree. Actors love Brad Heller, and so do I. -Mara Santino, Talent Manager of Luber Roklin Entertainment The Heller Approach could not be more practical; as a teacher, Brad arms his students with the tools necessary to tackle any situation. I was brought in to audition for one of several lead characters in an upcoming feature. After my initial read with the casting director, she told me that she liked me a lot but the part I was auditioning for had already been offered to a well-known actor. She then handed me a set of sides Id never seen before and asked me to step outside, prepare, and read for this new character on the spot. Brad had just taught me a lesson the night before about cold reading and told me that sooner or later, a CD would ask me to read for a different part than Id prepared for and that his lessons in cold reading would prove invaluable if this happened. I never expected this to happen the next day, & I found Brads words of wisdom echoing in my head as I prepared to cold read for this new role. I was subsequently called back twice and went on to screen test for the part. Thanks to Brads foresight and experience, I couldnt have been more prepared for such a curve ball.

-Alex Goode
I never show up for work without working with Brad first. He keeps me real and he points out both my strengths and weaknesses in an encouraging way that allows me to make the most of every opportunity. -Judge Reinhold Beverly Hills Cop 1, Beverly Hills 2, The Santa Claus 1, The

Santa Claus 2, Ruthless People, Fast Times at Ridgemont High

The Heller Approach is so refreshing compared to other classes Ive taken. In my first session with Brad I had a moment of clarity and knew right away what needed to be changed in the scene we were working on. I love the idea of not having to be beaten down and broken to be a good actor. You can still give a great performance and have fun with it! -Brittany Finamore Cory in the House, Ghost Whisperer, Another World

Ive trained with many acting coaches in both NY and LA, and I have never felt as confident going into an audition as I have after working with Brad. He taught me how to be more present and in the moment. Brad is a wonderful teacher that truly cares and knows what he is talking about. The call back today went so great! I felt a million times better about it once I worked on it with Brad! Looking forward to call on Thursday! -Natalie Distler Rescue Me

Testimonials continued
Brad Heller is an acting coach who knows what he is talking about. Most acting coaches will just tell you how to do your scene their way. Brad will work with you to create a character that will feel natural and unique to you as well as the casting director. If you want to go into an audition room and book the job, then I recommend you work with Brad. -George Finn How I Met Your Mother, Cold Case, Beverly Hills 90210 I've trained with different acting coaches in both London and Los Angeles , and I have never found a class that I truly look forward to every week. Brad has taught me to really let go and enjoy what I do, which in turn has made me get out of my head and be more in the moment. Brad is a fantastic teacher and a really great guy.

-Benjamin Stone Ten Things I Hate About You & lead roll in the play The

Dreaming (performed specifically for Queen of England at Windsor Castle)

Brad has been a wonderful acting coach to my son, Freddy. When he works with Brad prior to an audition, he usually books the job. His technique, though not difficult, has brought out the best in Freddy.

-Norine Siglar (Freddys mother) Byron Tyler Perrys I Can Do Bad All By Myself

Brad helped me understand my character and the story being told as a whole, and taught me to become and live the parts I've auditioned for, and projects I've worked on. Thanks Brad! -Arthur Napiontek Pineapple Express

Since I started Brad's class I feel that I have come across a technique that works for me. I highly recommend classes with Brad Heller! -Tyler Blackburn Cold Case, Days of our Lives, Gigantic, Pretty Little Liars

Mr. Heller is an absolutely amazing teacher that will not only take your acting skill to another level that you could never imagine, but will also guide and help you in your career and development as a human being. He is a true Sensei of the craft of acting and a role model that has and will continue to change lives daily.

