KPFK Interview with Tom Ardavany
On March 29, Te’nda PR Harris interviewed Ardavany for the KPFK 90.7 show “Connections”. The interview covers Tom’s philosophy on the art of acting.
Harris: How does one know that they are an artist?
Ardavany: How does one know that he is a doctor? They go to school and they earn it, work at it and then one day they have the skills to adapt under strenuous conditions to save somebody’s life. Same thing as the artist. I think what defines the artist is how much of their life experience they can bring through their work. What makes an artist is how he perceives the world, not just in his work, but the rest of the 168 hours in their week and how they go about “filling up” so they can share through their work, whatever it might be, whether they’re a dancer, actor, painter, writer or director……
Harris: You’re an acting coach. Let’s start with the acting. How about that?
Ardavany: Its interesting, I’m an acting coach, its a privilege to even make reference to that because acting is a nice analogy for taking action. So I’m actually an action coach. I teach people how to be more proactive in whatever they happen to be doing and helping them understand the elements that actually create true action — which is alignment of mind, body, and spirit. So there is a little bit of a spiritual thing going on. When I say spirit, I’m making a reference to that individual person being in balance between themselves and their environment. An individual in balance can be considered a spiritual person. There is an energy about them and clarity about them and when there is an energy and clarity about an individual, you can say that person is spiritual, or charged with the energy of life….They understand that they need to keep these things in the fore front of their existence whereas other people might not have the courage to leave the little box that they exist in to see what else is out there. And not even out there, just right in front of their own noses. Right directly, right here, right now… …The first step an individual needs to take is they need to know themselves. With any teaching that has any weight, the individual needs to know that they are embarking on a journey of knowing themselves more explicitly. And it gets to a point once they observe themselves enough that they’re ready to share their experience with somebody else and to engage other people in dialogue and in practice in whatever is that they’re doing…. So you have three basic steps, that anybody moving through this artistic process needs to move through to in the direction that they want to go in. They need to work on themselves, they need to practice with other people and they need to get into the confines of a community and support that community… The typical road for an actor is breaking down their script, finding themselves in that material and then going into the audition process to share that material and actually winding up in a production…. Your ability to share your experience is what defines a good actor. Its not happening above the shoulders, its happening in the body and its moving through space and you’re literally moving your life force through space.
This free class is open to first time. For more information and the sign up application click here.
If you would like to hire Tom for a speaking engagement just click here
