Australian TV and Film Acting with John Orcsik

Text The Late Bloomer Actor a Question or Comment.

Season 3 starts off with an awesome conversation, John Orcsik, an experienced actor and founder of TAFTA, discusses his background in acting and the evolution of the Australian television industry. He shares insights into his time working with Crawford Productions and the impact of shows like Number 96. John also talks about the importance of believability in acting and the emotions training method. He highlights the need for actors to be real and present in their performances. The conversation concludes with a discussion on TAFTA and its goals in training actors.

Takeaways

• John Orcsik has a background in acting and has worked in the Australian television industry for many years.
• He shares insights into his time working with Crawford Productions and the impact of shows like Number 96.
• John emphasizes the importance of believability in acting and the need for actors to be real and present in their performances.
• He also discusses Tafta, an organization he founded to provide training for actors.

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Episode Transcript

David John Clark (00:00):
Good morning everyone.
It's morning for me here inAustralia.
I'm David John Clark, the latebloom ragdoll, and welcome to
season three.
Yes, it's season three.
We've made it this far.
It's fantastic.
I'm recording this episode inNovember 2023, because I do have
a trip to the United Statesover Christmas, the new year,
and this episode will be comingout just as I'm flying back from

(00:22):
LA, I believe.
So here we are, ready forseason three with the wonderful
John Orsik.
John, welcome.

John Orcsik (00:31):
Oh, nice to see you , David.

David John Clark (00:33):
Thank you very much for agreeing to come on
the show.
It's an absolute pleasure tohave you on board.

John Orcsik (00:38):
Look, it's a pleasure, not a problem at all.
I did a couple of thesepodcasts.
I haven't been to America forabout eight, nine years.
And is it Aussies working?
There's a group called Aussiesor something over there.
Australians in film.
Yeah, that was it.
I did a couple of sessionswhile I was there with them.

David John Clark (01:01):
Awesome.
Well, before we go in, I've gota bunch of questions about
acting and training and etc.
We're going to go back in timea little bit, because you have
been in the industry for a whileand I'll leave it up to you
whether you say time frames orages or anything.
Can you just give our listenersa bit of an intro into who John

(01:23):
Orsik is, where you came from,your background in acting and
where you are today?

John Orcsik (01:30):
Well.
I actually span a much biggerarc than most people think, and
I guess I come from Perth and Iwasn't born in Perth.
I was born in Austria but myparents were refugees, if you
like, and went to.

(01:51):
We were just dumped in Perthand all the rest of it.
So my education was in Perthand I had always harboured this.
I'm going to say notion,because that's what it is.
People either want to be actorsor they don't really want to be
actors, and they find out thatthey really want to be actors,

(02:12):
then they really work very hard.
Those people who think theywould like to be actors don't
work that hard and then wonderwhy nothing happens.
But yeah, so I grew up in Perthand there was no such thing.
Then it was theatre.
So my training was with anamateur theatre company there

(02:32):
and I did a lot of plays withthem into my I guess I started
about 16, 17 years of age, intomy teens and very early 20s, and
then at one stage I was playingBiff Loeman in Death of a
Salesman for their Salmon to theTheatre Company, which was a
very good company, by the way.
They were very high standardand the director of the Perth

(02:56):
Playhouse then, which would bethe equivalent of the Melbourne
Theatre Company here InMelbourne or the Sydney Theatre
Company.
Anyway, he came, he saw theplay and he came back stage to
see me and asked me if I wantedto be a professional actor.
And I said, yes, I do, that'swhat I'm doing all this for.
And anyhow, he then gave me arole in his production of Henry

(03:17):
IV, parts 1 and 2.
And I had one line and Istuffed that up on a part nine.
I thought, well, that's the endof that.
That was a short-lived career,but anyway, I soon learned what
not to do rather than what to do, and so I worked there for

(03:38):
about two years and then decidedlook, it's time to go.
You know, I'm 4,000, 5,000kilometres away from the action,
I guess.
So I packed up and I came overto the Eastern States, as we
used to call them over there,probably still do and then went

(04:00):
to Sydney.
I thought it had all happenedat once.
I mean my first job withinthree weeks of hitting Sydney, I
auditioned for a play calledthe Knack and played the lead
role opposite Jackie Weaver, whowas then also a very young girl
like me, and I didn't know whoshe was.

(04:21):
She didn't know who I was.
I mean, none of us were of anynote at that time, but we just
had a great time doing the playand we two were Tassie doing it.
So I suddenly saw Tasmania,which I'd never seen before
either, and it kind of went fromthere.
I guess you know it's a verylong story.
David, you really want to hearthis.

David John Clark (04:42):
As much as you think it's permanent.

John Orcsik (04:46):
I mean, it kind of goes from there to the end of
that year.
During that year I was one ofthe first well, I was the first
actor to ever be in a couple ofAmerican plays that were never
done here, never performed, andit was.

(05:06):
It was quite amazing.
Then I auditioned for theMelbourne Theatre Company at the
end of that year, and I cantell you when that was, that was
1969.
Wow, and I got in.
So I spent the next two and ahalf years at the MTC as a
contract actor and at the end ofthat time not me I was offered

(05:26):
another season that each seasonran for about five months.
So my agent, who then was FaithMartin and then became Shanahan
, eventually said I think you'vedone enough theater, it's time
to come back to Sydney and dosome film and television.
It's the beginning of the filmand TV stuff and it began in

(05:47):
Little Things.
I do remember one wonderfulmoment of being in theater and
being and we'll talk about theacting thing as you wanted to
later, but as we go on.
But I was brought up or studiedas much as possible the
standard Stanislavski methods,blah, blah, blah.
It never quite worked for me.
It seemed to work against myown instincts somewhere.

(06:10):
Rather.
Anyhow, I sort of worked onthis and tried, and then I
remember I got a role.
I had two lines on a seriescalled the Link Men.
I think it might have actuallyeven been true here in Melbourne
.
Anyhow, there was not a verygood series, it was a police

(06:31):
series and there were a millionpolice series going around in
those days.
Yes, to come.
Yet beyond that wasCorfinsworth or that four or
five, culminating, I guess, inCopshop down the track, and I
had two lines.
I remember thinking I am thiswaiter and I had designs on this

(06:52):
girl who was having dinner withher boyfriend and I'd made up
this whole backstory.
I did everything.
I missed my cue about fourtimes to go on and the director
came back to me eventually.
He's an English chap and hecame down.
He put his arm around me.
He said my dear boy, just saythe fucking line.
I thought you know something.

(07:17):
It's as simple as that.

David John Clark (07:19):
I love that.
I used to ask a question at theend of my podcast I don't do it
anymore about what your t-shirtquote would be, and that could
be your t-shirt quote Just saythe fucking line, absolutely,
just say the fucking line.

John Orcsik (07:32):
I mean it's resonating now.
I mean that was 1972.
Wow, 1971.
It was, and I still remember it, I'll never forget it.
I mean I also thought, oh myGod, that's the end of it, I'll
never get another role again.
And it then went on.
And then I got another smallpart and another Crawford's

(07:52):
production and another smallpart.
And this is what was wonderfulabout Crawford as a company
which doesn't exist today,particularly for young actors
they gave you something, theytested you and they gave you
something a little bit bigger.
Then they gave you something alittle bit bigger.
Then they go look, this personcan handle it.
And after that I only playedlead roles for them Wonderful.

