The Bold Acting Podcast
by Reflections from Jason Bryden's More-than-just-an-Acting-Class class in Toronto.
I'm an actor and a teacher in Toronto. But I don't just teach acting. I teach performance technique that everyone can use. Each week I'll publish an episode that covers the newsletter, everything we've been working on in class and all of the videos I've published on social media. All in one place. boldacting.substack.com
Episodes
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66. A Bug, not a Feature
I spent this past week on the road with two dear, longtime friends as they needed some cheap labour for their comedy show they’re touring around Ontario. We improvised from Ottawa to Cornwall to Peterborough and back to Toronto. We stayed in Airbnbs, ate at questionable hours, didn’t sleep…
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45. Starting Artists
Somehow with all that’s going on the pressure is off. I’m reminded not to be surprised. Dogs are going to bark, baker’s gonna bake and humans are going to treat each other terribly. What’s important to you? For me, for now, it’s blood. Tonight I made some fake blood. Two tablespoons of chocolate...
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43. Kensington Diner
We have shot two episodes of a digital series I have created called Kensington Diner. We have four more to go. I based some of them on some of my favourite films: Cleo de Cinq a Sept, In Bruges, When Harry Met Sally, My Son the Fanatic. I steal from the greats — I do not just let myself be…
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42. MESSAGES TO MYSELF
From the Oxford English Dictionary hypocrite, n. From the Middle English by way of Old French: ecclesiastical; and the Greek: One who falsely professes to be virtuously or religiously inclined; one who pretends to have feelings or beliefs of a higher order than his real ones: A pretender, a...
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41. A Weird Way to Go Out
I found a book in a little library called Talk Like Ted. It’s annoying both because I’m easily annoyed and it was written by a finance Chad that’s more successful than me. One suggestion is when you want to engage an audience (like at a Ted Talk) teach them something new. Or at least frame it in…
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A Massive Bob
A pendulum is a weight called a bob suspended from a pivot so it can swing freely. In Math there is a simple gravity pendulum that swings without friction. This is so nerds can measure things like amplitude and bob’s trajectory. In real life there are other forces affecting the period of...
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1. The Gord Record
Now more than ever actors have to make their own opportunities. On the first episode we talk about how ACTRA members can make their own stuff and how best to navigate the ACTRA Toronto Co-op agreement. Cohosted by Gord Rand and Jason Bryden. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss...
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37. "… Open thine eyes. I am still here, just older.”
How to be a Person is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber. In Judith Kerr’s YA novel When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit (based on her escape from Nazi Germany as a child) she writes about how leaving her home and moving to...
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35. Persistence - Adaptability = Insanity
2009. A party at a house in Silver Lake. A horror movie director, named Tom, in a white button down shirt. A fat man with an architect’s eyewear that knew Jack Kerouac. The living room had a billiards table. The parlour had a wet bar, a wine closet and a stripper’s pole. I had made the hosts...
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32. How To Be A Person -- Everything is Porn
Porn is no longer relegated to sex acts. If the definition of a porn compulsion is an inability to stop using it (and let’s face it, we’re not just passively watching porn) then porn is also the way we interact with social media, dating apps and the biggest streamer in the world, YouTube. If…
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27. How To Be A Person -- "A Second Intention"
27. How To Be A Person — A Second Intention The kids were dressed-up. The parents were sweaty. 14 was graduating from his tiny middle school — population 58 students — at 1:30PM on a Wednesday in June. The ceremony was held in the gym at Shirley Street P.S. in the Portuguese neighbourhood of...
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23. How to be a Person -- 40 000 Feet
When I type the title of this newsletter there is always a grammatical negotiation that goes on in my head. Title case isn’t, as previously thought, capitalizing the first letter of every word. It is capitalizing just the major words — which suggests there are minor words. These are articles and...