-Kristopher Askins, represented by well respected Society Entertainment

Management

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Group Acting Classes

Each class offers an environment where all students will work on stage in every class. Classes will consist of, but are not limited to: scene study and analysis, cold reading and audition technique, career management (Getting an agent, headshots, etc.), and tools in overcoming stage fright or general fear. Classes are taught for all levels and ages. Beginners and seasoned pros are welcome. The Heller Approachs Acting Studio has group classes every week. Everyone hones their skills while auditioning and working regularly in television and film. It is a noncompetitive, safe, and supportive environment where everyone shares and enjoys practicing their craft. Students receive immediate feedback from Acting Coach, Brad Heller; negative criticism is not part of this unique curriculum. Productive feedback, tips, and pointers are only part of what make Brads group acting classes one of the most respected in LA. All students are encouraged to actively participate and ask questions.
4 times a month (once a week) group class cost is $250 8 times a month (twice a week) group class cost is $420 4348 Tujunga Ave. Studio City, CA 91604

Weekly Group Class Schedule

Tuesday: 7:00 PM10:30 PM Thursday: 10:00 AM1:00 PM

Location
Two Roads Theater

Free Introductory Class

Check out a class for free! See, hear, or feel if its right for you. Bring a monologue or a scene to work on with Brad Heller, if you like. Call 323.962.8077 or email info@thehellerapproach.com to schedule your free introductory class.

Cost

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Skype Acting Classes

The Heller Approach offers private and semi-private live Skype lessons to students worldwide. Lessons are available via webcam in real time through the free downloadable program, SKYPE. You can receive private coaching from Brad Heller or any of his assistant coaches in the comfort of your own home. The only requirement is to download SKYPE (it only takes a few minutes), and youre all set! You can choose from general acting lessons, or work on preparing for an upcoming audition, callback, or monologue. The Heller Approach and its successors are Los Angeles based, although studying with Brad or one of his assistant coaches takes place around the world through the advent of Skype. The Heller Approach currently teaches a number of out-of-state acting students via Skype, in addition to in-person private and group acting lessons. We also have a number of students who reside in Los Angeles, but still appreciate the advent of Skype in an effort to forgo heavy traffic conditions, or who request immediate coaching while on set, or for last minute audition preparation. Young actors preparing to embark on the journey to Hollywood can obtain a huge advantage over their competitors by receiving exceptional acting training prior to their move. An actors success in the entertainment industry heavily relies on his training and current knowledge of the business both of which are time sensitive and can be achieved prior to ones move to Hollywood. For every level of actor, The Heller Approachs teachings includes the steps required to embark on career as an actor, which involves a thorough study of the industry, the business, acquiring an agent, and headshot guidance. With the right training and up-to-date industry expectations, an actor moving to Los Angeles can dive right into the auditioning pool and into seeking an agent, upon arrival. Trying to break into the industry from your hometown? It IS possible. Los Angeles casting directors travel all over the United States seeking out-of- state talent, and in order to be prepared for these auditions, an actors must have a solid technique and understanding of the current entertainment industry. The Heller Approach offers training for all actors needs, and is one of the most highly regarded programs in the country. The non-method acting technique used at The Heller Approach is great for preparing you before moving to Hollywood, teaches you how to be a better actor (regardless if you or your child is moving to Los Angeles or not), and most importantly it keeps acting FUN!

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Brad Heller featured in Back Stage Magazine