(08:15):
And then I also wrote for them.
I wrote several episodes of DB4, matlock Police I think I wrote
one homicide and Bluey.
I wrote a couple of episodes ofBluey, which is another police
series, and then I wrote fourepisodes of cop shop, eventually
, in addition to acting in it.
And I'll tell you how, isn'tthat?

David John Clark (08:37):
interesting.
I'm sorry I was just about tosay that TV show called Bluey,
and now we've got the cartoon.
He's called Bluey, isn't he?
Yeah, I wonder if they drew onthat in any way.

John Orcsik (08:50):
No, they didn't.
I'll tell you, it was based onBluey.
Australian version was based on.
We copied everything thathappened overseas, particularly
at that time.
I mean homicide was a copy of,in a sense of, an American
homicide police series.
I mean, they all were Bluey.
There was an actor and I can'tremember his name.
He was a big actor.

(09:10):
He was a big guy who played acop on an American series.
It didn't last all that long,maybe two, three seasons, and
Bluey was an actor here and I'mtrying to remember his name.
He was a lovely man.
He's actually a comedian, acomic, a stand-up comic, and he
was a similar stature to thisAmerican actor.

(09:32):
So they simply started a showcalled Bluey.
It didn't do that well and itdidn't last that long.
I think it went for two seasons.
I think I acted in one episodeor two, but I know I wrote one
or two all those time ago.
But that was kind of like.
You know, I don't believe inany sense that you necessarily

(09:57):
are stuck in one genre as in anactor only.
I think it's a field that isused to express yourself in
whatever you want, if you wantto write and you think you can.
Most people think they can't,but they actually can.
And so writing and acting, Ithink, are synonymous with each

(10:21):
other.
As then comes directing.
It's also part and parcel ofthe entire thing and there's no
reason.
Well, we can see today, youknow, all major stars are also
directors and they also write alot, but it's made easier for
them because they have the cloudto do it.
In the days when I was doing itthere was none of that.
It had to be about how good wasit that you were writing?

(10:43):
But I at that time had awonderful two or three years,
because every time I came downfor Crawford's to act in one of
those police shows, they alsohired me as a writer, because it
wouldn't be an extra airfare.
So I was down here on my dayoff as an actor.
I went and had a writingmeeting, a script meeting, and

(11:07):
so then the next time I camedown as a script writer for the
edit, I was then given an actingjob.
So I always was getting twojobs at the same time.
That lasted for about two orthree years and then I left
there and I did a whole bunch ofother things.
I worked a lot for the ABC inthose days, ben Hall in

(11:29):
particular.
I played Flash, johnny Gilbert,in that series, which is a and
that was quite a lot of fun, amassive production for the day.
I believe that at the time eachepisode costs the same as an
average feature film would costto make here in Australia, which
was, but today's standards it'sa penny, it's nothing, but in

(11:53):
those days it really was.
So apart from Ben Hall, I alsodid another little series called
Beyond the Break, which wasabout a surf, lifesaving and
really, and another one whichwas fantastic was a one-off.
It was a telly movie calledDisplaced Persons and directed

(12:17):
by Geoffrey Nudge.
That was really.
That was really a veryinteresting telly movie in which
I played the very opposite.
See, up until that time I wasplaying tough guys, I was the
cop.
I mean, that's what cop shopeventually happened, and it
happened for that very reasonand I didn't care.

(12:40):
People say, ah, you knowtypecasting, and I say, listen,
as long as you're working, whocares?
I'm trying, and there's no suchthing as typecasting anyway,
because you will only be cast asto how you are perceived, not
by what you can do.
It's your suitability thatmatters in a screen test, not
your ability.

(13:00):
Because you've been asked toscreen test because everybody
already assumes you have theability.
So that's kind of there.
But that was about a group ofpeople that had fled Europe just
post 1945.

(13:20):
And I was cast as a HungarianJewish scholar.
Now that was so far away fromthe image it didn't matter, but
then at the time I was the onlyand I had to speak Hungarian.
Louis Narrow the late LouisNarrow, wrote the script.
It was a very good screenplayand I was the only Hungarian

(13:42):
speaking actor in the country,especially at that age.
So they really had no choice,but I did.

David John Clark (13:51):
Cornering the market.

John Orcsik (13:51):
as I said, yeah, I did love it and it was terrific
and it opened people's eyes.
Oh God, you know, you justdon't have to play somebody like
you know tough guys and allthat jazz.
So you know, it kind of went onuntil I guess you could say
cutting a long story short.
You know there was theaterhappening in between as well.
I did the odd play here andthere and then the little movie

(14:18):
here and there.
So, look, I guess you could sayUp until the end of cop shop.
I was literally never out ofwork.
That's fantastic.
I was very lucky.
If I wasn't writing, I wasacting.
If I wasn't acting, I waswriting.

(14:39):
The only thing I didn't delveinto in those days which I'm now
sorry that I didn't but, andthat was I should have moved
into directing as well, and Icould easily have, because at
Crawford's at that time all Iwould have had to have gone is
gone down to see Hector and say,hey, I want to do some

(15:00):
directing, and they would havemade it happen.

David John Clark (15:05):
So, that said, all those early days in acting,
reflecting on those roles, sothis will test the ages of my
listeners here.
So we've got homicide andDivision four and Matlock
leading into cop shop, as you'vementioned in 1978, playing
detective Mike Giorgio.

John Orcsik (15:24):
Yeah, that was it?

David John Clark (15:25):
Yeah, which?

John Orcsik (15:25):
was a story in a moment to, because that's very
funny but gone.

David John Clark (15:29):
Okay, definitely, that was a
significant point you create,but all this, that learning as
you're acting, and this willlead into your development of
taffter, I'm sure, which we'lltalk towards the end, totally so
, how did these roles influenceyour understanding of the
industry and and shape yourapproach to acting, especially
considering the different natureof television?

John Orcsik (15:51):
production.
Well, massively in many ways,and not at first.
At first I was kind of doingthe same sort of thing, but it
eventually made me develop asystem Emotional expression that

(16:15):
I teach, and have done so fornearly 20 years and have
improved on it more and more andmore and more.
And people often say, oh, look,I can't get in touch with my
emotions, can't do this, I can'tdo that.
Well, my theory is you don'tactually have to.
There are things that you cando, and it happened because I
was constantly under the pump tofind a new way of doing it.

