How To Mime

One of the oldest form of theatre, miming has its roots in France. Though it had originated in the ancient era, miming is a popular art form even in recent times. It is the art, wherein, the body and facial expressions do the talking. Miming reflects the grace of the body in motions and pays close attention to the technicalities of expression. In it, the body showcases the emotion, moods and thought of a person without using the mouth. Right from religious rituals to street theatre and classical ballet, miming has made its marks everywhere. Though it may appear to be a simple task, miming requires lot of skill and practice to make it look real. In the following lines we have provided some of the tips to learn how to mime, realistically.

Learn Miming

The first step towards being a mime would be to understand the basic fact that a mime does not use his mouth for expression. Instead, it’s the body and the facial expression that does the talking.
Using a mirror, try different postures and expression. Make most of the replica to assess, which movement is the most successful in conveying emotions, feelings, attitudes and reactions.
Begin with the basic mime action that of manipulating a rope, ball or even wall. Walking in place, climbing imaginary ladders and leaning would also be beneficial in learning the art of miming.
Now, choose a particular action and master it. For instance, mime opening a door. For this, you need to first reach out for the door, hold the knob, turn it and then push the door open. Open a door, a couple of times in reality, to know the exact posture in which your body bends.
Thereafter, mime the whole action recreating every move but this time without the door.
Repeat the action, a number of times, until you have attained perfection.
Once you have mastered the art on physical grounds, i.e. performing the actions on imaginary basis, go a step further to make mime interesting.
For this, take charge of the facial expressions. Emotions give substance to the art of miming. Choose a situation that demand emotions as well. Enact this in front of the mirror and watch out what your face and body does to show emotions.
From a look of surprise to a feeling of disgust to strong emotional outbursts, mime each type of emotion until you become perfect in each sphere.
Now that you have mastered the art through both body and facial expression individually, combine the two to form a story. Reflect the story using your body and expressions.

Tips

Remember, practice makes a man perfect. So, practice hard to learn the art of miming.
Exaggeration holds the key for natural emotional display, when it comes to miming.
Start enacting small short stories that demand less emotional display. Once you have perfected them, plunge for complex stories that demand strong emotions.
Your hands and face are your trump card. Use them well but do not forget that posture also counts.
Make-up and attire would accentuate your performance. So, make sure you are dressed up in a way that suits the need of the story.

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