The Craft

Leave the Agony Behind

These are the kinds of acting techniques I have experienced myself and have heard about from my students, ages 7 to 70. Some call it affective memory, a technique used in Method acting: using your memory of a personal tragic event to catapult you into a state of mind, at which point, supposedly, the character takes over and youll be emotional for the scene. An Electric Connection What is emotion? To me, emotion is the electricity in your body and your heart when you feel, which then beams out through your eyes. Like the electricity of rage you see in Anthony Hopkins eyes when he says, "Hello, Clarice," in "The Silence of the Lambs." I believe we need this electricity for great acting, and it beams out through our eyes. Its the engine that runs the car. Without it, your motor will be dead and your character will be flatlike old 7Up lacking carbonation. So how do we get that without ending up in therapy? After literally hundreds of thousands of wasted dollars and hours spent on crappy acting classes across the country, I found that the most effective way to evoke emotion was not taught to me in any university, but nearly 20 years ago in L.A. by the late Don Richardson, my acting mentor. Don wrote an amazing book called "Acting Without Agony: An Alternative to the Method." He taught some of the greatest actors of my generation: Grace Kelly, Anne Bancroft, Zero Mostel, and Helen Hayes (who wrote the foreword to his book). He directed more than 800 episodes of TV shows, many of which I watched as a kid: "Get Smart," "Bonanza," "The Defenders," "Lost in Space." He also directed plays on Broadway and was an original member of the Group Theatre, alongside Stella Adler and Sanford Meisner. This was important for me to know, as I wasnt looking for some fly-by-night, quick-fix technique. Don completely changed my outlook on acting and made it fun again. I discovered that its possible to get emotional without having to think of anything personal. Heres the deal. It may sound weird, but it works. Try it and youll see. Evoking emotion doesnt have to be done by thinking of something from your own life. You can do it by simply verbalizing the name of the emotion. Don explained that the body is so familiar with emotion, youll feel it by simply saying it aloud. Say "anxiety" aloud. Dont you feel an electric tingle in your chest? Thats where the center of the emotion anxiety is located. Say the word "joy." You may feel a tingle in your chest that rushes up your throat to your mouth. It may make you smile. Youre feeling this small amount of emotion. It isnt enough to carry you through a scene, but its the epicenter, if you will, of that emotionwhere it starts in the body. Just Breathe I learned that after saying the emotion aloud, theres a very simple breathing exercise to get my body filled with a tremendous amount of the required feeling. I could suddenly feel very angry, happy, or terrified at the snap of my fingers, without having to delve into my mental diary. Let me explain the breathing and why we do it. Whenever were emotional, our body has the same type of physiological reactionthe same one we get when were panting and out of breath after exercising. We get a little lightheaded, our muscles tense up, our heart rate increases, we sweat, and so on. No matter what the emotion is, our experience is the same. In my classes, I teach how to get really emotionalterrified, happy, angry, etc. simply by saying the name of the emotion and breathing heavily for a few seconds, and then we start the scene. The technique is built around the muscle memory that will automatically produce the lightheaded electricity we have when were really emotional. I taught this technique for five years at UCLA (where Don Richardson taught me) and then opened my own school in 1994, the Acting Without Agony Academy, where I currently teach. Dons technique changed my life and completely rejuvenated my passion to act.

"Think of your pet dog having a thousand needles stuck into him over his entire body. Think of his pain. Now, while in this state, do your monologue for me." An adult student told me that this is what his acting teacher instructed him to do in order to play a character whos terrified. A 9-year-old student informed me that her previous acting coach had told her that just before starting an emotional scene, she should think of her mommy dying. Little did this teacher know, the girls mother had recently been in a major car accident and was pronounced dead at the scene in front of her daughter before regaining consciousness and being rushed to the hospital. Months later, the girl was still traumatized by the acting exercise. Fortunately, shes no longer studying with that "teacher." As an adult, I dont ever want to think of those images, especially before shooting a scene. I cant imagine how terrible it would be for a child. I thought acting was supposed to be fun. As a kid, I pretended to be a cowboy. I never had to do things like this to be a scared cowboy. Furthermore, you arent playing yourself; youre playing a character. How can remembering a Brad Heller experience evoke emotion effectively for a character Im playing? The amount of terror I feel from thinking about my personal experience wont properly fit the scene Im doing. The character is not Brad Heller. Its like trying to put a piece of one puzzle into anotherit just wont fit. These are the kinds of acting techniques I have experienced myself and have heard about from my students, ages 7 to 70. Some call it affective memory, a technique used in Method acting: using your memory of a personal tragic event to catapult you into a state of mind, at which point, supposedly, the character takes over and youll be emotional for the scene.