(16:38):
Look, david, we did 90 oddepisodes a year.
One hour episodes, two hours aweek.
We were shot the equivalent ofa telemovie a week.
Wow.
And so the pressure on you asan actor is twofold.
One is sit back, take the money, relax, just do the same thing

(17:00):
you do every week and it's fine.
Everyone loves you, you'veestablished this, you've
established that, and just rollon and let the money roll in.
Well, never really rolled in inthose days, but anyhow, the
other thing is you challengeyourself as an actor.
As a group, we challengedourselves in that cast, ran some

(17:22):
workshops on occasions on aSaturday, and we chose to do
Shakespeare and we chose to dothe very opposite of what we
were doing, so that it wouldstretch us as actors and we
would discover things about eachother that we hadn't known
before, that we hadn't exploredbefore.
But also it was an explorationof how can I do something more

(17:44):
efficiently, how can I do itbetter, how can I do it more
convincingly?
How can I do?
All those questions were toeventually shape tafta.
But they go back to those dayswhere look, where you are there
five days a week.
You are there from dawn tilldusk and sometimes late into the
night.
You are working on a seriestelevision in those days in

(18:08):
particular, something like that.
You wouldn't do it today.
Today you would treat an hour aweek, not two.
You would get X number of times.
It would be just so many.
I just think it's so easy today, so easy Basically,

(18:29):
comparatively, only because ofthe schedules, the work you were
expected to come up with and atthe same time, as a group.
I must say that cop shop group,we were all the best of friends
and stay best of friends, andwe still are best of friends for
those of us who are still here.

(18:50):
We literally lived in eachother's pockets, and that was a
development.
That was also interesting,because normally when you work
together with a group great,we're with a bunch of people for
a long time you think, oh, I'mgoing to get the weekend off,
but no, on a weekend someonewould say, just like, I'm having

(19:10):
a Barbie on Sunday, you want tocome over and we go, yeah shit
yeah we're there, so we're allthere.
So we were there Sunday, andthen we were there Monday,
bloody morning, you know andthat happened with monotonous
regularity.
We even intermarried in theshow.
We still married.
The continuity girl then becamea casting director and I

(19:35):
married Paula.
It was just happening all overthe place.

David John Clark (19:42):
It shows the difference in the industry size,
wouldn't it?
Compared to today?

John Orcsik (19:47):
Very much so.
But I mean, I just think thesize today is scattered.
Look, and this is not a bitterpill or any other nonsense, but
I look at shows that are comingout today and I'm not talking as
an old man, which I am now, butI don't think I am, no, do I

(20:08):
behave like that.
But I think, despite thenaivety of the writing in those
shows, they were not pretentious.
I find that today's shows arepretentious.
We write for a reason.
We must have a social agenda ofsome kind and we worry about

(20:28):
the social agenda more than weworry about the story.
We've lost the art, in myopinion, of storytelling.
That's a shame, isn't it?
That's, I mean, I could bewrong, but not from what I have
seen, very rarely does somethingcome up that I think, gee,
that's really good.
But you know, let me tell youthe story about how I got into

(20:51):
culture.
Yes, definitely, that's reallyquite amusing.
I was brought down to Melbournein secrecy to audition for this
show called Cop Shop, which Ithought was a terrible title,
and I thought, oh, it's just so,never will.
Anyway, I came down and wentinto Channel 7 and there I was,

(21:14):
did my audition and left, Flewback to Sydney because I've seen
it again.
As to me, my Tony Bonner, whowasn't late at the time but
became later I mean Tony alsoauditioned for the role.
Tony got the gig for thisparticular character Anyhow.
I thought, oh well, that's it.

(21:35):
I had two other offers on theburn at the time.
I had another soap and I can'tremember the name of it Young,
something or Other, and also theABC were doing a thing called I
think it was the ABC, I'm notsure now called Chopper Squad,
where I had played a guest rolein a surf lifesaving captain.

(22:00):
It lost the use of his legsbecause of mental thing, but at
the end of the episode he says Igot more and I got more.
That's the story right for you.
Anyway, talk about cliche.
And then.
But they offered me the nextseason and I thought, oh look, I

(22:21):
could spend 26 episodes jumpingin and out of helicopters on
the beaches in the summer inSydney.
That sounds like a lot of fun.
And I was about to agree tothat series when Crawford's
reign my agent, the great BillShanahan at the time I said we
really want John in the show,that show, that role that he

(22:44):
auditioned for with Tony.
That was terrific, but Tony ismore right for the role.
But also that role won't reallyhave longevity and Tony doesn't
want to do it for that longanyway.
But we really want John in theshow and we want a different
kind of a character.
And they said how many languagescan John speak?
Because we want him to play amultilingual cop, so we will use

(23:10):
the use of those languages.
Now, that was going to be afirst and I said at that time I
think I could speak fourlanguages quite fluently.
Still, it's all gone now.
Well, I mean, when you're amigrant kid and you come there
and you're in a refugee camp andthere are all kinds of
different nationalities there,and you're a kid five, six,

(23:32):
seven years of age, you pick itup and it takes absolutely
nothing.
The communication was easy.
I mean, the only language Icouldn't speak when I came to
Australia was English.
But I soon made that happen.
And then he wrote back and saidyes, it's going to be four

(23:53):
languages.
He reckons he could do Get awaywith a couple of others.
But they said oh, terrific,well, that's what we want him to
do.
Now Bill, who was a very smartman, turned around to them and
said look guys.
That's terrific, but this is aspecial skill.
You're not going to findanother actor in the country who
can do this.
And so, apart from the standardfee, which we're going to talk

(24:15):
about in a minute, I'm alsogoing to charge you $100 per
language per week, whether ornot he speaks those languages or
not.
That's a standard add-on.
And they went oh right, we'llget back to you.
They rang back the following dayand said can John speak Greek?

(24:40):
Bill said well, it wasn't onthe list, but I'll ask him.
So he rang me and I said no,mate, I mean, I would have told
you if I didn't know I can'tspeak Greek.
So he rang back and he said no,no, he doesn't speak Greek.
And now later they rang backagain and said we want him to
play a Greek cop.
Oh, no See, it was about themoney.
They didn't want to pay theextra, they didn't want to pay

(25:04):
the extra bucks, and that wasreally hysterical.
And but at that time, as astudent officer and actor and I
talked about it with him, Iremember with Bill I said I'm
not going to speak any Greek onthe show.
I said people can speak Greekto me, but I will be going back
in English.
The reason is, david, that onceyou set up something, you can

(25:31):
break the mold, and if I've setmyself up as X, I open my mouth
to speak.
Melbourne has the secondbiggest Greek population outside
of Athens.
I believe, or did have, andthey'll say that boy Hino-Greek.
Because my accent, I will notbe speaking properly, so I would

(25:53):
rather say I'm Greek but notspeaking.
I might say yes or I might saythe odd word, but that would be
it.
But the fact is that the entirenation believed I was Greek.

David John Clark (26:07):
And in many ways it's still do.

John Orcsik (26:09):
That's what I mean.
So you've got to go and theysaid, oh, you're doing it
because you got pissed off aboutthe money.
I said no, no, no, you don'thave to say that, I wouldn't do
that, that was something we.
You change your mind?
No, because if I was thatpissed off I'd say no, stick to
the show where you want thatbest.
I don't like the title.
How wrong was everybody?
I think there was a headline inthe Sydney paper at one stage

(26:32):
when it first came out, sayingwhat a load of cop.
This later crap or something.
Well, six years later, ratingkiller later.
I mean it was amazing.
But there was an amazing showfor that.
But you know, I mean prior tothat, prior to pop shop, I mean
I was doing number 96.
I was in the show there for amonth or two and then I did the

(26:56):
movie.