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22. How to be a Person -- We’ve Got to Talk About How Justin Talks
Everybody knows the polls look terrible for Justin. Everyone knows Pierre Poillievre will be our next Prime Minister. But there are three things that Justy Trews could do differently that would afford him a more elegant exit. By virtue of Pierre’s runaway popularity I find myself hoping the…
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21. How to Be A Person — These are the People in your Victimhood
What stories are you telling yourself? Victimhood is the neighbourhood I used to live in (but I’m not talking about trauma. I’m just talking about how the ego hijacks.) A favourite story I used to tell myself was the one where I absolve myself of all responsibility for bad things happening. It…
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The Bold Interview: Dmitry Chepovetsky on How Children Ruin Everything, on Performance, Bankruptcy, Worry and Staying Present
Born in 1970 in Lviv, Ukraine Dmitry Chepovetsky’s family moved to Regina when he was a baby. He began acting in high school before attending theatre school at Ryerson now known as Toronto Metro University. Chepovetsky is best known for his recurring role on ReGenesis as Bob Melnikov, the show’s...
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The Bold Interview: Eric Peterson is Out of Work
Eric Peterson is one of Canada’s most iconic actors. With a career that spans more than 50 years. Best known for his roles in Corner Gas, Street Legal and onstage as the WWI flying ace Billy Bishop in Billy Bishop goes to War which he co-created with writer and composer John Gray. We talk about…
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20. How To Be A Person: Comparative Studies of my Navel via Social Media Equals I feel Bad About Myself Later (Approximately 3:30AM, 4:30AM and 5:45AM.)
Thanks to my paid readers. I appreciate you more than you know. I brag about you in social settings. You don’t have to pay for this but you do. The future looks brighter with you in my corner. If you like this newsletter consider upgrading to paid. Doing so gives you license to complain to me…
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What I Learned from Jimmy Carr
Getting advice from comedians is like getting advice from a funny person that has managed to survive one of the most difficult vocations around. I don’t have to tell you that comedians come out on stage, into what is historically a hostile environment their only weapons a mic and their words. Who...
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18. How To Be A Person According to a Stand-up Comedian
"What I Learned ..." is one of three different streams of podcasts you’ll find under the hospices of The Bold Acting Podcast. The other two are the Bold Interview (upcoming talks include Eric Peterson) and this newsletter. Find all the episodes wherever the podcasts are for you. Friday, May 3rd,...
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17. How To Be A Person - A Walk With the Man With the Scythe
Thank you to the paying customers, you golden few that have upgraded to paid. I really appreciate you. Do you pay for other newsletters? If so what makes it worth it? I’ve included a poll here for paid subscribers. I’d love to know what you think and how I can make BOLD better. This is an excerpt...
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16. How To Be A Person: Buying Pornography for My Children
14 and 11 (almost 12) are keeping their cards close to their chest. I am always asking them if they’re masturbating yet in an attempt to normalize it. I am beginning to think I have failed. You know when someone talks so much you can’t hear them anymore? I think that has happened. I haven’t used...
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15. How To Be A Person: Trouble
This week on the Bold Acting Podcast I read my notes gleaned from Steven Pressfield’s The War of Art. One of the things he talks about is why we get ourselves into trouble: because it’s easier than finishing what has to be done, Pressfield says. Everything from being late to blaring loud rap…
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What I Learned from Listening to "The War of Art" by Steven Pressfield
Steven Pressfield is a cheerleader. And we need more of those in this world. There are too many naysayers out there and inside our heads. We don’t need someone else telling us we’re getting it wrong. What serves me as a teacher? To position myself as rarefied? To conflate experience with wisdom?…
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The Bold Interview: Rebecca Northan on Her Be$t year, Authentic Intelligence and Why You Should Make Your Own Work
Rebecca Northan has been improvising and working as an actor since the 1990s. I met her at our illustrious alma mater The University of Calgary. She got her start at the famous Loose Moose Theatre Company in Calgary. There she met founder and improv master Keith Johnstone whose teachings would...
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14. HOW TO BE A PERSON: Apropos of Everything
Gabrielle Zevin wrote in her novel Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. “The alternative to appropriation is a world in which artists only reference their own cultures … Where white European people only make art about white European people, with only white European references in it. A world where...
