Film Courage: What is subtext?
John Gray, Filmmaker: Subtext is critical also to writing and acting but it's really what's
not spoken. It's what's really happening in the scene, what someone's really feeling,
thinking but they're saying something else, covering it up. Really as a director you're
trying to direct the subtext in a scene so it's about identifying what that subtext is and and
that's what the actors are playing and the words are they're saying you're almost there, not that,
there's a peripheralist but that's not really what's going on in the scene. What they're saying,
it's what they're thinking and feeling underneath. In fact if I may digress a little bit, I just did
a short film last year in Paris a little spy Thriller, a lot of fun, and I wanted to shoot
it in French because I just didn't want to have French people speaking English with accents should
be ridiculous yeah so we were going to subtitle it and shoot it in French I don't speak French
so I had to learn a little bit of it phonetically just so I could kind of get recognize the words
my French producer of course was bilingual so he would help me when the actors strayed
but the truth is it didn't matter because I wasn't directing the words I was directing what they were
their behavior and what was behind those words and that's why I was I think I was able to pull
it off because I just wasn't worried about it that and the fact that it wasn't that much dialogue but
so it really is important to know what the character's intentions are in the scene how
they're being thwarted what they're really what's going on underneath everything that's subtext
so even if you turn the sound down you could still kind of feel it from the bottom ideally in fact I
like to do an exercise with students from time to time when I sometimes do classes on working with
actors and directing actors and get a sample scene of two characters having lunch and I had them
memorize the scene I don't give them any notes but I said you memorize the scene so when you come in
tomorrow you're off book and ready to do it and so they come into the class and we confirm we've
never spoken about the scene we haven't talked about it nothing so I had them just play the scene
first with no direction at all whatsoever and it's like a financing then I'll say okay so here now
you were late for this lunch again and you're the same partner you are so fed up with this person
being late that you want to just kill them you feel disrespected you feel and you on the other
hand you feel like this person always judging you and that and so we didn't change a word of
dialogue or nothing else at all and they came in and played this scene again completely different
scene and we kept doing that with different before four or five different permutations on on what's
the subtext of the scene is it was a great way to illustrate for these students that wow it really
is about the subtlety the Nuance of behavior the body language and you can add a different meaning
to any scene and do you let the other party know the other actor know the intention or do you do
it in secret well and this it's a good idea to do that in this case I let them both know because it
was instructed for the students I wanted them to hear it but I have had moments where I've been
directing where I've held something back from one actor and given the information to another
actor not in a anything that's damaging or Menace or anything like that there are other times where
I've had two stars in a scene and I felt like you're the one star was a little bit intimidated
by this slightly bigger star in the scene with and I could just tell in the scene that that he was
cowering just a little bit and and that wasn't really true for his character his character had to
be had to stand up to this guy and so I just took him aside afterward between tanks and I just said
don't let him take the scene away from you and he instantly got it and then it was great then it was
like fire because and so now that kind of train they're really in the scene together so sometimes
withholding a little bit and giving extra information to somebody else's can be helpful
what if a scene doesn't have any subtext that is not a scene it's not shootable it's not actable
and and you at least have to be able to put a subtext in it and I can't actually I can't
even imagine a scene I mean a writer could have written a scene without some
things because they're just unconscious or just working on a very surface level
but anybody can any director or actor can take a scene and insert something it's the simplest thing
in the world what what just happened to me right before I entered the scene what am I worried about
I've got a pain in my rib that I'm really worried about and I'm afraid to go to the doctor about it
these are things are never spoken in the scene but they're going to inform how the scene is played
so there's always got to be got to be subjects no such thing as no subjects and even if it's just
one actor in a room and no one else enters that room yeah yeah it's still about what's what's
really going on with this person what does he really want how does the director help an actor
convey subtext so if I'm an actor in a scene and maybe it's another someone's late and they're
always late maybe it's my sister and they've always gotten away with being irresponsible and
I've always had to be the responsible one how are you helping me convey subtext to this late sister
that's she's not there and yeah I'm mad we've got reservations I've got to be back at work
right right it's it's really about body language and I feel like it's dangerous for me
try to give them a specific thing to do a behavioral thing to do because it's I don't
want them to indicate I don't want them to to feel like they're going to imitate me some reason why
I would I would never give a line reading unless some ask for it and oftentimes an actor will ask
me just just tell me how do you hear it yeah but other than that I would never give a library and
I'm very hesitant to give too much of a specific behavioral thing but I'll just try to make it
attitudinal how do you feel when this happens last time this happened how does it make you feel and
I just try to get them to summon their own feeling not to try to give them one but but to try to just
have them summon their own experience and everyone knows what it's like to be annoyed so I just try
to encourage them to bring it from within just like I would a writer or anyone else so yeah so
you'd be more asking me as the actor how is this making you feel instead of like telling me the
tone right I would just say just the third time it's the third time this week this has happened
I don't know I don't think she respects you yeah and that usually will sir you'll give some sort of
honest so instead he's saying look tap your foot look at your watch that's it's nobody wants to
hear that you're sure and no one wants to walk into a lunch like that either right yeah yeah.