A friend once invited me to her company’s production of a very long (and not-so-engaging) one-man play, which was performed in the producer’s living room. Apparently, I was the only one in the audience who didn’t love the production, and I very quickly had to come up with a compliment. (Since I was a friend of a friend and everyone else knew each other, the easiest ice breakers were “What did you think of the play?” and “Wasn’t that amazing?!?”) The line I went with was “Wow; how did he memorize all of those lines?” It’s a tougher compliment to get away with if you are a performer or if the role is small, but you can always go with something generic, like “He/She looked so different / confident / natural / comfortable on stage.” If you are talking to the performer, feel free to quickly sidetrack the conversation to focus on the specifics of the research (“How did you create the emotional backstory to portray a homicidal robot spider?” or the process (“How long did you have to work on memorization?”).
If this happens to you a lot, it doesn’t hurt to read up on the psychology of facial expressions (see Dr. Matsumoto & Dr. Eckman), to be able to more easily prevent pain and fear from creeping onto your face, while talking.
I agree with m. Otherwise there might be a following question like: why do you think it is an accomplishment? I would say first what I liked about it and then what I don’t really get in a respectful way.
Swissmiss is an online garden Tina Roth Eisenberg started in 2005 and has lovingly tended to ever since.
Besides swissmiss, Tina founded and runs TeuxDeux, CreativeMornings and her Brooklyn based co-working community Friends Work Here. (She also started Tattly which was recently adopted by BIC)
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I work with artists and sometimes after a performance, well… I don’t know what to say. Now I know! Thanks!
:)
xxx,
E.
http://www.theslowpace.com
Oct 22nd, 2013 / 2:17 am
Maybe it’s best when there’s nothing nice to say, don’t say anything at all.
Oct 22nd, 2013 / 6:48 am
Sounds so familiar. o_O
Oct 22nd, 2013 / 7:44 am
Tina, thanks on that!
We’ve quoted it on our Facebook here:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10151648954760776&set=a.127861615775.115458.96356535775&type=1&theater
Oct 22nd, 2013 / 8:08 am
Thanks for this!
A friend once invited me to her company’s production of a very long (and not-so-engaging) one-man play, which was performed in the producer’s living room. Apparently, I was the only one in the audience who didn’t love the production, and I very quickly had to come up with a compliment. (Since I was a friend of a friend and everyone else knew each other, the easiest ice breakers were “What did you think of the play?” and “Wasn’t that amazing?!?”) The line I went with was “Wow; how did he memorize all of those lines?” It’s a tougher compliment to get away with if you are a performer or if the role is small, but you can always go with something generic, like “He/She looked so different / confident / natural / comfortable on stage.” If you are talking to the performer, feel free to quickly sidetrack the conversation to focus on the specifics of the research (“How did you create the emotional backstory to portray a homicidal robot spider?” or the process (“How long did you have to work on memorization?”).
If this happens to you a lot, it doesn’t hurt to read up on the psychology of facial expressions (see Dr. Matsumoto & Dr. Eckman), to be able to more easily prevent pain and fear from creeping onto your face, while talking.
Oct 22nd, 2013 / 2:53 pm
I agree with m. Otherwise there might be a following question like: why do you think it is an accomplishment? I would say first what I liked about it and then what I don’t really get in a respectful way.
Oct 23rd, 2013 / 2:28 pm
this made me smile today! :D x http://drawnandsewed.blogspot.com
Oct 23rd, 2013 / 4:23 pm