Blog

This is an archive of Gary's postings as of May 2011. During this turnover, we will be rebuilding the blog and will post new articles as they come available. Please enjoy the articles here, and check back often.

Welcome to GarySwanson.org
Actor, Teacher and Director, Gary Swanson shares on screen and imparts on his students the lessons of his legendary maestro, Lee Strasberg, with whom he studied for eight years until his sudden passing in 1982. Strasberg enabled Gary to shine as one of the most highly rated actors on television in the 70s and 80s. Like other students such as Stella Adler and Sanford Meisner who went on to teach versions of Strasberg's "Method," Gary has shared his wisdom with thousands of students across the the US.
Faithful to Strasberg's teachings, Gary coaches one-on-one, conducts a profound weekly workshop, and teaches an intensive summer course in the Hamptons reminiscent of the famous Group Theatre project of the 1930s that changed the face of acting in America. The Montauk Group experience, recorded for the past two summers and soon to be captured on film again in a matter of weeks, is developing into a documentary that will shake the acting world

By gary at 04/12/2006 - 12:21am

The Conscience Of The King
By Gary Swanson

Stage and film director/producer, Arthur Penn (Miracle Worker, Bonnie and Clyde, and Missouri Breaks) died in late September of this year. Paul Newman, Marlon Brando, Marilyn Monroe, Steve Mc Queen, Anthony Quinn, Jackie Gleason, Lucille Ball, Elia Kazan, Arthur Miller, Tennessee Williams and Lee Strasberg (Artistic Director of The Actors Studio 1951 – 1982) were also passed to history into the mythology of greatness that may remain unchallenged into the next century.

In America, they were the core members of the Court of The Knights Of The Round Table in an era of excellence, creativity, beauty and unequaled success in film, theater and television. These worriers of the art changed social trends, fashion, world politics and – human behavior. They moved audiences, shook them loose until tears flowed, never condescending or backing down from a good fight. They and the results of their work were the culmination of the one hundred years of a ferocious work ethic, progressing from The Moscow Art Theater in Russia, to The Group Theater in 30's in America. Finally, in 1948, The Grail was passed at the birth of The Actors Studio on West 43rd Street in New York City.
(Unfortunately, the younger, breast - plated warriors, still living and working today, {Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Robert Duvall, Sean Penn, Ellen Burstyn, Nicole Kidman, Jack Nicholson, Jeff Bridges; directors Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola}, seem to have had The Holy Grail of Artistry snatched from their hands.) It does not appear there will be a Holy Grail hand off to the next generation.

The Film, Theater and Television business is not a nice industry, rife with acrimony: nothing tangible with too much at stake; abstract ideas and stories cobbled together with dreams and whimsy. The Arts, particularly TF & T are not known for coddling those who dare enter the Kingdom of Dreams. Movies are a mystery until tickets sell in massive quantities and the sacks fill with gold.

The mission of "the industry", starting in the early 1950's running up to the sharp right turn of the1980's, was to raise mostly private investment Money, shoot quality footage, or, rehearse and work a play to stage brilliance. Then – entertain those ticket payers, calm them and, at times, teach the masses - while having an in ordinate amount of fun doing it. Money and the "above the line" Players were never comfortable hoisting a stein together but they always knew the law of the land made them brothers in blood.

The classic film and theater productions conceived, nurtured and birthed during that earlier, valiant period were enhanced by the infusion of private investments into and co -piloting the art; - the driven, obsessed artists who worked tirelessly were supported and cheered on by those who operated and disseminated the funds. There was always a grudging conflict between the two forces, but out of that irritation came A Street Car Named Desire, On The Water Front, Cool Hand Luke, Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, Bullit, The Chase. Television programs like Amos And Andy, Your Show of Shows, Paladin, (Have Gun Will Travel), Run For Your Life, The Smother's Brothers and Amos and Andy (depicting a fascinating group of characters; a cross section of the American Dream and the prescient African American foil to the all white Honeymooners) stand today as exemplars of a Kingdom with a goal; harmonic trumpets played from The Thrown to the stables - the kitchen to the table.... Their work was rarely slick, often gristly, fraught with real conflict and great acting; not light footed, play-to-the-camera acting predominating any screen of modern day. Green screens did not exist then. Writers were forced to write real scenes resonating in the mind and body like a cultural blood transfusion. But, those productions, in their embers, remain a beautiful, floral emblem of the times of yore, dubbing them forever as - Works Of Art.

