"The Acting Industry and the Pandemic - A Love Story" by Matt Newton
Hey MN students,
Well here we are. Welcome to crazy town. I hope you are all staying safe and healthy. I am desperately trying to keep my sanity during this madness, and playing with Monster Trucks for 10 hours a day. Fun! How’s your day going?
In a week a lot has changed in the industry (and the world). I know some of you are feeling this hard, especially those in the service industry. Where do we go and what do we do? This is our livelihood.
Last you heard from me we were pressing the pause button on classes, and planning to resume mid-April. Turns out we can’t do that in our New York acting studio. I thought we would still be able to do our small group classes. So many productions have shut down (including my sister’s pilot and her husband’s movie with The Rock), film festivals have been cancelled (sorry for those of you who had premieres coming up), and we are at home bingeing the Kardashians and Love is Blind (just me?). Yesterday my son woke me up at 4am by hitting me in the face with a whiffle ball. Good times! Our structure has gone away.
There’s lots of empty studios right now.
Today all of our teachers met (over Zoom), and talked about how to move forward. We love what we do more than anything, and love the actors we work with. Myself and all of our teachers are dying to get back to doing creative work, and staying inspired during this strange time. We miss our community of students, and we miss working together and growing. We are ready to get back to teaching and kicking ass!
MN Acting Studio will offer online acting classes going forward until we are back at our wonderful little classrooms in NYC and Darien.
I spent the last few days testing out Zoom. It’s easy, free, and maintains the sense of collaboration that is so important at our school. I’ve jumped on board. I truly believe we can get a lot of work done, and work the same way, as though we are on-camera in a virtual class setting (complete with virtual “late jar”). So in some ways the computer screen simply replaces the tv screen in class. It’s not the same as the community of all sitting together and laughing, but we can still bring that element to the virtual class, ask questions, and maintain that group dynamic that is so essential to our on-camera studio.
Now is the time to reassess, to get better, to maintain a community of actors, and to keep ready for when everything comes back (and it will). Let’s keep each other accountable, let’s lift each other up, and let’s move forward together in these murky waters. I spoke to a lot of agents, and there are still auditions coming in (self tapes).
The logistics of class won’t change. We will still send sides, send you a video of the class afterwards, have the same amount of time on-camera, open it up to discussion after each person, give you self-taping homework assignments, and just have a good time in general while keeping it honest and real. Our goal is to bring happiness into your household, and keep the work thought provoking and challenging, with a focus on strong, real, authentic acting in front of the camera. At some point we will be out of this madness, and we feel it’s important to stay sharp for when that day comes and production starts booming again.
To take it further, I think it’s time to finally, finally get your self tape setup done right. What else are you doing with your time? I am also offering a free online acting workshop on SELF-TAPING next Friday, March 27th from 1:30-3pm Eastern time. Once you sign up for our online acting classes, we will send you a Zoom link the day before. I will cover everything from what lights to buy, how to upload, edit, etc, and anyone can ask questions via chat. Zoom is easy and amazing. We will be offering more of these kinds of things in the future to keep everyone busy and entertained during this time.
Thanks for being so wonderful. Love you guys, and look forward to this next journey with you.
Sincerely,
Matt