TTKWQ Chapter 13

“It’s fine, it’s fine! By receiving this genius child actress Nana-chan’s lessons for five minutes a day, you can become a famous actress while sleeping!”

“Eh, really…!?”

With a smile that covered my whole face and a thumbs up, the Kotori-san, who was hanging her head in shame and crying, showed a surprised expression and raised her head.

“It’s a joke though…”

Those three made a fool of themselves. They’re gullible.

“Acting has some little tricks to it. Remember this if you want to become more skilled.”

“Uh, umm… The disappearing thing, is it okay if I don’t learn it…?”

“It’s fine! That was a joke; it really was just CG. I can say with confidence that it’s computer graphics. There is no way for an ordinary human to disappear.”

With a laugh, I continued, “That’s right, normally people aren’t able to disappear…” and Kotori-san was convinced. Like shindou-sensei, I can do things that aren’t normal for the rest of humanity, but let’s just stay silent.

“Even me, I can become good at acting… I hope?”

“You’re completely fine! Just leave it to genius child actress Nana-chan!”

And, while laughing with a smug face, I pick up Kotori-san’s hand, and she showed a frail smile. From some time ago, she stopped crying and started to smile.

Yep, it’s better for girls to smile.

…But, what do I do?

I was bluffing when I said that acting skill can be raised with some little tricks. If it was like that, then going to lessons wouldn’t be necessary, and people wouldn’t go through such hardships. Constantly taking lessons is necessary.

Though, there are some people that are geniuses and can do it naturally.

Besides, I called myself a genius child actor to persuade Kotori-san, but, now that she calmed down, I’m embarrassed. I know I’m called that in the media, but it’s not good to call myself that. Like the middle-aged man who called himself a great detective.^[1]

However, no person learns from self-confidence, but those who learned how to do something from a person filled with self-confidence will also have self-confidence in doing what they learned.

The thing most necessary for Kotori-san is “self-confidence.”

To add self-confidence to Kotori-san, let’s act as a clown.

…Yes, I’m only acting as a clown, but can you stop looking at me with a lukewarm gaze and laughing, Shinosaki-san.^[2]

“It’s okay, Nana is a genius child actor.”

“Somehow, I don’t feel like I’m being praised, is it just my imagination?”

“It’s your imagination, genius child actor-san.”

Gununu… How long will she tease me with this joke material?

The other party’s manager guided me to the lesson room that was as big as a classroom. There was a one-way window so you could see the lesson room from outside.

In that class, there were other idols that seemed to be assembled to learn for their first time. It was soundproofed and I couldn’t hear any voices, but I could see that they were having fun. Somehow, I felt like I was looking at a panda in a zoo.^[3]

“Sorry, Nana-chan will teach here. People in the way will have to leave.”

“No, it’s fine. Real shooting’d give a similar feeling, so let’s do it as it is.”

Momiji-san said that, but, in a real shooting, there are cameras, a director, staff, lighting, voices, and, when filming in town, there are curious onlookers surrounding us. People’s eyes had better become used to lessons.

Well,for popular idols, I think that they’re already used to it since they have live concerts where an audience is looking at them.

Today, besides Kotori-san, I’m teaching Isumi-san and Momiji-san. There are three students. Actually, there were more applicants, but Shinosaki-san made the conclusion that having many students was like putting the cart before the horse, so I only taught Kotori-san and her unit.

Even so, I’m mainly teaching Kotori-san, and the other two are just here to watch.

“A confirmation before starting the lesson, but has Kotori-san cleared the original work, ‘My Name’?”

“Yes, I cleared the game 3 times.”

That’s amazing. The novel game has an amazing volume, for it has a playtime of nearly 100 hours.^[4] One time was the limit for me, and I even tried doing it on mobile, but I wasn’t able to finish. Finally, during other shootings, I cleared it during breaks. It takes a while to listen to the full voicetrack, doesn’t it? I skipped over the voice to finish it quickly, however.

“Really good. You’ll have no problem in understanding then.”

She’ll have it easy in regards to the original work.

She doesn’t have to listen to the director about the original work, and she can do without most of the script. The script will differ from the original work, but the true heart of the lines won’t. But, the completed movie was very well done; it’s surprising that it has yet to win a prize.

“Then, when acting a role, you have to be able to have a precise understanding of the heroine of ‘My Name’…”

I gave the heroine’s profile away.

“Umm, I don’t get what this ‘sundere’ is…”^[5]

Nervously, Kotori-san asked that. The heroine of “My Name”‘s first trait is being a tsundere. However, “What’s a tsundere?” The definitions are many, and it’s something that religious wars are fought over.

At the beginning they are tsuntsun,^[6] and, when they fall in love, they become a deredere.^[7] That is a “tsundere.” In front of others, they act tsuntsun, and, when the two of them are alone, they are deredere.

“Kotorin, a ‘tsundere’ is like Isumin.”

“Haa!?”

I was about to be worried over explaining the definition of a tsundere, but Momiji-san put her arm on Isumi-san’s shoulder with a smug face. At the tsundere statement, Isumi-san raised her voice in protest, “You’re always so direct, like at our first meeting! “I’ll stretch my legs~” you said, you’re always so meddlesome, and you’re an awkward yet a good child!”

“Nanana, I can’t hear you!”

