An Emmy, Tony, and Golden Globe winner, actor Jeffrey Wright has a wealth of experience in film, television, and theater. But the “Westworld” star has recently navigated uncharted waters, producing and appearing in the HBO documentary “We Are Not Done Yet,” which follows a group of veterans and service members working through PTSD-related traumas in a United Service Organizations writing workshop at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. Wright sat down with Backstage to discuss his experience producing the documentary and other acting tips.
Anyone can be an artist.
“One of [the veterans, Joe Merritt,] said something really interesting. He said the military doesn’t know it, but they’re actually training artists. He says the military tells you to observe in great detail, to communicate everything you see and take action, and he says those are steps along the path toward being an artist. He also says if you have a story, you’re an artist, so get it out.”
Different projects have different demands, so be open.
“Stanislavsky is about recall, and about—you know that Pavlovian thing, finding those triggers that allow you to reach into your experiences through your imagination and replicate them through these characters as needed…. There are times when you need to immerse yourself in a thing in order to be it, but there are also those times when you need to use your imagination more so than that. So it’s just about feeling what it takes and being open to it.”
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Work with your scene partner, not against them.
“[A good scene partner comes from] just that willingness not to work against one another or not to compete with one another, but to compete against the things that are barriers to creating this scene together. It’s a sparring; it’s a match. People talk about working together as if it’s a tennis match. It is that, but the opponent is not one another; the opponent is the thing that’s preventing that scene from being born yet. And then the last 100 things on that list [of what makes a good scene partner] are don’t be a fucking asshole.”
Working in theater is an actor’s best training ground.
“I think the theater is a place for an actor to learn independence, because you learn how to manage the edit. When you’re onstage, you learn how to manage the time when the play starts, the narrative clock begins, [and] you understand how to manage that. A lot of actors who don’t have theater experience don’t know that, and it shows in their performance. They don’t really have those muscles to shape beyond that, and so the theater’s the place, man. ‘Do a play’ is invariably what I say.”
Let it go in the audition room.
“[My] audition advice is: prepare, be ready, and then just throw it. Just go in the room, be gracious, be polite, and when they ask you to start the scene, throw all that away and just rip it up and do your thing.”
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