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Length: ~2hr30min, 20 lessons

My rating: ★★★★★ (5/5)

My one-liner takeaway: Acting is an exercise in empathy, so being good at it requires you to be sensitive to your character, the crew, and the environment you’re in.

Natalie notes that her young start into acting allowed her to take on the perspective of a learner more naturally, given the lower expectations everyone had from what a child might know. She encourages us to take on the same perspective, absorbing information like a sponge. In order for her performance on camera to flow comfortably, she spends a lot of time researching, even citing YouTube as a reliable source of learning. She strongly emphasizes focusing on the psychological arc of the character, the dynamic between the other characters and yours, and how your character thinks the other characters are thinking of you. It’s apparent that while others may be playing one-dimensional checkers, Natalie’s playing three-dimensional chess. I later learned she has a degree in psychology from Harvard. Makes sense.

Natalie’s course is full of extremely practical tips, even with a set of exercises that can be implemented by anyone who hopes to be a better actor. She’s extremely good at articulating complexity, and it feels like she’s speaking casually to a friend at times. One of my favorite moments is an actual demo in a fictional scene that Masterclass set up. She acts and breaks the fourth-wall occasionally to provide commentary on why she did something. The course really showed me that it’s not like the camera starts rolling and magic just happens with the people on set. There’s a whole lot of thought to every decision, an entire process for understanding your character’s mindset, how they may use props, and how they want to represent themselves inwardly vs outwardly. Acting can seem like a very abstract art form, but in this course Natalie helps provide a layer of almost scientific thought to the craft.

If you’d like to hear it directly from Natalie, check out her course here. As of now there are over 100 instructors to learn from, with more being added every week!

This review is part of a larger series, where I try learning from every single course within the catalog. Find my full list here.