David John Clark (26:58):
And number 96 was just such a big change for
Australian TV.
It wasn't a tested boundariesthat had ever been tested before
.

John Orcsik (27:05):
And well, exactly, in a very sort of daring way,
for the times we don't do thatanymore.
We don't do that.
That's what I'm talking abouttoday.
We're so super safe for a bunchof boring, dull wokes Well, I'm
not, but that's what'shappening out there.
So the material that's comingout is like that, you know it's.

(27:29):
You can't have that becauseyou've got to have one of those
in it and one of those in it,one of them or one of them.
Well, what's the story about?
We go back to what is my story,and to me, that's what writing
is about.
Story, it's not about making it.
If the story makes a socialcomment, great, and if that's it

(27:51):
.
But tell the story.
But yeah, I mean cop, not chop,not cop Number 96,.
I mean then I had thedistinction of having the first
male kiss on Australiantelevision was Joe Hashem.
That was very funny.
I didn't know that.
Oh, you know that Joe and Ikilled ourselves laughing.
That was in the movie.

David John Clark (28:09):
And was that done?
Was that done in a comedic way,or was it no?

John Orcsik (28:11):
no, oh, no, it was real.
Oh, it's real.
That's another very funny story.
I was down here in Melbourneand I was shooting a film with
Tom Thompson called Peterson andJackie and a bunch of other
guys and I've never huge role inthat, but it was.
It was a lot of fun.
And Faith Martin, who was myagent at that time, just before
Bill took over the agents, sentme down the script of the number

(28:35):
96 movie, saying they wanted toplay the same character that
you played in the series.
Well, the guy that I played inthe series was a bit of a.
You were the big ladies man.
I mean in the fair with thelame Lee and the fair with some
cup to three of the ladies show.
I Read the script and thisguy's gay.

(28:55):
I sent back the script To faiththat I said no, tell Bill
Harman I'm not doing this.
This is not my character.
Money idiot I was anyway.
The attitude was ridiculous.
Anyway, then Bill came back,being in New York, to that bill
wasn't what he wants?
More money, is that what it is?

(29:16):
I don't think it was for money.
I just don't think he likes it.
I don't give us to do it, thisis what.
So anyway.
Eventually he kept at it and atit, and at it and at it and I
had a very good friend who waspart of the show at that time.
It was one of the producerscalled Bob Hugh, and Bob said
off, a Christ sake, john, it wasalso an American, will you see

(29:39):
him?
So I said okay.
So it was after I finishedPeterson I went back and I had a
meeting with Bill and I said,bill, I Was playing this wild
guy.
You know, this guy is sort ofoff with every woman in the
bloody place, and now he wantedto turn this character gay.
He turned around to meAbsolutely with complete

(30:01):
open-minded.
So, john, everything changes.
Wow.
In the end I went bugger, okay,what the hell?
And, and.
And.
It turned out to be one of thebest things I've ever done when
I say best things in terms of, Iguess, notoriety, but it was

(30:23):
also a lot of fun and I workedwith people that I really liked.
Again, the Joe was a great guy.
I think Channel 7.
Twice I was on a show therethey had called when are they
now?
Some years ago, and the secondtime around they actually flew
Joe out of Jakarta, because Joelives in Jakarta these days, I
believe.
So they're uniting us backagain on which was, which was a

(30:44):
lot of fun.

David John Clark (30:46):
And what year was that on television, when you
played the, the gay character?

John Orcsik (30:53):
Well, it was in the movies, first the movie sorry,
yeah, and then it went totelevision some time after that.
I'm just trying to think musthave been late.
My mid 60s, 64, 65.

David John Clark (31:10):
So very much in a time when homosexuality
wasn't portrayed in TV I don'tknow my time frames when Sydney
started kicking off with the youknow the game Artigraha and
making and people coming out andtrying to Understand and
culture changing so that sort ofleads into.
We were talking about it before, about the diversity of

(31:33):
television and that.
So we've.

John Orcsik (31:35):
But you know the beauty, I'll urge this.
No, no, we did, we did and II'm totally for it.
The thing about it was that Ithink we did it Because we
wanted to do it, we found itinteresting, we found it
entertaining.
We didn't do it because wesocially felt we must.

(31:57):
Okay, which is the differencebetween then and now, in that
sense, nobody cared.
Nobody cared.
I mean, I must say most of myfriends were going anyway.
They were in the theater andnot in the theater, film and
television not so much, but Imean nevertheless, and and they

(32:19):
were all my, my dear goodfriends, I mean nobody cared.
I mean Susie myself, she was afriend of mine, she was also my
agent, she was a castingdirector.
One says dear.
Or Susie passed away a coupleof years ago, but we used to get
up to cansellers and hire a bitthere and have lunch and watch
the game Artigraha from up thereand it was.

(32:41):
It was a lot of fun and it wasterrific.
And I just think that sort ofsome kind of a criminius crept
in for whatever reason, I Don'tknow.

David John Clark (32:53):
Well, see, I think there's a streaming
service now, I won't know yournames, but there's a streaming
service that Won't take onproductions unless you tick all
the diversity boxes, and it'sgot to literally have every
single To get a right storyaround that.
I mean, that's.
That's like saying Dunkirk, forexample, when the movie Dunkirk

(33:16):
come out.
There was a question there whythere were no women in the movie
.
No well, hang on a second.
So it's a.
It's a movie about soldiers inWorld War two, you know exactly.

John Orcsik (33:27):
I mean the women were not in the field at that
time.
No, I mean they may be today.

David John Clark (33:36):
But exactly, and if you wrote a story today,
then you've got that ability toput the diversity in there.
Diversity Stories shouldreflect exactly what they are.
But, like you said, we're nowwriting stories to tick 200
boxes, which well, we're notwriting stories anymore.

John Orcsik (33:52):
I think what we're doing is writing, is ticking
boxes and hoping there's a storyin there.
I mean it's everywhere, I meanit's it's not just Australia,
but Australia in particular,just.
And people say, albert, this isour story.
No, it's not our story at alland you know it's.

(34:13):
To me it's a bit of a pity.
Look, we'll get through it.
The pendulum swings, david.
It swings this way and itswings back that way and it will
do so forever.
And I've seen it.
I've seen it go from theextremes of the 60s and 70s
which are amazing, fun too.
What was in the early 80s?

(34:33):
Then it became more and morerestrictive.
And I know, on cop shop wethere were certain things we
could do, because it was an 830show, but at a 730 show we
couldn't do the things that wedid at 830, whereas, of course,
today, being a streaming servicedoesn't really matter.
I mean, you can, you can tuneinto anything you want at any

(34:54):
time.
You know so, but but you know Iended up.
I ended up, I guess, formingtaffta With Paula, curiously
enough, way back in 19.
No, yes, 94.

