Playing Attorney on Procedural Drama TV or in Hollywood Film.

Confidence in playing an attorney on TV is crucial. I don't like to use the word 'arrogant'—but I'm going to. They have a kind of strut to work in front of a jury, there has to be a self-assured willingness to put themselves out there, in front of people, persuading, and selling themselves for the client so they're always on. Self-deprecation is not a trait common among trial attorneys. Attorneys, if they're good, always think they're going to win. They have to. So I think an actor playing an attorney has to have that mindset. Courtroom drama offer a gold mine of scenarios that can help actors break through their own obstacles and move forward with greater confidence," Giving actors "conflict-driven scenes and improv from real and fictional (stage, television, and film) settings to master is a unique opportunity for actors to become the most direct, authentic performers they can be." Working with legal material helps actors break through obstacles and move forward with confidence. Like attorneys, actors perform on multiple levels. No matter what their deep-down personal feelings about the client, defense attorney, for example, are paid to convince judge and jury of the client's innocence. Inside, they may feel their client is as guilty as hell. Similarly, actors in performance must relentlessly pursue a goal, using various acting techniques to convince, persuade, entice—whatever is necessary to achieve that goal. Whatever confused or contradictory emotions the character is feeling inside are usually not something to be overtly revealed or shared; that's the subtext. What does give your character depth? That makes sense to me. The experience of needing to appear absolutely sincere and convincing in a high-stakes situation when you're feeling conflicted internally ought to be very useful for actors. It reminds me of an exercise I once did in an acting class: You tell your classmates one thing that's true about yourself and one thing that's false. The idea is to make sure they can't tell which is which. It's about committing to a truth for that moment. Subscribe to a particular version of reality, and actors playing attorneys better sell themselves in the courtroom. People may be lying and think it's the truth, or they may know they're lying on some level but have to present it as the truth—which is a moral conundrum for the lawyer. But for an actor, this is the beauty of it: There's no moral dilemma. You can play anyone, from Mary Poppins to Hitler, and you've got to subscribe to the emotional truth of that character and believe in whatever fictional construct you have created. A real-life courtroom drama, is a fine example of a situation with palpable subtext. Nowadays, due to the economy, there are fewer trials; issues are often settled out of court. So when there is a trial, you have to assume things have gotten extreme and all civility has broken down. Yet the attorney has to be civil to the judge (contrary to what is seen on TV, lawyers don't scream at judges) and to the colleague across the aisle. Powerful emotions are reined in; language is unfailingly polite. The way Attorney's behave in film and on TV does not, from experience, represent the way they behave in real life. There's a great diversity among attorneys in how they behave and present themselves. They come in a wide variety of packages and personalities and have to be confident characters. If you're a good actor in general, you know how to hold on to some internal conflict. Understanding how to persuade to get what you want. In regard to the more technical aspects of playing a lawyer. When judging legal shows, actors have to convince the audience that they remotely understand the context of the lines they're saying. Presumably that criterion could be applied to any profession represented onscreen. Actors playing attorneys have to least vaguely understand the technical legal jargon they're spouting out. I wondered if there were any way that an actor could go seriously wrong in depicting a lawyer. There's a stereotypical choice that's dangerous, There's a fine line between arrogance and humanity in playing a trial attorney. A trial attorney has to have audacity. Audacity that you can't believe you'll lose, but the audience has to believe there's a chance you will.

-Rajeev Pahuja