Thursday, December 01, 2016
Acting Concepts Through the Lens of Physics
HowlRound: Can a background in physics help you understand concepts of acting? Would a transition from physics to acting be an intellectually conflicting experience? Can someone use his physics background to be a better actor? I moved to New York City from Boston in September 2015 to pursue acting. Prior to that, I was a research scientist in the Physics Department of Boston University. Every time I say that I am physicist, I get responses such as: “from Physics to acting? Wow!” Now I have completed my first year of acting school; throughout the year, my physics background has helped me to perceive acting concepts better or receive it in a physics point of view.
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4 comments:
It is interesting how we can take these different ideas and apply them through a seemingly completely different filter. Analogies and comparison allow us to relate things which, at first glance, we would say are impossible to find similarities in; music and me tying my shoes, writing a poem and being the captain of a ship, physics and being a performer. Even though I stick to the design and production side of theatre now I used to love performing and playwriting, and because of those previous experiences it was fascinating to hear this perspective and think about the relationship between humans acting on a stage and logical and scientific processes. When you think about it thats all humans are, things being acted on. Individual systems being acted on by outside factors, whether those factors be other individual systems bumping into us as we cross a busy street or the text in a play that performers have to take on. Without these outside factors we move in completely straight lines and we are nothing.
When I interviewed for Carnegie Mellon, I gave this little pitch in the beginning on how I had always been a science-person. Ever since I was a kid, I’d get better grades in my math and science classes. Up until my junior year of high school, I’d just assumed I’d major in a STEM field, and find up in some sort of research position. But then at some point along the way, theatre happened and I just couldn’t let that go. And eventually I realized the two things weren’t really all that different. I’m not sure how much they liked my little spiel, but hey, I’m here, so I must have gotten something right. All of this goes to say that I think there’s an unspoken resonance between science and art. Not just in a sound waves = physics but also = sound design kind of way, but also in the mode of thinking one uses. To engage in and create art requires a certain level of mental awareness, creativity, and intelligence. It’s the same mindset scientists apply when hypothesizing and creating trials. An understanding of process, the need for iteration, the constant searching for the next step, it’s all a bridge between these two seemingly unrelated fields. There’s art in science and science in art, we’re not all that different.
Pieces that reflect on the true codependence and interrelatedness of art and science are a true pleasure of mine. Perhaps really championing the intersection of these two fields is my way of justifying my own switch from science to art. Indeed, for an English class I am taking to satisfy the requirements for my English secondary major, I am writing an article that contemplates the true nature of the relationship between the arts and science. Beyond providing much food for thought for the other field, this understanding of the arts and sciences as something inherently intertwined also makes for a much more broad sighted, and more well rounded population. Applying physics methods to acting seemed a bit of a stretch, even to me. However, by the article's end I was happy to see these patterns mirror each other in art and science. One has much to gain from the other, and vice versa, which makes thought structures like these so important.
This was a great article. The author has a completely valid point; both physics and acting deal with changes in objects over time. Perhaps a deeper point one can take away from this article is that the fields of science and art are much more interconnected than most people think. As someone with a heavy science background before coming to college, I appreciate the desire to find new ways to think about theatre in terms of scientific terms. I find that my science background helps me to think about what I'm doing in a more precise manner. The notion of chaos as applied to theatre is an interesting one. The world of the actor is very much random and disorderly, but it is shaped by several controllable and uncontrollable parameters. I can see how keeping this all in mind when one is acting can help one to better explore this world.
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