Back then, The Money hunted down the projects based on news stories, magazine articles or folklore; projects that demanded value with vision, packing a punch into the gut of the human condition. Money was the dancing Lipizzaner that rode glamour and The Beauties sidesaddle or bareback onto the screens and into the theaters. Currency, back then, seemed to have a conscience. The money and the artists were regulated, held firmly, bonded, strapped in place through teeth gritting competition but set within the boundries of fair play at it's most poetic and vital. That bond was protected by the courts, the Antitrust Laws acting like a guard dog, growling if any player dare pull cards from the bottom of the deck.

That Golden era ended when the new Corporate Money Monster charged into an implacable and destructive era jousting with the former conventional logic; trampling on the mode. In the early 80's, gun powder was then poured into a musket, the guard dog walked to a field in the dark of night and put it out of it's misery with a blast by a new King. He was, himself, a humble foot soldier, an average horseman, a poor swordsman but he had a thirst to rule rather than to create, enrich rather then define, exploit than to seed lush growth for the future. This new Regal King, positioned by The Money, took the reins and then - "let slip the dogs of"… corporate finance.

And, so began the foul deed:

The corporate financial gargoyle beat the industry with a bat. The disciplined, trained writers, directors and actors that lead the way and turned money into art and art into treasure were carefully displaced or sidelined. The monster was always out there waiting to pounce, but now it had a regal leader and it began to feed to bloat and roam at will. Money is now in search of food and it does not care what it eats.

The corporate mergers of the 1980's based in the freeing up of the anti – trust laws were the cells in the Petri dish that created and grew into the snaggletooth monster of today. Industry Unions have been watered down and flacid. The rules of competition that set up fair play in the work place with an opportunity to compete for all actors, directors and writers became a thing of the past as "packaging" galloped in. After that, the major agents; CAA, William Morris, ICM did what they were now allowed to do before; they pointed their fingers at the "above the line talent" with lordly power and with a flourish and stated - "You are it". Viable, legal competition was and is now a remembrance of dreams gone by. Hence, the Monster was created out of money, power and a savage hunger to feed itself.

This monster bites, snarls and pounds the living creativity out of those who possess the temerity to shape the dreams into art forms. In place of originality, creativity, craft, training and diligence to making a beautiful project have life, the new rules in place demand convention, redundancy and a flowerless bed of stationary stones along the path to the mote of the Kingdom Of Yore.

The "Hollywood Elite" are prodded and branded like cattle, backing them into the corner of the kingdom's dungeon. Playwrights are sopped up before they can grow and develop, made fat and rich as staff writers on comedy shows. Actors are encouraged not to train.

Screen Actors Guild has been so crippled by the power of big business, it no longer can accurately account for actor's checks nor does it have power of coercion over agents or producers to protect an actor from abuse, or even – the health of the actor. Examine the Screen Actors Guild contracts with producers from the early 1980's to the current day and try to find a significant increase based on the two GDP's.

In the court yard of The (new) Kingdom, there's great excitement as the sick body of the creative dream draws flies, the buzzards gliding above and the jackals sniffing around one singular objective – banish the dreamers, stop creativity and replace it with making more money. Surprise! Here's Not Johnny!

Is Avatar the new God Father? Is The Jersey Shore the new All in the Family? Or, are those productions of the past the mythical tragedy of culture befouled by avarice and financial greed? Could it be that Bridzilla or Survivor will withstand time and become something the future people, one hundred years from now, will look back on with the same esteem we now honor Anton Chekhov's "The Seagull" or, more recent classics such as Arthur Miller's "Death Of A Salesman"?

Money was never the sole motive to create great films or plays of the past. The primary desire was the childish hope to share the vision of a dream that could change the world and make it a better place. But the prince and princess dream also accomplished a standard exposing truth to evil. Money and politics do not do that. Money and politics snarl at exposure of the truth as it lays in the courtyard, side by side with the panting, moaning Creative Dream, temporarily comatose; almost, but not completely, dead.