“In spite of being Nana-chan’s fan, but because of Kotorin, we made it difficult. Well, that’s basically what friends are for, muguu.”

Momiji-san’s mouth was clammed up by Isumi-san’s two hands, and Momiji-san went, “Waa! Waa!” with a loud voice while her face turned red. Both her mouth and nose were covered; I wonder if she’s okay.

I said, “So, with this, it’s easy to get the tsundere image through Isumi-san.”

“I see… But, sometimes there’s words like, ‘thx,’ or, ‘btch’ that I don’t really get…”^[8]

“Ahh, those are net slang, they mean, “thank you,” and “dog-like person,” I think?”^[9]

The heroine sometimes uses net slang, but I’m not very knowledgeable about that area. Though, I know her nuances for some reason.

“That’s basically ‘thanks.’  The other one is basically ‘b*tch.’ For no real reason, they became popular slang words.”

Without me noticing, the situation reversed, and Momiji-san armlock’d Isumi-san and added that to the conversation. The voice-trained Isumi-san let out a painful cry in a voice that a girl should never use.

Being noisy, Momiji said, “Don’t do more than that,” while broadly grinning and laughing.

“…In conclusion, there’s many connections between the words.”

“Hoe~, it’s useful.”

“…Kotori-san, people use net slang like everyday; it’s pathetic so you better stop.”

Momiji-san ended her explanation, and Kotori-san slowly got what the true message was. She remembered back in her middle school days when she happily spoke words like that, but she was told repeatedly that she was an otaku in a train, that bad experience.

“Eh!? Acting needs to use words like that, who would’ve thought…”

“To understand acting you need to completely act as your role, but because of acting your role almost everyday, please be careful not to become mentally sick.”

Yes, that was written in a book that I recently read.

However, although I have been acting everyday, I don’t have any problems.

Well, I started acting at 3, and I’m originally an adult. Since I’ve been acting professionally and acting as a young female, I probably developed a resistance.

Come to think about it,^[10] back then, when I was teaching him acting almost everyday, he showed signs of mental instability. I see.

“In acting, there are ‘roles that match with you’ and ‘roles that you try to match,’ but, this time, it’s bad since it’s the latter. Because Kotori-san’s personality is different.”

A “roles that match with you” example would be the famous idol in, “Wait for Me.”^[11] In roles that match with the actor, it’s easier to act more skillfully and naturally.

Nonetheless, being able to act naturally isn’t that easy, though.

I think that the reason that Kotori-san didn’t perform well in part one is that she had to act as a completely different character for the first time.

Visually, Kotori-san has a similar image to the heroine, and she had a meek and a good-child personality. Nevertheless, she was told to act as a tsundere all of a sudden and could only show crude acting because of that, I think.

No, that was the reality.

“It’s really difficult to act; all the time, the director gets angry and calls for a retake…”

“It’s fine, I’ve prepared secret skills! Ta-da!”

While saying some sound effects, I pulled out 2 DVDs from my pouch.

“From past to present, from east to west, I have assembled scenes with tsundere-like characters from famous movies! Next time, I’ll have a third disc just about acting!”

“””Ohh~~!”””

“But, I won’t use it today.”

“””Ehh~~!?”””

All three of them are gullible. Do you train using variety programs?

“When today’s lesson ends, please use these teaching materials. By the way, Shinosaki-san collect all these scenes from the movies overnight. Now, applause!”

The three people clapped with a pachipachi sound, and I raised my glasses with my middle finger as if shy.^[12]

“Today, I’ll show you an example, so please copy the acting there. Keep in mind about this video when filming.”

There were 2 TVs of about 40 inches. Also, there was a video camera on a tripod that was wired to a laptop so the recordings could be played on the TV.

There were 2 TVs, so we could use our eyes to compare them.

By the way, the two TVs were prepared by Iroha, but the video camera and laptop were my private things. The laptop couldn’t be connected to the TV because of bad ease-of-use from the developers.

“Umm, my earlier teacher taught me, ‘don’t copy others; take out originality,’ so…”

“Ahh, at the beginning, that’s not necessary. Things like originality can be used to progress when trial-and-error is okay. The shortcut to progress is to copy. It’s the same as drawing; at first you copy others to quickly improve.”

There are many teachers with a artistic characters from theatrical backrounds. Even if they say to do your own acting without imitating others, it’d be hard for a layman to act. And, I have a video camera, so I can correct each little detail. With that, I can teach acting even without understanding how to properly conduct a lesson.

In order to copy acting, if they can’t look at it objectively, it isn’t quite right. To see themselves objectively, it’s best to film with a video camera then check.

And, by constantly comparing themselves to a reference and thinking on what’s different, by trial-and-error, they can act in a short time.

From then, talent is important, and there’s no choice but to steadily take lessons and pile up on experience.

“And so, first, I’ll show a sample. After you see it, please copy the acting.”

[1] Detective Conan? 名探偵を自称するおっさん並だ this sentence is confusing, anyone know? [Sera: I don’t recall D.C. being so self-complimentary. Might be Sherlock Holmes?]
[2] Lukewarm gaze: 生暖かい目 means looking at someone with curiosity, not with encouragement or being supportive attitude, not with critical or judgmental attitude, somewhere in the middle.
[3]