There’s one in almost every story and the actors who play villains best make the camera and the audience root for them. By the way, that’s how villains get to be the leading characters in stories—they make the camera and the audience root for them. Oddly, some actors don’t want to play villains because they only want to play the kinds of roles which entail deep emotional conflict. Clever actors understand that this is what earns the actor who is playing a villain an Academy Award. Here are a few other things clever actors understand about how to create cinematic villains.
Villains love the sound of their own voices. What they do with their voices is often more unnerving than what they say with their words. They prefer controlled voices. They prefer textured voices. They like voices that can be soft and innocent one second and pure venom the next. They want voices that can seduce you or terrify you. They want their voices to be the ones you can’t get out of your head and they’re not afraid to speak so softly it feels like they’re lightly tapping on your brain. They want a voice that will chill the audience long after the audience has left the movie theater. To the villain, his or her
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