Acting and Performance for Animation

Chapter 2

Types of Performance

This chapter looks at the nature of performance, its history, and the way theories of acting have developed and how that is related to ideas of performance in animation. We examine the ways in which we can use performance ideas from theatre and cinema to add to what we do in animation and the things that animation can do that are not open to other media.

From its inception as a novelty to its current status as one of the world’s box office champions, animated cinema has developed alongside live-action cinema and has dealt with the same kinds of subject while creating its own special kind of appeal. Those who make the mistake of calling animation a “genre” are corrected in no uncertain terms; animated films have ...