Campbell Vertesi

Today I started working on the physical life of Bartolo.  Unfortunately, without a cane in Cincinnati I'll have to wait until I get to California to work on the "walk."  But there is much more than just a walk to a character!  My favorite is figuring out the nervous tic.

Most people have a nervous habit they do, something they do when they get emotional, or angry.  If this action is consistent throughout your character's physical and emotional life, it will help make the image of this person appear real in the audiences eyes.  Unfortunately, it's easy to go overboard with this.  If you're always doing your nervous "thing", it becomes pretty transparent and fake.  The balance is a careful one.  (think about Indiana Jones' little smirk, or any of Chris Farley's character's nervous physicalizations.  These bring some color to the character, and an easy physical cue for the audience of his state of mind)

I decided that Bartolo's nervous tic will be with a pencil, or a pen perhaps.  A little twirl, or some funny trick he does almost without thinking.  I like this idea because not only does it give me a very personal prop to work with, not only does it give me a physical action that can keep me occupied while Bartolo thinks, but it's a very distinctive sort of action too.  Plus, the possibility exists of Bartolo getting particularly worked up and breaking the pencil - that's good for effect, depending on how you play it.

 Some other examples... my Colline folds the lapels of his coat obsessively, and I've always wanted to learn a few knife twirling tricks for Sparafucile.

Anyways, I'm spending quality time at pentrix.com - a very good place to waste an afternoon if you want to learn tricks with a pencil. :)