It was a year ago that Arthur Penn, in session at The Actors Studio on West 44th Street gave the membership a stern but gentle slap on its' artistic tail. He told us we were all too nice to each other in acting session. That, as we critiqued our fellow actors, after they completed a 20 minute scene, we were too worried about offending them, instead of doing the hard work of clear, cold criticism. The Old King of The Court was warning us that if we spare each other, coddled each other and did not firmly, accurately fearlessly critique the work, in that sanctuary of those private sessions at The Actors Studio - in that wonderful Kingdom Of Dreams - then the world would let us know with a very painful joust, later on, that we did not do "our work" and - we will lose our audience...

The fight of the artist is good one. And the artist had best learn the to slay dragons and fight Monsters before we… become them.

By gary at 01/13/2011 - 1:51pm

CREATE, CHANGE, HEAL AND TEACH
By Gary Swanson
The creative mind wakes me up.
The electric charge that jump - starts my day begins with the synergy in the arts and those who bundle imagination, concepts, feelings with strong beliefs. Artists assemble these abstract concepts into forms then work to nurture these creations to fruition. I want to be part of that experience.

The artist has the power to entertain, to heal, and even to teach.

The mission is to mold these forms, torn from the chaos of the universe, then, reshape that bounty into beautiful, films, paintings, novels, sonatas with choreographed images and sounds that forever settled in the minds of those privileged to witness a pirouette with music. Study Auguste Rodin's "The Thinker", bent over, with his chin on his clinched fist, forever contemplating the mystery of the human spirit, and that inert sculpture challenges viewers to think, feel and examine their our own lives.

These dreams of creation demand courage. Creating something from the ether is one of the most daunting tasks known to man. But, to improve the human condition, advancing life through art is the essence of life. Bruce Springsteen, in the documentary, "From The Edge Of Night", talks about the empty stage before a concert. He said that before he and The E Street Band step on to the stage - there is nothing there. Nothing. Empty as an egg waiting for the seed to enter the sphere and create new life. When they do step on the stage and start to play and sing, suddenly the artists and the audience come to life. It is at that moment that the Art has reached fruition through years of work as the music fills the stadium for an experience that, for some, will leave them changed forever. Springsteen's music has that kind of artistic power.

Art has been working for us long before archaeologists discovered scrawling images along the walls of caves. Many aspects of our immediate lives are also showing signs of becoming redundant, noisy and, in some circumstances, destructive. Our work as artists - at least from my perspective – is as important, perhaps even more relevant, then the advancement of science, technology, theology or finance. I'm not sure if the Iphone or the PC are preparing us to live better in the future. Or, are the millisecond needs created by these devices rolling us to a frenetic leap into oblivion? Di Vinci, Franklin and Thomas Paine all lived well into there eighties. They did pretty well without cell phones and computers. And, they got a lot done.

Art forms are the veins that run throughout the body of history. Without art, civilization would end with certainty. With art, there is a chance that it will not end. I realize that this theory is vulnerable to rolling eyes and shaking heads, but at what point does technology stop advancement and start destruction? Oppenheimer and Teller wrote that they, themselves, were afraid the Manhattan Project and their creation of the atom bomb could become the commencement of the end of mankind. I'm not denigrating the advancement of technology; cell phones, computers, HD cameras, medical imaging machines are great tools. But that is all they are. Some say we had better health care years ago when doctors actually did exhaustive, detailed, personal work - ups on patients combining the human being's vigilance with a stethoscope's augmentation of sound.

Tools are there to serve our advancement, not for our idolatry. After all, truth told, I'm writing on a computer, using spell check and answering questions with Google while my cell phone lays within hands reach. I use them constantly – as tools.

Where are the great films or television dramas of today that explore who we are and why we do what we do? The Kraft Television Theater or The Hall Mark Hall Of Fame, done live before millions of people in the 50's were partially responsible for this writer/actor/teacher's passion and hunger for that former quality of writing, driving great performances of well trained actors. The mystery of the human condition still trumps the computerized car crash or Spider Man knitting himself from skyscraper to the 59th street Bridge. The results of these films disregard human involvement, like a robot cooking show; the human gets to taste the repetitive cuisine of a soulless chef. I'm afraid that lightening - speed growth of technology, has over whelmed us, our need to fight for the art, the love of the labor to create.

