Acting Tips For Villains and Antagonistic Characters
An antagonist isn’t always the villain. An antagonist is simply the opposing force against the protagonist. If the protagonist is a thief, the antagonist could be the police, even if they are actually the good guys in the story.
Antagonist Acting Tips to Make Your Performance Realistic
Tip #1 Know where you’re coming from. Antagonists need a reason to be who and what they are, and especially so if they’re the bad guy as well. Its easy to make the audience hate you if you’re playing a zombie or a demon, but what if you’re playing Hannibal Lecter, a well-educated man who turned crazy and murderous somewhere along the way? You need to connect with your character to play your role as naturally as possible.
In other words, understand your character. You don’t need to profess love or hate for it, but you do need to understand your characters goals, motivation, and conflict.
Tip #2 The role of an antagonist is to create and stimulate conflict. It’s your job to make the protagonists life difficult so every step you take should be focused on attaining that goal. That is your primary purpose and if you’ve made the protagonists life hell then you’ve done your job!
Tip #3 Have fun. There are certain antagonistic roles where you can simply have fun being bad. Being an antagonist doesn’t always have to be dark and gloomy. Obviously, roles like the Riddler or a nasty Leprechaun prove that true. If you don’t think being seriously evil will match your role then explore other alternatives like being gloriously evil or hilariously bad. A change of perspective could save you from a lackluster performance!
Tip #4 Be angry for your character. The first tip tells you to find the reason why your antagonist has to do what he’s doing. If he’s a terrorist, you need to know why he finds it acceptable to throw bombs and kill hundreds of people. Now, once you’ve found that reason, keep it close and never let it go until the whole things under wraps.
Understanding the reason will get you started, but its nursing the resentment inside you that will sustain the level of performance you need for the rest of the film or show.
Tip #5 Be prepared for physical torture. On camera, you might be the one doing the butchering but off camera, its you who’s going to be tortured by the makeup artists and costume designers. A lot of antagonists in films require a change in looks and usually for the worse which could mean being baked alive under dozens of pounds worth of makeup and prosthetics.