(35:15):
That sounds right, paula and Isort of split up is a funny
story.
Paula and I sort of split upand both living in Sydney and I
was working for an acting schoolthere, teaching and Working.
I think I just finished up alittle stint on home and away
and various other things and andshe rang me and said I've just

(35:39):
been offered a 12 month contractin Queensland for a show called
Paradise Beach.
And I said oh good, good on you.
We were funny enough, we werestill friends, which is weird.
But anyway, we were and stillare very, very friends and
that's that's the way to do itis what life's too short, my

(36:01):
friend accurate.
After many years of waste oftime, I so she went off with
Jessica just feels about eightyears of age at the time and I
was an LA directing and doingher own thing, which is
wonderful and she's just had ababy.
I've just become a grandfather.

David John Clark (36:19):
I'll come got you guys.

John Orcsik (36:20):
He's been wonderful .
And so she's gone for about twoweeks, three weeks maybe, and
my phone rings as my agent whois by then someone else, bill
had died.
I'm gone and I was no longerwith that agency anyway.
It was John can and they rangme and said Do you want to hear

(36:46):
the good news of the bad news?
I said I'll stuff the bad news.
That's the good news.
He said well, the good news isthat Paradise Beach productions
have asked if you'd beinterested in going up there for
about three months as a guestOn the show.
I went on great, yes, love it,that'd be fantastic.

(37:10):
I suggest you know all the restof it.
And so I Said oh, it almostdoesn't attend to myself.
What's the bad news?
You said I want you to playPaula's love interest.

David John Clark (37:27):
So it's a bit like Crawford's, did she know?

John Orcsik (37:29):
that I rang her and said so we had a big laugh
about it.
Anyway, I went up there, I, I,I did Show there for a while and
then later on I was in anothershow there.
I think we just stayed up therefor about four or five years

(37:50):
and, and in the January of thatyear the producers of the show,
who were both ex-Crawford'speople, said look, we're here,
you've been doing some teaching.
Can you do some teaching uphere?
Because we are literally hiring50 worders and flying them up

(38:12):
from Sydney because all the guysaround here are so theater
bound, it's a pain in the neck.
So that's how we started.
By then, as straight whatever,I got back together again and
Tafta was born.
Literally then that was 13years ago, this coming January.

David John Clark (38:39):
I talk about a lot of my podcast about sliding
doors and how certain doorsopen when you just don't expect
them.
And things have to happen todaybecause of that.

John Orcsik (38:49):
I mean I was still doing a lot of acting then and
all kinds of different shows,not just up there.
I did a couple of movies upthere and then I did another ABC
show which I flew down here toMelbourne for was a kid's show,
I can't remember what it wascalled, but it was interesting,

(39:12):
as I say it was.
Even then we were concernedwith the story, not who was in
your story, was that the oneabout the zoo?
But it was yeah, so it wastough.
Then we opened Sydney and thenwe opened Melbourne and then we
had three, and then it's again abit too hard and the times are

(39:35):
tough at the moment.
Maybe he's got any money, whichof course is interesting Well,
or if they do this, I can'tspend it.
I'm not risking it, but that'sokay, we'll get through this.
We always have all kinds ofthings will happen.
But I mean I've had a veryinteresting I'm finished yet

(39:55):
either the way career.
While I was there actuallydoing that, I wrote and directed
a telly movie called Academywhich channeled mine board, and
that was sort of when I startedto really delve into the
directing part of it, which Iquite liked, and I'm messing

(40:16):
around with that still at theminute, which is fun.
But yeah, it goes on, david.
I mean we could be here for awhile.

David John Clark (40:27):
It's a it's brilliant to talk to you because
I've told my wife I wasinterviewing today and she's
loved all the iconic TV showsand she just can't believe that
we'll be sitting here havingthis chat about iconic
Australian history.

John Orcsik (40:43):
Well, it's just brilliant.
It is very true.
Look, I mean, I can tell younow that I did.
I did a God.
How many days of interviews forthe, for the archives in
Canberra a couple of years agoWonderful, and it took several
days and I thought, Jesus, Ididn't think I had done that

(41:04):
much until I started to talkabout that stuff.
But we have.
I think we have a possibilityof a very new and vibrant
industry.
I think we've gone global andmaybe this is a transition as
well, and we are in a transitoryperiod like that.

(41:25):
So we're not quite sure we wantto hang on to our own roots,
but we are also looking globalat the same time.
So what is it that have to do?
Yeah, so what is it that wehave can translate into that big
picture and not just staywithin the small picture?

David John Clark (41:41):
Well, I think it was good, because I think
those stories are stories tostore on as that's cool, and
bringing that, tying that intotafftor, and what your goals are
as a training organization.
How does tafftor operate inthis market?
What's your goals with trainingactors as opposed to a standard

(42:04):
drama school that offer thethree year degrees?
You branch out with a lot ofdifferent casting director
workshops.
I'd like to quickly touch onyour training method as well.
That sort of stuff.

John Orcsik (42:15):
I mean, look, what we do is different to what
everyone else does.
In the first instance, I haveditched all those mysnerian,
chicovian and all those basedtheories on acting, all that
stuff about getting intoyourself and finding an
emotional recall, which isnonsensical because it does

(42:38):
exist.
What I did do exist.
Find out.
That's quite ironic, butthrough my because.
Then I began to study the wholeemotions thing.
There's actually emotionsmolecules that exist in your
body and they are real and theycluster, if you like, around

(43:01):
certain organs and certainstimuli happen.
It's too long a story for us togo into, but that is the basis
of it.
And there was a wonderful woman, professor Candace C A N D A C
Hall, who actually was able tomeasure the opiate perceptor,
which is as well as this part ofthe molecule of emotion, and

(43:24):
therefore proved that this isn'tjust a feeling, but this
feeling is in fact a physicalreality.
Now what we need to do is evokethose physical realities and
then we'll find it so muchsimpler to tap into those
so-called emotions.
So I have a system in which Ido that.

(43:46):
I also think that acting issimple.
We don't need three years.
Look, at the end of the day,someone says okay, david, I
really would like to see you inthis.
There's the script.
Learn the lines and come backtomorrow and let's see how you
go.
Acting is about shown.

(44:07):
It's called showing.
You can have 25,000certificates, you can have a
doctorate.
It's not going to make you abetter actor.
It might make you aninteresting academic, but it's
not going to make you a betteractor.
Acting is very simple.
If you can't learn everythingyou need to know in six months,
then go somewhere else.

(44:28):
The difference is that allthose other institutions you
then get the chance to practicefor a lot longer before you let
out into the industry.

David John Clark (44:40):
Yeah, because my son just finished year 12 and
he's applying for Flindersdrama for the three-year degree.
But he's 17 years of age andyou can't go wrong purely on
that experience level.

John Orcsik (44:53):
Yeah, see, 17 years of age, though today, unlike in
the Cops Club days in that era,if you like, there are shows
for all those people.
They're not just token gestures.
I did a series called ZooFamily, which was wonderful, but
that was a token gesture byChannel 9.
At the time they bought 26episodes because they had to

(45:14):
make up their C classification.
Today we don't care about Cclassification anymore because
that showed, although writtenfor kids can suddenly become
global.
Now it's a money making entity,whereas at that time it was a
gesture.
I mean, we used to fight sohard to get kids drama up, I
remember, but that isn't thereanymore At 17,.

