Charles Tuthill has taught at the Atlantic Theater Company, The Actors Center, Purchase College Conservatory, Caymichael Patten Studios, and New York University. As an actor he has played leading roles in New York at Manhattan Theater Club, Lincoln Center Directors LAB, Revelation Theater Company, Theater for a New Audience, Worth Street Theater, and the WPA. Regionally, he has appeared at Actors Theater of Louisville, Alliance Theater, Arena Stage, Berkeley Repertory Theater, Great Lakes Theater Festival, Repertory Theater of St Louis, Trinity Repertory, and the Williamstown Theater Festival. Film and Television credits include Law and Order, Law and Order: Special Victims Unit, all the New York based daytime dramas, and many short films including the Academy Award Nominated SPEED FOR THESPIANS based on Chekhov’s THE BEAR.

Interviewed by Joanna Parson

Let’s get to the nitty gritty of what our readers want to know about monologues and auditions. In your opinion, what makes a great contemporary monologue, and how can actors find them?
A great contemporary monologue reflects a point of view about our culture that the auditor can identify with or admire. The idea of what is contemporary changes drastically from year to year, sometimes from week to week! I am always curious to know what is on the minds of actors in their twenties because they represent the next generation of theater makers. I am a bit of a voyeur. I enjoy seeing what it is they want to express about themselves, what kinds of questions they are asking and it gives me a clue as to what life will be like twenty years from now when these young actors are leading the way.

It doesn’t interest me to see an actor in their twenties do a piece that was written when I was in my twenties.I was sitting in a class today taught by Olympia Dukakis and she asked the actors who were working: “What is the one deep thought that resides within this play?” This seems to me to a great way to distill what a play can be about into tangible terms. I heard somewhere that we have 3 to 5 really big character developing moments in our lives. Monologues are usually one of those moments in the characters life, so your attachment to the material should be deep.

Ask yourself what you are auditioning for and suit your monologue to that material. Auditioning for an agent or a casting director carries a different set of expectations than auditioning for a season at a theater or for a graduate school. Don’t confuse them, and don’t leave your sense of humor behind. A friend of mine likes to say an initial audition is just a first date, it’s not the wedding!

Your Web site includes a list of monologues that you consider to be overdone. Why is it important for actors to look for newer or less-heard material?
The list you are referring to was compiled by my friend Karen Kohlhaas who teaches a monologue preparation class in New York. She asked several industry professionals to list monologues they were tired of seeing. The interesting thing she learned was how old some of the material was! Often twenty years old! What was going on in the 1980’s really isn’t relevant or immediate anymore! If you are a young actor, find something newer. It’s likely that it will express a point of view that you can identify with and you will get attached to the ideas in the material in a significant way. Don’t underestimate what the material can do to help your acting. I sometimes think when I assign scenes in class that the character will teach the actor more about living life than I will.

However, I could see material from a great play repeatedly rather than average material. I wouldn’t get tired of the material because a great play is dependent on the actor bringing something of himself to the role. I love Shakespeare plays to see what a particular actor brings to it. The same is true for O’Neill, Williams, Chekhov, Shaw, Ibsen…When the strongest aspect of the monologue is the storytelling, you’re in trouble. I just don’t care about the plot. I care about the individual interpretation of the circumstances and how they relate to that particular performer. While I enjoy the writing of Teresa Rebeck or Nicky Silver, when I’ve heard it once, it doesn’t allow for much revelation of individuality. I end up listening to the writing rather than being aware of what the actor is bringing to the audition room.

You also talk a lot about “actions”—what is an action, and how can an actor use action to shape a performance or monologue?
Different schools teach the meaning of action in different ways. It’s a way of finding out what the underlying purpose of the material is. What carries you from one moment into the next, and how are those moments connected?

There are many ways of playing an action. A typical action as taught by a school like the Atlantic might be something like: “I am trying to put my partner in his place” or “I am going to get my partner to accept a beautiful gift”. This way of working is illustrated in the book The Practical Handbook for the Actor. Another school teaches an action as “to get the love I deserve”. Yet another school of thought is “what are you trying to make your partner FEEL?” These to me are all actions. My favorite way of looking at actions, by way of Ron Van Lieu is to ask “How am I trying to move my life forward in this particular moment in time?”

