Mark Evans Studio

  Allow room for failure I’m getting real and personal here for a moment, which I think is important as a teacher of artists and an artist myself. I recently had a therapy session where I described the week I had just completed to my therapist.  This was the list and the role I was in for each thing: I shot an episode of a show that’s on Netflix - Acting I ran two rehearsals of The Play That Goes Wrong - Associate Directing I private coached 15 students - Coaching I presented a brand new class that I created to a large group of actors. Some of whom I’ve never met - Teaching I taught two additional classes that I created the concept for - Teaching I started potty training our daughter (along with my husband) who is a year and ten months old - Parenting And…… I had friends over to our house for an overdue catch up and fun night together - DRINKING!!!!!! ;-) I explained to my therapist that I felt a little overwhelmed and he said he understood because that’s a substantial list. H...

  Breathe a Sigh Of Relief I am currently reading ‘Freeing The Natural Voice’ by Kristin Linklater.  She gives an incredible amount of detailed guidance to breathing in a way that frees you into your most authentic, expressive self. She talks about inspiration and expiration (breathing in and breathing out) and teaches an exercise where the small, simple, honest expiration (outward breath) should be focused on as a ‘ sigh of relief’ I want to encourage you to think of as many things as possible that you can free yourself up from by giving them a metaphoric and literal sigh of relief.   Do you have tension in your shoulders? Give it a sigh of relief and let it go. Has your day been challenging and made you feel stressed? Give it a sigh of relief and let it go.  Do you have a bunch of thoughts racing around your mind right now? Give them a sigh of relief and let them go.  Do you have someone in your life who no longer SHOULD be? Give them a sigh of relief and l...

  It’s all about you When discussing an approach to auditioning I said this to a student recently.  “It’s all about you, then it’s nothing to do with you” Write that down so you remember it and can glance at it before your auditions and now let me explain what I mean:  When you’re preparing for an audition, find every opportunity possible to bring yourself into the material. Your voice, your point of view, your sense of humor, your uniqueness, your experience, your trauma, your LIFE! Then when you step into the audition, know and trust that you deserve to be in that room. You deserve to occupy that space and their time and demand their attention because THEY deserve to get to know you and see you in the material. It’s the only thing that you have over every other person auditioning. The audition happens.  Then, once you step out of that room (or turn the camera off with a self tape), you must remind yourself that it now has NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU . You have no...

  Have a little           patience.  At the end of my script analysis group class ‘Mine For The Meaning’, I invite every student to share whatever resonated the most with them about working in that way. Recently, one of the students, Katy, explained how valuable it was to spend the time (2.5 hours on one scene!!!) to go through the script with a fine tooth comb looking for all the information the writer has included in there and how difficult it can be to actually be patient enough to do that on a regular basis. BUT, by patiently DOING that work, it actually saves you a lot of time in the long run because you have a much better chance at having a familiar shorthand with what you’re saying and doing as the character.  Katy shared this and I threw the ‘fridge magnet’ quote on it at the end: “You must practice patience to expedite the process” This is true in our work beyond just script analysis too. One of the main things that gets in the way of pro...

  Act Selfishly  I was recently walking uptown on 8th avenue away from Penn Station as hundreds of commuters were quickly shuffling in the opposite direction during rush hour. Everyone was extremely eager to make sure they didn't miss their train.  I often have moments where I’m reminded that this city is full of people who are just trying to survive. We all are, right? YOU are just trying to take care of your day whether that be, making your train, paying your rent, finding a love or getting a job, the list is endless.  I almost find it moving just how selfish everyone is required to be in order to get through.  Most of us are taught as children and young people that to be selfish is bad. It’s rude, it's inconsiderate, it’s wrong. I agree. To be selfish is pretty awful, but we ALL act selfishly at times, whether we intend to or not.  We have all rushed to get a train and accidentally stepped in front of someone and bumped them. We were putting our own ne...

  ‘Good’ isn’t good.   I just returned from a trip to Wales in the UK to visit family.  I tend to fly back once or twice a year and every time, I have moments of clarity about my childhood or teenage years that I can appreciate with a broader perspective now that I'm old(er). I drove past my old high school, where I mostly had a pretty miserable time as someone who didn’t fit in with the majority crowd. Somewhere I excelled however, was in music and drama classes….(and Catering - Yes; my school offered a GCSE course in Catering - Random) I had a flashback to a moment in a drama class where I was asked to do a scene with an unfamiliar regional Welsh accent. I had never tried doing it before and the lack of preparation time or control made me terrified. I felt so intimidated to just be put on the spot. Mainly because the time I spent in music and drama class was when I felt safe and confident because I was considered the talented kid. The top-of-class student who took ever...

  Bored of being bored. I went to bed last night looking at my schedule for the next day: A very busy 24 hours was planned out. Justin and I need to know that at least one of us can be with the baby at all times (duh; parenting), so we put everything in our shared calendar.  Each event in my calendar is color coded. Teaching and coaching is orange. Acting work is red. Baby stuff is yellow. Social life is purple etc etc etc. At a glance, my rainbow calendar looks as gay as every corporation during pride month. I was set to wake up at 7am. However our dog had other plans and needed to pee at 5.50am. So I woke up and brought him downstairs and let him into the yard and I looked at the clock and thought “I have just been gifted an extra hour of awake time”. So I didn’t go back to bed. As I type this, I am sitting on the sofa, next to the dog who of course, went back to sleep. I began reading a book that contains a quote from Marianne Williamson, which reads: ‘Children aren’t bored...