(45:36):
I mean, you know, this is whatI point out to them.
At one stage, all your standardinstitutions didn't take anyone
much under 20, 21 years of agebecause they wanted them to have
a little life.
Well, the problem is that I'vegot a bunch of students, for
example, who have been with mesince they were 14 years of age,

(45:57):
our teenagers and our teens.
They are now 18.
They don't need to go to athree year institution.
They need now exposure and work, and they're the two things
that at the time matters.
You know, work, work withoutthis.

(46:17):
You know what they're doing.
Work with the directors is justa fucking line.

David John Clark (46:21):
It's interesting.
I mean Codd has been.
He's been doing classes for acouple of years with his agency
here and been making his ownfilm with a bunch of people.
We watch him on screen, he'sthat's what you need to do.
It's one of those things,because if he gets a call to go
to home and away tomorrow, thenhe might not need to.
I've heard of people who'vedropped out of the uni because
they were on home and away, andit becomes their university

(46:44):
Absolutely.

John Orcsik (46:45):
Look, there is no going way back to when I was 17,
18 years of age and just inschool I auditioned for Mida.
At that time, that time wasonly a two year course and you
didn't get any kind ofgovernment assistance.
There were no student loans.
You had to pay for it.
It was straight out.
You want to do that and I can'tremember what it cost, but it

(47:07):
wasn't cheap by any stretch ofthe imagination.
Now I was in Perth and theyauditioned all over the country
which is what they do still andwhich is fair enough and I got
accepted to go to United and Iwent wow, okay, South or well,
dad's going to have to pay, Idon't have any money, et cetera.
Well, my dad was okay, it wasreasonably well off.

(47:32):
He came, as other people did,to Australia and, not being able
to speak English, and ended upbeing a builder.
He was actually an architectbut ended up being a builder and
building schools and buildingall kinds of stuff and doing
okay.
But as life luck, whatever elsewould have it, he suddenly fell
ill and he had cancer.

(47:54):
So I then wrote back to mycurrent memory exactly who they
were at night and said look, I'msorry but I can't come over.
My dad's just been diagnosedwith cancer, et cetera.
And they were lovely.
They wrote back to me and saidlook, John, we understand, we'll
keep the position open for youfor next year.

(48:15):
You don't have to auditionagain, We'll just accept you, in
other words, and I went wow,that's really, really nice.
And then, of course, as lifehappened in that towards the end
of that 12 months, my dad diedand it was time for me to go,

(48:35):
and by now, of course, he wasgoing to be short and mum
couldn't do it.
I couldn't leave her.
So I wrote back to them andsaid I'm sorry but I can't go,
and pointed out the reasons why.
And they then beautifully wroteback and said if you can see
your way over here, we will giveyou the microchilispe
scholarship to come over.

(48:59):
But I couldn't do it, it wasjust not possible.
And it was at that time that Istarted then to do some really
serious roles with this majoramateur theater company.
And then came the Playhouse,the director and me working
there then for the next twoyears.

(49:20):
By the time I finished workingwith professionals for two years
, I said to myself is there anypoint in going to a drama school
.
The answer was no, there wasn't, Because I learned more from
those guys than I could everlearn in two years.
It would have been a wonderfultime, I'm sure, and I believe

(49:41):
this is a great deal ofcamaraderie.
And John Clark, who was head ofMITRE for a long time, wasn't at
the time a bit later was afriend of mine.
He came to see most shows thatI saw and in fact he did some
workshops Shakespeare workshopsfor us at Tafta Incident a
couple of times, which wasreally nice.
But sometimes life has its ownweird and wonderful way of

(50:06):
shaping your future and sayingwhat if I had done this or not
done that?
There's no point to any of thator thinking about it.
But at the time that's whathappened and they were my
decisions and they were thingsthat I had to do.
Okay, it made it a bit tougherdown the track, but then again,

(50:32):
I've never been anyone to shirksomething.
That's tough, maybe becauseit's how we were forged, in the
words of the great Bard.

David John Clark (50:44):
Wonderful, awesome.
I'm mindful of the time.

John Orcsik (50:48):
That's okay, mate, no problem.

David John Clark (50:50):
That's on the training front that we were
talking about.
Yeah, you're discussing notbeing able to go to drama school
or going to drama school.
Me being a late bloomer actor,having started acting in my 40s
One of my biggest things I get Itry to get as much training as
I can, but I've done courseswith you and I've done the
casting director workshops butit's finding that believability.

(51:12):
One of my biggest statementsthat I've got, which is why I
haven't landed the 50 worders orthe 20 worders, is my auditions
, so to speak, lacking thebelievability of character.
So, from your perspective, withall your experience in TV and
film and now as a teacher withTafta, where can we get that

(51:35):
from?
How do we develop that abilityto come on screen whether it's
on set or whether it's in anaudition, and have that
believability of character?
So someone goes I'm notwatching David Clark.
I'm watching David Clark, theactor, whatever character I'm
playing.

John Orcsik (51:50):
Now you notice I smiled at that.
The fact is that we're alwayswatching David Clark, and the
more David Clark thinks he wantsto be someone else, the less
successful he's going to be atthat, if that makes sense to you
, is he?
I am also writing a book it'sprobably about three quarters

(52:12):
there at the moment and I have achapter on just the very thing
that you said is character.
Where that?
Who am I?
Where have I come from?
What do I do?
I throw all that out the window.
To me, character is aboutdetailed behavior and the
believability is reallysomething that can only come

(52:33):
from you.
You have to stop worrying aboutwho you are.
It's David Clark delivering thelines and the moment with the
truth as David feels it not seesit, but feels it.
Once you do that, you've gotcharacter.
I'm going to tell you a quickstory about that fairly recent.

(52:55):
The last three or four years Idid an episode of Dr Blake's
Motor Mysteries and I hadauditioned for the show a couple
of times and was unsuccessfulOn this particular time.
I went in there and LouMitchell was the cast a
wonderful lady I've known formany, many years and the

(53:18):
character was a gypsy leader ofa Gypsy band.
His daughter was murdered andhe obviously is a suspect.
And the scene was him discussingwith the Doctor Black character
, his daughter and his emotional.
So he had to be crying or nearcrying or apparently crying or

(53:44):
dying.
And at the same time I said canyou give us a mede-European,
hungarian, transylvanian,romanian accent?
So I said yeah.
I said yeah, I can do that.
So I said I remember saying mydear Doctor, you have no idea

(54:06):
what you are talking about.
Anyhow, I did all that and didthe tears and all that and left.
And then I was on my way homewhen my phone rang and it was
the director.
It was going to direct it and Iremember Ian rang me and said

(54:27):
can I talk to you?
And I said only if you've castme.
I said joke.
And he said well, of course Ihave.
Why am I fucking calling you?
And we had worked together onthe ABC, god knows way back 40
odd years ago.
He was then an editor and hewas editing all those shows that
I was talking about back therein the ABC and he was a director
, lovely, lovely man.

(54:48):
And he said how do you feelabout long hair?
And this is how we put it howdo you feel about long hair.
I said what do you mean?
How do I feel about long hair?
I said I don't have the hair Ihad when I was in cop shop.
He said no, no, no I know that.
I said but?
And I said I'm not going to beable to grow it because we're
shooting.
In what?
Six weeks?
He said yeah.