Are we using our minds and spirits to see the truth? Is the news any longer our focus when images are so HD sharp we can almost notice the blood shot eyes of the hung over anchorwoman? Is the new opiate the ugly horror of "The Jersey Shore" lowering our ideals, expectations and standards until we all but lose our civilization? We only need to go back to some of the great silent films starting with Louse Le Prince's "Round Hay Garden Scene" to "The Jazz Singer", or Orson Wells' great classic "Citizen Kane" to confirm that there was always great film. "The Honeymooners" are as funny and relevant today as they were when they were shot live with black and white kinescope camera's on a sound stage, the music of the human audience breathing, clapping and laughing as the show unfolds validates in perpetuity the treasure left to us with the human being using technology to advance our march into the future. "The Honeymooners" has become a document of our existence shooting far beyond Gleason's dream of making people laugh. In 1974 Francis Coppola wrote and directed "The Godfather" Master Piece series when an average computer would fit in a garage.

We may have become an impatient lot, unable to sit through edited shots not longer than three seconds. But, we still know when we can't leap out of our seats because a film or an O'Neal play, with well-trained actors quiets us with pleasure, transporting us by the beauty of art and the exploration of the human condition.

The last five years of my summers have been my stumbling attempt to capture on film the work of the artist, specifically the art of acting; to continue to seed the ground for our work in theater and film, hopefully, before the art is smothered by the dazzle and zing of mechanical innovation and the corporate need to keep the masses paying them for an abyss of flotsam and jetsam. I do not think I have yet to break the cold ground with footage that will earth - shake the majority, but I feel gratified that I've had actors struggle with who they are and what they are capable of giving back to an audience from their chore, from the essential seat of their powers. I have five years of compelling footage of that acting process logged in.... Hard Drives!

This Spring The Montauk Group is continuing the struggle to create a better world by inviting true artists do what Ilia Kazan and Lee Strasberg did for past generations. They taught, gave back and passed the baton to those destined to break new ground for the future artists of the world. I have invited successful directors, producers, writers, actors, casting agents and musicians to participate through out the winter and into the spring. These artists have become leaders in the field. All are invited to come to "The Artists Salon" with like-minded artists who would rather learn how to dig for gold in a stream than drink beer on a Saturday sports bar while yelling at a flat screen HD TV.

Craig Singer and Frank Calo are two director/producer/writers who have lived their lives in accordance with the rules and laws of the creative artist. They have lived the work and are now, - both men still with long futures ahead of them - reaping the success that they have earned, writing, producing and directing major feature films. Both men made their way up through the tiers of jobs from film grunts to film royalty. Both men are great communicators who live every minute of the day as "artists"…

By gary at 04/06/2007 - 4:11pm

Performance Thursday, Sept. 28th 2006, 314 W. 54th St. 4th Floor, 8pm

On Sept. 16th The Montauk Group was launched mounting scenes from Romeo and Juliet, The Seagull, Five Finger Exercise, Of Mice and Men and Edward Albee's The Zoo Story. The audience sat under the stars as the back deck of my Montauk home lit up like a Broadway stage.

"I have never seen ZOO STORY performed but the interpretation could be considered pretty close to'definitive' --I don't believe it could be topped. Brett Fleisher is very graceful, moving like a dancer, so it was wonderful to watch him. Reminded me of the lithesome cat-figure of 'Arlecchino.'... Albee's dialogue is complex, comic and menacing, but vividly evokes New York City in the sixties, with cheap SRO's and inexpensive walk-ups where people on the fringe and artists and yes, even some writers could afford to live."

Carolyn Balducci..."I had the privilage of experiencing Romeo and Juliet, The Seagull and Zoo Story all performed on a makeshift stage in Gary's backyard, complete Montauk old-school style with a sail from a 22' Catamaran draped above the actors to make a 'roof' for the stage"... "The stars of the show are also incredibly talented."

David Lion Rattiner - "The Montauk Pioneer"
We will be performing one more time:
American Theater for Actors
314 West 54th St.
The Sergent Theater (4th floor)
Thursday, Sept. 28th.
8 PM Curtain
Hope to see you there.
Gary

By gary at 09/27/2006 - 3:21pm