Brad Heller will host the intensive "Master the Audition" at Actorfest LA on Saturday, Nov. 6. For more information, go to Actorfest.com. **This article is available at http://www.backstage.com/advicefor-actors/acting-teachers/leave-theagony-behind/

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Brad Heller featured in LA Weekly - An Article by Erin Aubry Kaplan

Finding Alan
My husband, acting out
By Erin Aubry Kaplan Thursday, Apr 21 2005
When my husband, Alan, confessed not long after we got married that he wanted to take acting lessons, I was thrilled Alan was in for hell, and I could help him through it. He could prosper in a way that I never did when I studied acting at UCLA, but only if I explained it all. Id have been less thrilled and more jealous were Alan not the most un-actorly guy I know. He hates affect of any kind and despises having his picture taken even more. He likes coffee shops but is wholly suspicious of coffeehouses, which he thinks of as colonies for slackers and model types and people with no real jobs, like actors. Hes a leftist social critic and a public high school teacher with a wardrobe and mindset so utilitarian, I have to beg him to buy new socks or underwear from a real store (he also hates malls) instead of a swap meet. Yet hes always had a flair for the dramatic and a commanding ease in front of tough crowds the hallmark of any successful teacher, and excellent training for any actor. But he still resisted lessons. This was partly because he remained leery of the whole acting culture, but mostly because hes a perfectionist who hates doing anything that he cant do well the first time. Essentially, he fears looking like a fool. If you want to be an actor, I told him, you had better get rid of the idea that you wont look like a fool, at least at first. That much I knew. Like almost every red-blooded Angeleno who grew up with a love of the movies and a chronically vague sense of career, I thought I wanted to be an actor. After college I did the rounds of small theater, playing everything from Anita in a dinner-theater production of West Side Story to a tap-dancing allegory named Life in an ambitious little musical at a community playhouse. It was as good a time as Id ever had while making almost no money, and I thought Id found a calling. In UCLAs graduate theater program, I was taught that acting is about the furthest thing from a good time that a person could possibly imagine. My teacher was a fierce Strasberg devotee who believed people must be reduced to emotional pulp before they can even call themselves actors. I was still in guarded post-adolescence and knew I was in trouble when, during the first moment-to-moment exercise, I stood before my professors famously withering gaze and said, I feel fine. Nothings going on! Bad answer. I eventually ditched my acting dreams for writing, I suppose because as a writer I could detail my feelings without somebody barking from five feet away that I wasnt feeling them. I consoled myself with the thought that I would still be performing, but on the page. Every art form shares a common set of muses, and all that. Finally, Alan agreed to acting lessons, but only after braving tap-dance classes for five weeks and feeling like a total failure from moment one. He was in bad need of an antidote. I leapt into action. I went on the Internet, and, among the 850,000-plus hits I got when I put in acting classes in Los Angeles, found the One: Acting Without Agony. Probably too good to be true, but the mere promise of a painless experience sold me. The program was inspired by the teachings of Don Richardson, a Group Theater alumnus whod decided that the deep-psychology approach of Strasberg and Stanislavsky was bad for good acting, so he created a much more pragmatic-sounding technique that he called an alternative to the Method. Richardson was dead, but one of his protgs, Brad Heller, was running an Acting Without Agony academy out in Studio City. Classes met every Tuesday at Two Roads Theater on Tujunga Avenue, directly across the street from the restaurant where Robert Blakes murdered wife ate her last meal. Alan thought this was a good sign, in a morbid kind of way. Heller turned out to be wiry and bright-eyed, with an impossible amount of energy and dark, wispy hair that always made him look like hed just rolled out of bed, though I could hardly imagine him doing something as passive as sleeping. No coddler, he put Alan onstage right away with a monologue Alan had chosen before this first meeting. I had gone through a monologue book with Alan over dinner to suggest pieces he might like to do. One was a lovely speech about regret and lost youth from a play by Ivan Turgenev. I thought my intellectually inclined, Russian-descended husband would like it; he didnt. I dont get this, he grumbled. Its too talky. What else is there? He ended up choosing a speech from another play called Good Business, in which a character named John, a lowrent white thug from Detroit, tries to talk his partner out of pulling a boneheaded job in a Jewish part of town. West Bloomfield thats way the fuck out there, man, Alan read aloud. Theyre gonna nail our asses to the wall, man. JesusfuckingChrist! He looked pleased. He was more nervous reading it to Heller onstage, though Heller didnt really give him time to be, immediately explaining the basics of Richardsons anti-Method method, which consists of setting an objective and emotion in any scene and sticking with them throughout. Acting is 80 percent emotion, said Heller. We dont

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Brad Heller featured in LA Weekly - An Article by Erin Aubry Kaplan