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The Bold Interview: Bruce Horak On Making Art, Bookkeeping and Kitchen Renovations When You're Visually Impaired
Having lost over 90% of his eyesight to a childhood Cancer, artist and actor Bruce Horak has has been making stuff in the world of the fully-sighted for over 25 years. Bilateral Retinoblastoma is a cancer which appears on the retina of the eyes, the treatment of which left Horak completely blind…
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13. How To Be A Person: The Best Way to Pass the Time Before Time Runs Out
As far as cuisine is concerned one must read everything, see everything, hear everything, try everything, observe everything, in order to retain in the end, just a little.” — Fernand Point, father of French Cuisine. The future is not here yet. Why are we so enamoured with it? And the past? What…
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What I Learned from Reading Rick Rubin's The Creative Act
Oscar Wilde said some things are too important to take seriously. And this is Rick Rubin’s stance on creativity. For me the pragmatic act of making art is the destination. And if we’re wary enough of inspiration we can get down to the business of getting our reps in. Art isn’t about thinking or...
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The Bold Interview: Nicola Correia-Damude On Being Too Ethnic, Too Mixed Race, Too Fat And Too Tall.
A Guyanese-Canadian actor Nicola Correia-Damude is best known for her role as Dr. Lucy Di Silva on Law & Order Toronto: Criminal Intent. Nicola came over to my house to talk about how, up until six years ago, she didn’t have a career in Film & TV. Since recent cultural shifts she has never been...
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12. How to Be a Person: Your Money's Worth
This week I went to the Comedy Bar here in Toronto and I did not get my money’s worth. We went to see the 9:30 standup show called Point Break Comedy because we didn't have time to go to the 8 o'clock improv show “Nice Time” that has a lot of heavy hitters in it. The first Comic got up and was…
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The Bold Interview: Jeff Low - Commercial Director Talks Comedy, Suicide and Working in Eastern Block Countries
This episode previously aired on In the Dark, July of 2017..WARNING: Topics discussed include suicide and depression. While in Bucharest, Romania I spoke with the acclaimed commercial director while we were working on a male incontinence campaign. I loved making these commercials. Jeff will be...
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11. How to Be a Person: Outside the Butcher’s
Once I had a friend named Ben. He was really nice. I value friendship over most everything else and I wanted to be a man that makes friends easily. But Ben was boring. So boring. I felt terrible for leading him on. But not as terrible as I did hanging out with him. I ghosted him but he wouldn’t...
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RIP Guy MacPherson | What I Learned from Reading The Method by Isaac Butler, Pt. Deux
Guy MacPherson was a friend of mine. I only reconnected when I heard he had cancer. He didn’t seem to mind hanging out together. Guy was a lover of comedy and comedians. (He would object to me using the word lover.) He was Vancouver’s first comedy critic (The Georgia Straight), The world’s first...
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What I Learned From Reading "The Method" by Isaac Butler -- Pt. 1
Anyone can call themselves an acting teacher. In 1898 in Moscow that’s exactly what an actor named Constantine Stanislavski did. Stanislavski and his crew came up with what turned out to be the most enduring acting system in the world. And it needs a refresh. Actors are savvier these days. As are...
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10. How To Be a Person: Advice from Berkshire Hathaway's Charlie Munger
There is so much Ven overlap between investors and actors. So this week I’ve cribbed from the best, Warren Butler’s partner, Charlie Munger. And then, because I love talking about me (and acting and teaching) I use Charlie’s wisdom as a jumping-off point. Because Charles and I are equals … in the...
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What I Learned from Reading "The Art of Acting by Stella Adler
Stella Adler was a giant within the modern method acting movement of New York beginning in the 1950s. Her book although prescriptive and judgemental still has many practical insights that apply to surviving showbiz these days. I've read it and made copious notes that I read to you here. If you…
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9. How To Be A Person: Always Keep One Hog Back
Gambling Actors gamble with their feelings, their egos, humiliation. But you don’t want to bet the farm. Not every time. You’ll become depleted. Always keep one hog back. The winters can be long in this neck of the woods. We deal in feelings and feelings are the reason we are all here however, we...
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8. How To Be a Person: It’s All in the Way You Hold Your Tongue
David Rotenberg died recently in Toronto. He was a legendary acting teacher with a lot of big name students that came through his doors over the years. I lasted three classes with him before he emailed me and told me not to come back. I was missing the very basics of acting he said and there was...