I have to say that when I studied acting I hated playing actions, but as a teacher, I see how invaluable it is to actors. It gives the work focus. What is even more fun is when that initial work is done, to trust it, throw it away, and really play.

How can you choose material that’s appropriate for your “type”? Actors can play anything, right? So how do you even know what your type is?
I don’t think actors can play anything. I think actors like to believe they can because they’re actors. Again, I think the material should reflect the actor’s frame of reference. I don’t see how a twenty year old actor can play King Lear. They could certainly play an aspect of Lear, but their life experience isn’t anywhere near the character’s. This isn’t to say that an actor is limited to playing only what he knows. The imagination is an important part of the work as well, and I think we’ve all had experiences acting where we released something we didn’t know was inside us. That’s the kind of acting we live for!

As for typing yourself, I think it’s a good idea to do a couple of things. Ask friends what parts you could play, what actors you remind them of, or what adjectives describe you. Then do it again with people who don’t know you, who only have a first impression of you. After all, we only get about seven seconds from the time we walk into a room before someone has made decisions about who we are. It’s important that you know what you are giving off when you enter a room and your audition material should be in line with who you are.

So, what makes a good Shakespearean monologue?
As far as I’m concerned any Shakespeare monologue is good! But if you want to stand out from the pack, I think it’s best to stay away from pieces that have a lot of antithesis or split focus. Find something that is straightforward, with high stakes, and BOLD. Don’t get involved with trying to find something they’ve never heard. It can’t be done. Find something you want say.

Chekov, Wilde, Tennessee Williams– is it important to have monologues for all of different classical and American play styles?
Absolutely. You can’t use an Oscar Wilde monologue to audition for a Chekhov play. The social behaviors, rules of conduct, and internal needs of the characters are drastically different. If you are auditioning for a Chekhov play, you don’t have to do Chekhov per se. You could use Turgenev, Ostrovsky or Gorky, and it would put you in the landscape that the director is interested in examining. For a Wilde play you could use Granville Barker, Somerset Maugham or perhaps Shaw depending on the material. It always helps a director if your audition selection is in the same ballpark as the material being produced. I can’t tell if you can play Williams if you are doing a monologue by Nicky Silver. I love them both, but to me they ask very different things of the actor playing them.

When, if ever, is it appropriate to choose a monologue where you speak with an accent that is not your own?
I think it only makes sense if the play you are auditioning for contains that accent, and you are letting the production team know that you are capable of that dialect. If you were doing a general audition, and you were allowed two pieces, I would say you could do one with an accent if you absolutely love the monologue, and it shows off your work to great advantage. Otherwise I mostly want to see YOU. When I’m auditioning actors, I’m not only looking for people who are talented, but people who are fun to be around. I want to get a sense of that person. Monologues are so difficult. We get to learn so much about you and your acting when you are doing a monologue which is why they are useful to directors. Don’t complicate it by adding a dialect

Let’s say I have an audition tomorrow, and I don’t feel that I have a monologue that, in my opinion, is perfect for what they might be looking for. Should I try to prepare a new monologue, or stick with something tried and true that may not be exactly appropriate for the part?
This is one of those questions that drives me a little crazy because I imagine one set of circumstances where I have a particular answer, and once that answer is formed in mind, I imagine another set of circumstances where my answer is negated. Karen Kohlhaas says that if you have 20 monologues ready to go at anytime all of your bases will be covered. I think there is truth in that.

At the end of the day, you have to feel good about what you are doing. There is no sense in walking into a room and doing work that you are not proud of. I like to think that if presented with a monologue that doesn’t quite line up with the circumstances in the play I am directing, that I have enough imagination to see you in that role.

What if you’re interested in film acting? Are there monologues that can help you show your “film acting” style? Say, is there such a thing as “film acting style”, anyway?
Of course there is no such thing as film acting style! What I think you mean is: Is this acting the kind of acting where I want to move in for a close-up? Acting for the stage and acting for the camera are two separate jobs. I think it is rare that an actor would be asked to do a monologue from a play when auditioning for a film. Plays are verbal, films are visual, and some of the best acting in film comes in moments that are non verbal. If you are asked to do a monologue for a film audition work on being intimate and simple, and allow your thoughts to tell the story. We don’t need a lot of voice from you in film, we are more interested in whether we can experience you.