Finding Alan(Continued)
My husband, acting out
By Erin Aubry Kaplan Thursday, Apr 21 2005
need sense memory. Objective is the anchor that keeps you focused. With an objective, you always try to get it, to keep the other character here, but you never do. You keep trying, but you never actually achieve the objective. You never figure it out, because then the dog gets the bone. The storys over. The storys never over. Alan nodded vigorously. He was probably thinking of all those students whose attention he had to hold for an hour at a stretch, and then get it back the next day. Alan lived this stuff in a way that I never did, especially at 23. At 7:30 the rest of the class filed in, and Heller introduced the new recruit. Alan got to do the monologue again, this time kind of jumping the gun instead of relaxing, jamming the words together in his haste to get them out. But there was no doubt my husband was interesting to watch, genuine and appealing even as he stumbled. Heller praised him and then gave him copious notes, punctuating every one of them with, Does this make sense? Driving home, Alan was broody, but in a more productive way than usual. I lost it, he muttered. I had it the first time, and then I lost it. I reminded him that the acting flow was like that, maddeningly ephemeral, there one beat and gone the next. But I could see that Alan was on the right track; he wanted to be good. He didnt think he sucked or that this whole enterprise was hopeless. He was having some normal difficulty, but no agony in fact, he was having fun. Now I was envious. The following week he rehearsed John with a vengeance. He said his lines under his breath in the car, around the house, in supermarket lines and parking lots. He started pacing and gesturing with his hands. Once I called him on his cell phone and was startled to hear John answer, Jesus-fucking-Christ! The next class he did the monologue from memory. Heller was impressed enough to let him go to the next step a scene. He assigned him a partner, a veteran actor named Kerry. Alan was excited, though he lapsed for a moment back into his loser gloom. Kerrys a pro, and Im a beginner, he said after class. Hes being polite about baby-sitting me. He probably doesnt even want to do it. Alan practiced even harder the next week. Before I could offer help this time (which by now I could see he didnt need), he drafted me into playing his partner. Over and over we rehearsed the scene, in which Alan played another thug Scottish this time and Kerry played the gang boss. The thug was a loose-cannon underling who tries to get his bosss assurances that he wont screw up a lucrative drug deal. Rudimentary stuff,
dramatically hardly Turgenev and I was already worrying that my husband was typecasting himself as a hood. But maybe he needed this to vent an inner criminal that he didnt normally exercise as a history and humanities teacher dedicated to serving others. Maybe if I had used acting that way when I was studying it, I would be doing it this very moment instead of writing about it.

Alans passion now was such a contrast to my reticence then, I couldnt help but feel a kind of peevishness that I hadnt known or trusted myself enough to walk away, or speak up, or use what I had in me. Nor could I help but wonder what might have happened if Id had a Heller for a teacher instead of an accidental terrorist. But then, one thing Ive already learned from Heller is what he told Alan when he derailed in his monologue: Its always better to be where youre at than to try to recapture a moment you lost. The scene was brilliant, by the way. Dressed all in black, Alan was much more imposing than Id ever seen him. He brought to his character all the nuances of himself, everything utterly familiar to me anxious air, darting eyes, clasped hands, hunched shoulders which now looked utterly different. He was menacing, but oddly sweet, which made him more menacing. He stared at Kerry hard enough to burn a hole in him. I knew the scene by heart, but when Alan leapt up and exploded in anger, I was taken aback. Everybody was. When the scene was done, Heller didnt say anything for several seconds a long time for him to be quiet. Alan was very good, and we all knew it; I felt not regretful or envious at all, but proud. On the way home this time, I said little. I wanted to bask. Alan was torn between being giddy and being sheepish. That was all right, he finally said. That felt good. He let out a long breath and laughed shakily. But you know, I was terrified. I was scared to death. That, of course, is entirely the point of acting, latching on to the moment and riding it wherever it takes you. I never really got a hold of it, but Alan well, hes going to be a different story. One thats hardly going to end anytime soon.

**Erin Aubry Kaplans article, Finding Alan is available at http://www.laweekly.com/200504-21/news/finding-alan/

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