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The years in-between, and the ones since, have brought valuable lessons to award-winning actress Kim Darby, who shared some with members of the Scriptwriters Network at the April 14 meeting. Since not every actor is meant to play every role, Darby said actors' success is based in large part on their ability to evaluate what scripts are right for them.
"I like to read something that's simple and holds me." Darby told her audience. "I can tell in the first six pages if it's a right read for me." Today, as she teaches the film and TV actresses of the future in her classes at UCLA, a good portion of her focus remains on what's on the page. But from an acting standpoint, Darby said, this means playing a scene as if the characters have no knowledge of what is happening later in the story. Rather than pre-conceived motivations, the interplay between characters, in the moment, is crucial. Darby said she has found that what's not on the page can be as useful to the actor as what is explicitly written. She said she has always preferred simple, understated writing that conveys emotions without necessarily telegraphing them. Sometimes, it's better for actors to "go against the drama" being presented in an emotional scene -- for example, by trying not to cry, or trying to avoid an argument. Her knack for connecting with good writing was evident in her first major role at age 16, when Darby played a blind high school student who falls in love with her teacher in an episode of the mid-1960s TV drama Mr. Novak. Since she had trouble reading at the time, she used pictures in her mind to memorize lines. For her audition, she delivered a monologue so perfectly that producers initially thought it was a fluke, but were later proven wrong. "When I read it, I just got it. It was with me," Darby recalled. Among the things that inspired her was the script itself, written by E.G. Marshall. "It was so human, so brave, so underwritten," Darby said. "There was something there on the page. I could feel it." That performance launched her on a long and rewarding career in television, film and theater. She was nominated for an Emmy at age 18 for her work in an episode of Run for Your Life, and received another nomination for her role in the 1970s miniseries Rich Man, Poor Man. On Broadway, she won the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for The Porcelain Years. Playing the lead role of Mattie Ross in True Grit brought her a Golden Globe Award nomination (the first of two in her career). Even more valuable was the chance to work on that film with director Henry Hathaway -- who reminded Darby of her own grandfather and became a longtime friend -- and Wayne, whom she described as the "ultimate professional." The actors hit it off well during filming -- although Darby recalls she got off on the wrong foot with The Duke. "I was young and I didn't know a damn thing about politics, but I didn't like those Green Berets. And I was stupid enough and unstylish enough to say it." Darby comes from six generations of show business, but she was by no means a born performer like her parents, who had a dance act that played in Las Vegas and other cities. Quiet and introverted as a child, Darby said she found her life's calling when she attended an acting class on the Desilu studio lot in the early 1960s, beginning at age 14. "If you gave me a situation, I wasn't afraid of being connected to it," Darby recalled. The class marked the first time she really felt comfortable being herself. "It was the first place that I felt safe for being me. I was being honored in this class for being who I was." After years of performing roles she was meant to play -- along with some she regrets accepting -- Darby has come full circle in her acting life. She is back in the classroom, in what she considers the role of a lifetime -- teaching her craft to budding actors. "I come into a room differently today than I ever did before. I think teaching is what I'm supposed to do," Darby said. Thankful for what acting has done for her own life, and remembering the obstacles she had to overcome, Darby finds inspiration in teaching actors to hone their craft. But it goes beyond teaching techniques; it means helping them express who they are -- as long as the acting life, with all its inherent difficulties, is really what they want. "I'm not interested in somebody's skill. I'm interested in the person who wants to do this, and is willing to bring their heart into it," Darby said. "I don't care if they're good or bad, I just want to be with them and to help them." For more information on Kim Darby's Acting from Actor's Point of View, call 818-985-0666. Network member Lou Hirsh is a writer and editor for a Los Angeles Internet company.
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