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The Bold Interview: Shaun Benson
Shaun Benson was born in 1976 in Guelph ON. The son of an English professor and a German literature professor. Shaun started his creative career as a ballet dancer and a musician. He completed his undergrad, a Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry at Western University. But fate intervened. Upon...
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How To be A Person: Odious Comparisons
YVR Jan 4, 2024 This morning walking back from the gym through the gloom and rain I saw that someone had written in marker on a large hydro box “All comparison is odious”. I compare myself frequently to others. On instagram, at the gym or even in conversation. Like when I feel someone losing...
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The Bold Interview: From NBC's "Transplant" - Actor Gord Rand
There are two streams that make up the Bold Acting Podcast: How to be a Person — The Newsletter which I read aloud and publish, and the Bold Interview. Today I speak to Gord Rand. Gord Rand is an actor and creator. He has performed on stages such as The Shaw Festival, The Stratford Festival and…
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8. How To Be A Person : In Translation
I am not a great teacher yet. I haven’t been doing it long enough. I’m a great student but that’s because of mentors like Ben Immanuel and fellow actors like Michael Teigen and it’s also because I’ve started teaching. The teaching makes me a better actor. The teaching gives me so much. The…
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7. How To Be A Person: Ten Ways to Use Annoying People to Win at Life
They are all around us. They drive without signalling. They talk loudly on their phones in the library. They holdup the line at the bank with all their dumb complaints. They write newsletters. But instead of letting a perfect stranger highjack your happiness perhaps they can fuel your creativity?...
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6. HOW TO BE A PERSON: Day One
On a podcast I heard a founder of a startup say “Day one, your product is never worse.” He was talking about encouraging early adopters to sign up for their product even though it wasn’t complete. When you admit that today the thing you have to offer is only going to get stronger and better you...
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5. How To Be A Person: Daniel Day-Lewis Was A Highly Ineffective Actor
The ROI on DDL Daniel Day-Lewis is a highly ineffective actor when you consider his Return On Investment. It’s a good thing he’s retired so we don’t have to put up with further reports of his methodology. If only Jeremy Strong’s wholehearted admiration for Mr. Day-Lewis would also have him...
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4. How To Be A Person: The Mildly Interested Stranger
Gerry and I went for Korean on Wednesday. We ordered a beef dinner for four instead for some reason. The appetizer was thin slices of beef cooked on our table. All the smoke blew into Gerry’s eyes. Then there were mushrooms — the only vegetable I saw all night except for the kimchi. Which was...
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29. Dinosaurism, Cognitive Autopilot, Design Thinking, the ACTRA Lockout and Phone Zombies
I got strong opinions. And I say the same thing over again. Sometimes these things bear repeating. On this week’s episode I repeat myself mostly because I know what the click rate is of my newsletter. 63% of you open the Bold Acting Newsletter so I can record audio versions of four of these and...
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28. The Guide Beside You, Not the Guru in Front of You -- Incest, Embarrassment, Great Writing and David Milchard, Former Internet Sensation
“The rate at which a person can mature is directly proportional to the embarrassment he can tolerate.” — Douglas Englebart - Father of the computer mouse and digital pioneer Complaining is a human need: the transfer of information, much like gossip, between village members is a survival tool…
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The Bold Acting Podcast Ep. 27
Catchup on newsletters you haven’t read yet. Let me read to you instead. Thank you for reading The Bold Acting Newsletter. This post is public so feel free to share it. If you like the Bold Acting Podcast talk it up at your next dinner or book club. Word-of-Mouth is the best form of advertising.…
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26. Goblins, Macbeth, Questions and Answers
I don’t like Shakespeare. Mostly it’s our outsized reverence for Shakespeare that I don’t like. Reverence for anything makes me roll my eyes. A preciousness for the old where it leaves less room for the new makes me suspicious. The bard takes up a lot of space, still. Would he be so popular if we...
About this show
I'm an actor and a teacher in Toronto. But I don't just teach acting. I teach performance technique that everyone can use. Each week I'll publish an episode that covers the newsletter, everything we've been working on in class and all of the videos I've published on social media. All in one place.
boldacting.substack.com
Hosted by
Reflections from Jason Bryden's More-than-just-an-Acting-Class class in Toronto.
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