Do you suggest actors do any kind of physical or vocal warm-up before a monologue audition, or is all of that a bunch of hooey?
Seriously??? Of course I think you should do a physical and vocal warm-up! Don’t you want range in your expression? If you aren’t needing to do a vocal and physical warm up before a monologue, you are not challenging yourself enough as an actor, and you should go to LA and be on TV and leave the actors who want to be in the theater alone to do their job.

What if an actor gets really nervous before auditioning? Do you have any suggestions for handling nerves?
Audition more often. Sooner or later, you will stop thinking about the people at the table and what they think of you. You will start thinking about what you are doing in your work. This is such a good day, that you never go back to worrying about the table again. Even when they are eating their lunch.

I knew a teacher that said: “character thoughts replace actor fears.” If you can be specific and personal, your inner critic will go away and you will become an advocate for your character’s needs. Give yourself something that you WANT to do up there! It has to be PLEASURABLE for you, or you will become self conscious.

Some acting auditions are cold readings, where actors are handed a script they’ve never seen, given ten minutes in a waiting area, and then expected to be brilliant. What do you suggest actors do first when they’re given a script for a cold reading?
I never really had to do this often when I was acting to tell the truth, but my advice is: Take a big bite in the opening moment and let the rest play out from there. No one wants to see timidity, even when you are playing Laura in the Glass Menagerie. We want to see what that character is capable of, and the only way to do that is to put it out there. You will let everyone in the room know that you are a risk taker, and a generous actor. Who doesn’t want to work with that?

What do you think directors and casting directors look for on a resume? Are there common resume mistakes that you see actors making?
Once you get the basic format there isn’t much more to it. Some people like to arrange their credits a particular way, or import headshots into the resume. That’s all fine, I suppose. I don’t think it makes much difference. I want to know who they’ve worked with. Can I call a director they’ve worked with and get a referral? Where have they trained? Do I enjoy the acting that comes from that training ground, or am I going to spend my rehearsal period trying to undo bad habits?

Frankly, I think this topic gets too much importance by young actors. As long as I can read it, it’s fine. Do there have to be do’s and don’ts about everything in this business? Where is the individuality?

How important is a good headshot? What can actors do to get the best headshot possible?
Obviously a good headshot is important at the beginning of your career. It’s all you have. You can get a meeting if you have a great shot.

As for what you can do to get the best shot, someone should poll the headshot photographers on this. Perhaps it will be your next interview! It took me several times before I got good shots, and I got better at it every time I had new shots taken.

My advice is: study headshots before your session. Look at the body language and find what you like and bring it to the photographer. When you are in your session, put your eyes on the floor, drop in an image of a loved one, and slowly raise your eyes in to the lens. Slowly and gently move your face so the photographer can capture the light playing on your face in different ways. When you get tired or you do go dry internally, lower your eyes. The photographer can’t photograph you if you aren’t making yourself available to the lens. It keeps you in the driver’s seat, rather than giving all of your power to the photographer.

You’ve taught acting and actors for years, at some of the best institutions in New York, and privately. What would you say to people who say that acting talent can’t be taught—you’ve either got it, or you don’t?
Some actors have instinct. Some are hungry and determined. I can’t teach these things. I can talk about a particular play, or a period in time that the play was written, or the structure of a scene. I can observe the actors working, and when I’m lucky, see what they are missing in the work and try to offer a way for them to get to it. The potential for better work usually lies in the body, or the breath. I don’t like teachers who direct the students. I am trying to bring out the best in the student and to bring what’s best about them from within themselves and out into the room so it can be shared with an audience. I love actors and their ability to do this. If I can encourage it in the classroom, then I like to believe it will have an impact in the future of the profession. It takes a tremendous amount of courage to act, and I think anybody can do it. There should be as many types of actors as there are stories to tell, don’t you think?