How do actors and actresses learn to cry for scenes?

Question

It's alien to me as I have to be in earth-shattering emotional pain to cry at all. I have to see someone die, basically. How can actors do it?

Answer 1

The ability to do that is part of acting and a professional can do it with the snap of the fingers. They learn how to cry by disengaging themselves to become the person who is crying. It takes time to learn how to do that.

Answer 2

The one time I was called on to cry in an audition, I thought about my cat dying.

Answer 3

I have certain songs which I play over in my head if I need to cry. "The White Cliffs of Dover" and "My Sister and I" work every time.

Answer 4

Onions 🧅 on fingers, I take drama class

Answer 5

As cogito says it isn't necessary for an actor to actually cry in a scene.   They get into the emotions of the script and use them to appear to be crying.

The real trick to appear to cry is to mimic the things people do to stop from crying and the audience then believes the actor really is crying.

Answer 6

Crying on demand is always easy for me.  I’ve been in a lot of very stressful and sometimes sad situations.  I just have to draw it out when i need it

Answer 7

The don't actually cry, in most cases.  Good actors are just very skilled in making it look like they're crying, through their voice, facial expressions and physical movements.

Many actors can produce tears whenever they choose, but in TV shows and in movies, there are so many takes that few actors can produce enough real tears in a short space of time.  Also, many actors are unable to produce tears - it's not an essential requirement for actors.  They have make-up artists who add fake tears - it's very easy - or tears are added digitally during editing. For stage acting, the audience is usually too far away to see if there are any tears or not, and then it's all about excellent acting, convincing the audience that they're really weeping.

Answer 8

That is what makes a good actor in that they can make themselves project an emotion or mood almost at will.