(55:10):
He said but don't worry, buthow do you feel about it?
I said you want?
I said what you're reallysaying to me and is that you
want me to have long hair.
Is that right?
Or you would like me to havelong hair?
You would like me to considerthat?
He said well, yes.
I said fine, I don't mind,that's cool.
I said I haven't even thoughtabout this, but let's say cool.
He said good, good, good, thankyou, hang up.

(55:32):
And my phone rang again in thecar just before I got home and
he said how do you feel about abeard?
And I said six weeks.
I said I can grow you somethingin six weeks and I'm going to
be massive.
He was about that length.
I said but I can grow yousomething in six weeks.
I said you want me to have abeard?
And he said that would be nice,do you mind?

(55:54):
I said no, I don't mind, it'sgreat.
I got home, I was inside, Iwasn't there long and my phone
rang again and it was the endagain and I said we got to stop
meeting like this, right?
And he said how do you feelabout long fingernails?
Oh, my God, I said what he said.

(56:16):
How do you feel about longfingernails?
I said I don't care why youwant me to have long fingernails
.
He said yes, I think that wouldbe fantastic.
I said all right, I haven'teven thought about this.
All I've done is cried andgiven you a bloody accident.

(56:37):
And now we're doing all this.
And he said I said why do youwant me to have long fingernails
?
He said well, I've got thisshot in mind because you will be
a suspect, because on that showeverybody was a suspect.
Obviously it was a who done it.
And I said yes.
He said I've got this shot inmind where I want to shoot past
your hand, which is holding awalking stick, to the police who

(57:02):
are talking to you, and I justthink I'd like to see those
talons as I shoot past your hand.
I said what you're fuckingsaying is you want me to have a
walking stick as well?
He said oh, do you mind?
And that was always a do youmind?
And I said no.

(57:23):
I said you know how much workyou've just saved me?
I said I had no idea what I wasgoing to do, but now you have
given me a character image.
Do you see what I'm saying here?
Suddenly, the outside went onand there it was.
All I now have to do wasdeliver the accent and the

(57:43):
emotions where necessary, andit's like instant character.
And I know you can say well,how about a business?
How about that?
The same thing applies.
The fact is, you can never getaway from you, and that's one of
the biggest mistakes actorsmake.
They think I'm playing someoneelse.

(58:04):
No, you're not.
If you were really playingsomeone else, there'd be a whole
bunch of white coded peoplecoming to take you away because
you'll be a menace of society.
You can only ever play you withthe emotions that you see fit,
not necessarily the emotions aswritten by the writer, because
that's the writer's emotions.
When this happens to you or yougo through this situation, I

(58:28):
don't do, and never have done,so called script analysis.
That comes later.
What I do is I attach anemotion to the scene and to the
character and I rehearse it withthat emotion.
Then I attach another.

(58:48):
There are five basic emotions.
We don't have time to go intothat at the moment.
Six perhaps actually.

David John Clark (58:57):
Can people can buy the book.

John Orcsik (58:59):
Yes, they will.
There's an entire chapterdevoted to it, which has already
been written.
It's about 15 pages, butexamining all those things.
But once you've attached theseemotions to the scene and to
both the characters, put it downand go away.
Come back 24 hours later andsee what has happened in your

(59:24):
subconscious, see where now yourimpulses and your instincts
point you to.
Now you can rationalize.
Now you can say yes, thatreally works, that works.
No, that doesn't work all thatwell, but this does.
Now I can put together theperformance.
But we tend to do it the otherway around.

(59:44):
We try and put together theperformance before we've
actually done the performance.
That's the basics of myapproach and I don't think that
any of that particularlyemotional recall where am I
going to get this from?
Truth in performance, oh my God, truth in performance.

(01:00:05):
I'm sorry, those things alwaysdrive me bananas and they are so
old fashioned, they belong to atheatrical era of the 1930s
that has stayed with us foreverand a day.
And because the teachers havestayed with us, and then one
after another, after another,and yeah, I'm not going to go

(01:00:27):
into it, but I mean it's justbecause people do what they want
to do If they want to teachthat, they can teach that.
If people want to learn that,they can.
I abhor my students or my actorswriting on their scripts.
Why do you want to write on thescripts?
The dialogue is there.
The first thing I do is I willread the script and I will read

(01:00:49):
the script a couple of times soI kind of have an idea of I am
interested in.
Do I have a story in my headand what is the sequence of
events in the story?
And then I'll go scene by sceneby scene by scene and in each
scene.
I'm not going to work out allthose.
Who am I as a?
What am I as?
Where am I feeling?

(01:01:10):
It's no substitution, none ofthat stuff.
And I'll tell you who taught methis.
It was not I wish I was say, itwas my idea that it's not.
It was the wonderful GeorgeMelody who I worked with for
quite a few years, one timeanother and George and I became
friends Again.
George has said you no longerwith us With cop shop.
It was that hard, the pressurewas hard.

(01:01:31):
I had to learn so many lines andI'd never done that before on a
constant basis, week in, weekout, and I was going to leave
the show, I said no, I can'thandle this.
So George asked me to go to hisplace and I said I can't come
over.
Anyway, I've got too much to do.
He said come over and he taughtme how this can happen and work

(01:01:51):
, and without me losing it oranything else.
I said you get all the scriptssix weeks in advance.
I said yep.
He said good, read them alltwice.
Take a day out on a Sunday toread them all.
Don't do anything else, justread them.
And he said then look at whatyou're going to do next week.
He said once you've read themand read all the scripts, you

(01:02:16):
now have a story in your head.
You know what your story is forthe next six weeks.
I said yep.
And he said then now, then goback and read what next week's
episode is that you're going tobe shooting.
So I do this and read that.
Read, never learn.
I don't learn lines, neverlearn.
Read.

(01:02:36):
And I read them through.
He said now pull out your scenesand put them in chronological
order.
You're not going to be shootingin chronological order, because
that's not going to happen.
Scene one you may shoot onFriday and not on Monday.
He said but chronological ordermatters, because you again will

(01:02:57):
have this week's story in yourhead.
You know what you're going tobe doing.
Now read them scene after sceneafter scene.
Now put all that away.
And I said yep, and now learnthe lines.
He says no, now you know thelines, and he's right.
I pull out the scene fortomorrow that I'm doing, or two

(01:03:19):
or three, and look at them, oneat a time only, and I know what
I've read.
I've read it now so many times.
Oh yeah, that's what I'm doingand I know what I'm saying.
I've applied some emotionaldetail to all those things.
I don't have to go to thetrouble of going.
Now tell me, where are we onthe night of the fourth?

(01:03:39):
It's already there.
Now I've just got to applymyself and attach myself.
Mike Giorgio was me in many ways.
I'm not Greek, but I'm notAustralian, I'm European.
I was a martial artist.
Mike Giorgio was a martialartist.

(01:04:01):
I was this, I was that.
There were so many things thatbelong to Mike, that belong to
me and in all other charactersthat I've played, and so does
everybody else.
They belong to you and that youmake them belong to you.
You do the study.
I go well, I'm playing, I'mplaying, I'm playing a doctor,
I'm playing a physician, I'm aphysician, I'm playing there.

