John Melainey teaches from a perspective of 40 years’ experience in the business of acting and getting cast!
He’s a self-deprecating tutor but we think he’s an expert on what happens before, during and after the audition room process!
He’s featured in dozens of commercials worldwide as well as numerous appearances on British TV, including The Bill and Coronation Street.
John breaks the three-hour class into ‘The Actor’s Preparation for Commercials’ (25 key guidelines) and ‘Commercials. Do’s and Don’ts (a further 32 guidelines for success!)
Take all of this on board, practice and you WILL vastly improve your chances of success.
Ans success leads to more success!
During the acting class John lends his experience to cover so much!
Essential tips include:
- They are looking for the ‘RIGHT’ actor to sell their product
- They look for reasons NOT TO USE YOU. You must do all you can do to discover what is ‘RIGHT’. Then, look and act as RIGHT as possible when you meet them
- The PRODUCT is the STAR, you are the supporting actor. SUPPORTING ACTORS ARE THERE TO MAKE THE START LOOK GOOD
- DO NOT chat to friends in the waiting toom.
- DO Study the script
- DO Visualise what might be asked of you and plan your response
- DO NOT go in without a PLAN
- DO be brave, imaginative and adaptable
- DO NOT pester your agent!
- …………….and many, many MORE!!
For the Film & TV Audition Technique class we build on Commercials week.
John introduces and helps to practice and hopefully perfect a fool proof sight reading technique. The late Nina Finburgh originally taught this technique for over 10 years at London’s Actors Centre. We also build upon this later in the course. It’s extremely important when we have our there casting director evenings – coming up!
For TV & Film John has another set of guidelines similar but different in key ways to the Commercial castings.
We also cover INFORMATION TO GET FROM THE SCRIPT WHICH AFFECTS YOUR ACTING CHOCES:
- Who am I? and then break it down into finer detail Professionally?/Psychologically?/Physically?/Emotionally?/Socially?/Intellectually?
- What is my role?
- Where am I?
- PLUS TEN MORE detailed questions VITAL to your character and the scene
Finally, a screen test of short scenes learnt for homework finishes the class.
The actors were buzzing by the end!
Thanks again, John Melainey, we’ll see you for the show case rehearsals in Week 9!
Ashleigh Swain says:
Working with John is an opportunity to learn from someone with so much knowledge and experience in the industry. The way he presents his classes means you soak everything up like a sponge. He is thorough and methodical. John talks you through auditioning: from getting the script through to what to expect on the day and most importantly how to approach and perform it. It was so interesting to learn the difference between the audition process for commercials compared to auditions for TV and Film. It’s an area I hope to pursue and I didn’t know half the tips he gave us so this was extremely useful. The best part was taking everything he had told you and then giving it a shot yourself. When you watch back your taped auditions it’s nice to compare how you actually look to how you thought you would look. This is a good tool for being able to improve on certain aspects for the future. Watching the rest of the class and their interpretations of a scene (especially in TV & Film) gives the opportunity for you to learn from your fellow cast mates, too. You'll find they will pick up on things you didn't or vice versa. All in all, a thoroughly enjoyable and useful class delivered and presented with finesse!
David Varkonyi says:
John Melainey has provided great examples and tips for auditioning for commercials. He explained the process of the audition itself and how it differs from TV or movies and what to pay attention to.
The recording of the different exercises was very useful as we were able to watch back what we have done and learn from it.
Overall great, enjoyable class, providing great confidence when auditioning for commercials.