“The best research for playing a drunk is being a British actor for 20 years” – Michael Caine
It is never advisable to get drunk in order to play a drunk, it is dangerous and disrespectful.
I have known many an actor to stink of booze during Act Two, after a snifter in the interval, I’ve worked with actors who have a cheeky bottle of gin in the dressing room to steady the nerves before curtain up, I’ve even been in a production of Lear where Cordelia was afraid to be carried on in the last scene by a Lear who was, more often than not, sozzled!
It’s not easy acting opposite a drunk, but what is equally difficult is acting drunk when you are 100% sober!
A man’s true character comes out when he’s drunk.
There are many plays which require you to act ‘three sheets to the wind’. In ‘Abigail’s Party’ the entire cast knock back a fair bit of booze, the character Sue drinks so much that she is throwing up as the curtain falls on Act One. In Laura Wade’s ‘Posh’ the Bullingdon Boys binge away for the entire play! In ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf’ we see the character of Martha, a seasoned drinker, go from witty and entertaining in Act One to vicious and argumentative in Act Two and then sad and contemplative in the final Act.
Acting Tips for playing drunk
If you are in a play you are going to need stamina and technique to successfully portray a drunk 8 times a week, it is so easy to fall into caricature.
The first piece of advice anyone will tell you is ‘To act drunk you need to pretend not to be drunk’ – there is a lot of truth in this, to convincingly play a drunk you may need to use some reverse psychology as very often a drunk is actually trying very hard to ‘act sober’.
Here are some other factors you need to finesse if you are going to act like a convincing drunk.
How to Act Drunk – Physically & Vocally
Here are some acting tips for when your character has to be drunk during a performance
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Try not to be drunkThis is the classic advice, and will probably help you most times you are going to have to act drunk in a play. The character is likely to be fighting against appearing drunk and trying to appear sober. A drunk who is aware that their motor skills are not in the best shape will overcompensate and be precise in everything they do. Slowing down and over concentration on others and your actions can help massively. -
RelaxAlcohol depresses the central nervous system, there are countless stories of drunks falling down and injuring themselves and it is only the next morning when the booze wears off that they realise just how painful that fall was! Booze puts you in a state of relaxation, so perhaps think about how you feel after a heavy tranquiliser to get you tension free.
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SlurringSlurring is a symptom of being drunk, but does the playwright want their words not to be understood by the audience? I don’t think so, and slurring is usually the easiest route to caricature. Imagine how it feels after you have been to the dentist and had an injection in your mouth, your tongue is relaxed. A drunk will usually overcompensate if they think they are slurring, so add to your slur some over-enunciating and slowing down of speech.
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Don’t stand your groundAlcohol will impair your balance, we all know that feeling of the room spinning when we are laying down after a heavy night. When I have acted drunk I have found that by taking some of my weight off just one of my feet I have been able to have that slight sway of a drunk man.
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Don’t keep boundariesBe sloppy and reckless! Most drunks are unaware of the spectacle they are making of themselves. Being over confident, overly familiar, messier and louder are all the behaviour of a drunk.
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Concentrate on the simpleA clear way to signpost you are drunk is to try too hard at doing something which the audience knows is easy. Using a corkscrew, buttoning up your jacket, or trying to pour a glass of wine can all become hugely complicated tasks when you are p*ssed!
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Make the normal difficultJust like concentrating on the simple can signpost a drunk, you could also have difficulty doing basic human movements. Walking in a straight line can be tricky, your knees can buckle slightly when you are standing still, your neck can become rubber and cause your head to fall and snap back into place just like when you are falling asleep on a train! Look for the unusual in the usual.
The emotional drunk – Acting Tips for playing drunk
All of the above will help you to physicalise and vocalise the characteristics of a drunk, but you are an actor and as you know a huge amount of your work is emotional – the character’s emotional journey.
It is important you ask yourself why the writer has chosen to make your character drunk, what are they saying about the character and what is the character revealing about themselves and others.
Martha in Who’s Afraid of Virgina Woolf (above video) is a seasoned drunk and over the course of the play she journeys through different stages of being drunk – your character will fall into one or more of the stages of drunkenness, it is important you understand and explore their emotional journey.
How to Act Drunk – Emotionally
There are four types of emotional drunks and you can switch from one to the other or maintain one during your whole drunk scene, act or the entire play!
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AloofA wise man once said that you know you are drunk when you feel sophisticated but you just could not pronounce it! Aloof drunks attempt to rise above the sloppy effects of alcohol, they have a sense of detachment, they think they are witty, elegant, flamboyant and are usually both blunt and confident. -
HappyA happy drunk is one who is revelling in their state. They know that they are p*ssed and are damn happy being in that state! A happy drunk is celebrating the lack of inhibitions that the alcohol has given him or her. They will laugh a little too hard and too long, normally at their own jokes, they think everyone is their best mate, and they will willingly jump into whatever activity will bring more fun their way.
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AngryAn angry drunk is dangerous and volatile, they are on the edge of an explosion and woe betide anyone who comes on the receiving end of their wrath! They are sneering, bitter, hostile and sinister – everything and everyone is grim and disgusting to an angry drunk.
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MaudlinThe world is too painful for a maudlin drunk, the drink is numbing the pain and upset of the real world. Good and bad things can upset the maudlin drunk. They are sentimental, weepy, on the edge of a breakdown, and usually nostalgic.
Look for why your character is drunk, and why the playwright has made your character drunk – the clues as to what kind of drunk you should be are all there in the script.
Do your homework and honour the text.
Do your homework and honour the text.
The dangers of ‘acting drunk’!
Eugene O’ Neill’s The Iceman Cometh is perhaps the booziest play of all time, set in Harry’s Bar – described by O’Neill as: “a cheap gin-mill of the five-cent whiskey, last-resort variety situated on the downtown West Side of New York.”
The play was staged in 1998 at the Almeida and Hugo Kalmar, the most drunk role in the play, was performed by Nigel Cook who spends most of the four hours of the drama passed out with his head on the table. Here he describes one of the dangers of too convincingly acting drunk:
I suppose it is quite a distinction to have played the drunkest character in the drunkest play in history, though in those circumstances the real challenge is to avoid falling asleep.
It did happen once, at a Monday performance after I’d spent the weekend visiting my father, and had a strange dream that he was appearing in the play alongside me.
Fortunately, I realised where I was before having to utter one of my half-a-dozen lines. But it was one of those occasions when playing drunk becomes a real wake-up call.
It did happen once, at a Monday performance after I’d spent the weekend visiting my father, and had a strange dream that he was appearing in the play alongside me.
Fortunately, I realised where I was before having to utter one of my half-a-dozen lines. But it was one of those occasions when playing drunk becomes a real wake-up call.