(01:04:23):
And again you go back to whatare the physical things that I
have to do physically and thenthe rest will just come to you.
You can never get away fromDavid.
This is what I'm saying.
As an actor, I can't get awayfrom me.
I can get dressed in a millionkind of different outfits, but I

(01:04:47):
can never get away from me.
And as long as I don't try andbecome that nonsense, I will
still be that.
You will still believe me asthat character.
Do you understand what I'msaying?

David John Clark (01:05:03):
Yeah, I do.
I'm taking so much away fromthis.
It's fantastic, it's.
You know, we get into our headsso much, and there's especially
with the internet, and there'sso many courses, there's so many
books, there's so many peopleyelling and screaming at you do
this, do it my way, learn fromthis.
You have to.
This is how you do it write onyour script, and I need to go
back to where I was, where Istarted.

(01:05:24):
I started on a very similarapproach with you.
I've never written on myscripts.
I learned a lot of my beliefsfrom Jeff Seymour.

John Orcsik (01:05:32):
Jeff is a great guy and his book is a very good
book.
I don't agree with everything,but nor should I but, and nor do
you agree with everything Iwould have written.
But but yes, it's a very goodbook and it makes terrific sense
.
The Real Love Act is a verygood book.
I recommend it highly.

David John Clark (01:05:49):
And I think, just everything that you've just
said in the last couple ofminutes, I'm going to go back
and listen to it myself, andeveryone listening to the
podcast should really just divedown into it, because I think
there's so much in that Irecommend I recommend two other
books to you, david, just see ifI can see them there very

(01:06:09):
quickly.

John Orcsik (01:06:09):
One is called how to Stop Acting.
It's a wonderful book, and theother is the Science of Onscreen
Acting.
I think, and just can youexcuse me for two secs Certainly
, certainly.
Yep, I recommend four booksreally, and Jeff's is one of
them.
The other one is HaroldGuskin's book how to Stop Acting

(01:06:32):
.

David John Clark (01:06:34):
I have seen that one.
I don't have it myself, but Ihave seen that one.

John Orcsik (01:06:38):
And the other one a little more complex, but this
one, the Science of OnscreenActing, by Andrea Morris.
This is a fantastic book,absolutely brilliant.
Okay, that's a new one.
And I also think, combined withall that, everybody, but
everybody, should read thewriter's journey.

David John Clark (01:07:00):
I have heard of that one.
I've heard it's a very, verygood book.

John Orcsik (01:07:02):
It is not just for writers, but it's also for
actors.
What it makes you understand iswhat's important is not who
you're playing, but what yourfunction is.
What's your function in thestory Once you can nail that
down?
Or what is your function at anyone particular point?

(01:07:22):
Not who you are.
What is your function?
My function in this scene is togive you the shits.
For example, not because I'm abad person, not because I'm
going to be an ugly guy, notbecause I'm going to be bad.
But they said no.
My function here in this sceneis to frighten you.
That's it.
It's that simple.

(01:07:44):
So I will play the scenewithout in mind Nothing else.
Or my function here is to lureyou into something.
Function is almost moreimportant, because the character
won't change.
You are the character.
You can't change the story.
Look, the story starts here andfinishes there.
That's the story.
You can't change that.
The author has written thestory.

(01:08:05):
How you tell the story is up toyou, and each actor will tell
the story differently, but it'llbe the same story.
That's what's important.
Love it.

David John Clark (01:08:16):
Beautiful David.
Thank you very much.

John Orcsik (01:08:19):
I think so Anytime mate.

David John Clark (01:08:20):
Thank you very much.
Is there anything you want toend the show with?
Anything you want to say to myguests?

John Orcsik (01:08:28):
Well, if they're here, I mean you know, hop onto
our website and have a look.
Basically, that's what I'msaying Look at our website.
We have got a course that isgoing to be beginning in early
February next year and it's 30weeks, three 10 weeks semesters,
three full days a week, and weguarantee you will have an agent

(01:08:52):
at the end of it and, in fact,probably in the beginning.
But you will learn more.
As someone said and I believeit's true and I'm not pumping
myself up or anything someonecame and said to me I learned
more here in the week than I didin the entire two years.
I did someone else, wow.

David John Clark (01:09:16):
I mean, everything I've done with Taft
has always been brilliant, andI've sat in a room with you
yourself as you know so I alwayswalk away.

John Orcsik (01:09:24):
Well, david, you know, I think that the more you
also begin to realise thatacting is simple, it's child's
play.
And when I say child's play,because that's what children do.
They don't ask questions, theydon't get in their heads, they
tell the story as they feel itand they see it and they move on

(01:09:46):
and they can go from oneemotion to the next and not
worry about where did that comefrom?
How did I get that?
Oh my God, that's us.
Once you're in your head, it'svery hard to get out of it, and
that's the whole point abouteverything.
And that's the trouble with allthe other complexities.
It's not complex.

(01:10:06):
Acting is simple.
You know, and don't worry.
In the scene that I'm doing nowwith you, I'm not going to care
what happened four scenes ago.
I'm only focusing on this scene, right now at this moment, this
is the only moment that matters.
The moments that happened tomake this happen.

(01:10:27):
Oh my God, you wouldn't thinkabout that.
Why?
That's the story.
You're the writer or thedirector.
Now, the director has to thinkabout all those things, right,
of course, but not you.
Your simple job is to deliveryou, here and now, with
something that you feel, not see, not think about, not

(01:10:48):
articulate, but something thatyou sometimes can't articulate.
And something just happens, asyou'll find, with Harold Guskin
in that book, and he says justtry and do it differently.
I had a very good friend of mine, who sadly is no longer with us
in LA, and he used to rehearsehis people and say I just want

(01:11:10):
you to do all the cartoon voicesyou can think of with this
scene.
I don't want you to do anythingelse, just all the cartoon
voices.
Focus on those.
And everyone did On thefocusing of those.
They then suddenly knew thelines.
They absorbed a whole bunch ofstuff that they didn't even know
Subliminally.
You know that happened, yes.
And then you produce it, takeafter take after take, but each

(01:11:33):
take is slightly differentanyway.
No two takes are ever the same,I think I'm sure.
Thank you, david.

David John Clark (01:11:41):
Thank you, and just quickly, john, when's the
book due?
Do you have a title on it yet?

John Orcsik (01:11:45):
Yeah, yeah, I'm at the moment.
I'm writing a sitcom at themoment because I'm doing a
course starting in January.
Well, it's comedy capers too.
The first one was on sketchcomedy and this is a course in
SIDCOM that I'm writing thesitcom for the course.
So be fun.

(01:12:06):
Thank you, David.

David John Clark (01:12:07):
Wonderful.
All right, John.

John Orcsik (01:12:09):
Thank you very much .

David John Clark (01:12:09):
It's been an absolute pleasure and, ladies
and gentlemen, you can checkJohn out at taftacomau.

John Orcsik (01:12:15):
Thanks a lot.

David John Clark (01:12:16):
Thank you very much.

John Orcsik (01:12:17):
Yes, you're welcome .
See you later, thanks.

David John Clark (01:12:20):
Thank you.