Cold Readings

Hurray! I’m on a roll! New Art!

Pictured above is an installation shot of four video pieces (please click on the image for a larger view). Included from left to right are Cold Read (Seth), Cold Read (Caitlin), Cold Read (Todd), and Cold Read (Aimée). Each looping video captures ten minutes of one actor’s cold reading. There are several other videos and more to be made!

What is a cold reading, you ask? As defined by Wikipedia, it is “a reading aloud from a script or other text without any rehearsal, practice or study in advance”. But that’s just the theatrical definition. Another definition goes to state that it is “a technique used to convince another person that the reader knows much more about a subject than he actually does”. I think the latter really resonates with the reason I started the series.

I’m fascinated with the idea that millions of people can sit in front of a television and be convinced that the person in a commercial is an expert who is speaking directly to the viewer. Many of my friends go on commercial auditions and it really struck me one day when I was watching television with a friend to see her point at the television and say, “I auditioned for that part”. It’s even wilder to see a friend in a commercial. Commercials are fiction—the people in them are actors who create a reality.

Stills from Cold Read (Sara)

Stills from Cold Read (Caitlin)

But how do actors get to that level of seamless reality? How do they construct the reality so convincingly? Cold Readings captures the actor’s process from the moment he/she receives the script to the moment he/she delivers the lines. The process is repeated as many times as the actor can complete in approximately ten minutes, and then the entire video is looped.

I wrote several short scripts that mimicked any ‘ole television commercial that one might see on television—anything from health problems to credit reports, vehicle purchases to online dating. The script for Cold Read (Caitlin), for example, reads:

Why wait any longer? This offer won’t last forever. Order a year subscription today and you’ll receive an additional six months for free, guaranteed, no strings attached.

I made sure to add ‘you’ or ‘your’ so that the viewer really felt the actor speaking directly to him/her. I also added phrases regarding time like “don’t delay” or “call now” to emphasize the actor’s temporary presence within that reality. I told the actors that it wasn’t so important that they memorize the script (though the short length was intended for easier memorization), but rather focus on delivering the lines in a variety of ways. The versatility forced the actors to stay away from committing to one character and to keep that cold reading process fresh. If the actors were to repeat the same style of delivery, I believe the process of cold reading would stop and the process of rehearsal would begin, thus eliminating the idea of what a cold reading is all about.

I also presented some other directions and guidelines to the actors. They were told to deliver the lines to the camera. There was a spike (a tape mark on the floor) that they stood on when delivering. I also left the actor alone in the room with the camera rolling and said that I would be back in ten minutes. They were free to move about and do whatever so long as they returned to the mark, looked into the camera, and delivered the lines.

Stills from Cold Read (Todd)

Stills from Cold Read (Aimée)

When viewing the piece, the most fascinating thing for me, so far, has been the silence between deliveries. It’s so interesting to see that while the gears are totally cranking in their minds, on the outside their facial expressions are totally blank. It’s also weird to think that while their eyes may be looking in one direction as they conjure up a new way to deliver, I don’t think that they actually ‘look’ at anything. It’s kinda like that thing that happens when you stare off into space and then when you snap back to reality, you realize you had your eyes on someone else’s deformed hand and now their staring back at you, completely pissed off.

In regards to the installation of the piece, I ultimately wish to have a long row of a bunch of televisions displaying the videos.  The long line of videos would imitate a lobby or waiting area of a studio where actors are often told to wait for an audition.  I’ve been to a few auditions back in my day and the experience can be pretty overwhelming.  There are many an actor leaning against the wall warming-up their voices and bodies.  As one would pass the televisions, it would seem as if the voices were competing for your attention.

As it goes with my art, I remind you that my work explores the analogy of life as the theatre. I always invite the viewer to ask him/herself, “How does this piece (the theatre) relate to me (life)”? With Cold Readings, in terms of the theatre, I’m obviously revealing a process that is normally hidden—an actor’s cold reading process. In fact, when the actors reviewed the footage, it was interesting to see that even they didn’t realize they did certain things during their processes.

So far, I have six videos completed and there are quirks in each of them that deserve mention. In Cold Read (David), David’s process was saturated with associations from our reality—he often incorporated unscripted lines to work his way into the fictional world of the commercial. In Cold Read (Seth), Seth entered the commercial’s fictitious reality while simultaneously breaking the fourth wall and using a prop from within the room. Utilizing the script as a prop in Cold Read (Sara), Sara retreated from the eyes of the viewer by blocking her face with the piece paper, only to return as another character. The script’s seemingly one-directional message in Cold Read (Todd) was introduced quickly, and Todd’s (and my) obvious discomfort with the script only furthered my interest in the rest of his delivery choices. Caitlin’s frequent mix of two words in Cold Read (Caitlin) is an unexpected comedic twist that further developed rather than hindered her deliveries. Finally, Aimée’s incorrect line repetition in Cold Read (Aimée) was so engrained in her mind and speech that a subtle discovery and ultimate correction mid-way through stood out as the dramatic highlight.

Stills from Cold Read (David)

Stills from Cold Read (Seth)

In terms of life, I know that Cold Readings makes us aware of what goes on behind the images we see on television. The actors reveal a wide range of emotions in response to little things like landing a line perfectly or screwing up a simple word. They’ve forced themselves to think fast and perform with complete versatility while sharing some fun and frustrating moments. They’ve constructed individual processes to deal with the theatrical definition of a cold reading. In terms of life, I think that we are the actors in Cold Readings and that perhaps we share similar processes of retaining new information and spitting it back out. Maybe like David, I find myself relating something new to something familiar. Maybe like Caitlin, I can giggle at myself when I stumble on my words during a serious situation. Maybe like Aimée, I’ll have a discovery that I’ve actually been singing the wrong lyrics to my favorite song for the last five years. Or maybe, I have my own process—but that is something I’m interested in finding out because of Cold Readings.