STEVE ANDERSON
ACTOR - DIRECTOR - COACH
FIELD NOTES
A notebook devoted to human behavior, performance, and the practice of paying attention.
Why Field Notes?
Long before I began teaching acting, or even acting, I found myself quietly watching people.
Coffee shops.
Airports.
Parks.
Waiting rooms.
Not to judge them, but to wonder about them.
Over the years, I realized those observations weren't just teaching me about people.
They were teaching me about acting.
About listening.
About relationships.
About how attention changes us.
Observation changes the observer. That's where truthful performance begins.
Years after she died, someone told me my grandmother had been the same way. She would sit and quietly watch people for hours. I was too young to notice it then. Looking back, I wonder if I inherited more than her eyes.
Please enjoy this small sample of Field Notes. Each begins with a simple observation from everyday life, followed by a few reflections on what it stirred in me as an actor, director, and teacher.
I'll be adding a new note each week, so I hope you'll stop by again.
These observations are slowly becoming a book—an acting book, yes, but also a quiet invitation to move through the world a little differently. Because our craft is nourished by attention. The more deeply we notice, the more deeply we experience. And from that experience, everything else has somewhere to live.
The Last Sip
He sat alone on the patio of a neighborhood coffee shop.
He looked to be in his late seventies or early eighties.
He was dressed with quiet care: comfortable shoes that almost resembled slippers, neatly pressed slacks, a button-down shirt beneath a soft tan vest, and a felt cap that looked as though it had been worn for years. Nothing about him called attention to itself. Everything felt gentle. Comfortable. Chosen.
An empty chair sat across from him.
He wasn't reading.
He wasn't looking at his phone.
He simply sat.
Every so often his eyes drifted to the chair opposite him, lingering there for a moment before returning to his coffee.
Eventually he lifted the cup and finished the last sip.
He looked inside for a second, noticing a small ring of foam clinging to the porcelain.
With one finger, he carefully gathered the remaining foam and brought it to his mouth.
Then he looked once more at the empty chair.
A long look.
Not searching.
Not waiting.
Just...looking.
He placed the cup gently on the saucer.
Sat quietly for another moment.
Then rose, adjusted his vest almost absentmindedly, and walked away.
Nothing happened.
And yet it felt as though I had just witnessed the end of something.
-Looking a Little Deeper-
What stayed with me wasn't the story.
It was the care.
Everything he did carried the same quality.
The way he dressed.
The way he held the cup.
The way he removed the last bit of foam instead of leaving it behind.
The way he looked at the empty chair before he stood to leave.
As actors, we're often tempted to think meaning comes from dramatic action or emotional display.
Sometimes it lives somewhere much quieter.
In the way someone sets down a coffee cup.
In the amount of time they spend looking at an empty chair.
In the care they bring to ordinary things.
If I were directing this scene, I wouldn't ask the actor to play grief.
I'd ask a few questions instead.
"Who taught you to wipe the last bit of foam from the cup?"
Perhaps no one.
Or perhaps it was his wife.
Maybe she always did it that way, and years later he finds himself doing the same thing without ever deciding to.
Sometimes we carry the people we've loved not only in our memories, but in our habits.
Suddenly, that tiny gesture becomes more than a gesture.
It becomes a relationship.
The feeling has somewhere to live.
If this were a film, the audience might already know the story. They may have watched this couple share coffee in this very café years earlier.
They may know she's gone.
The actor doesn't need to help us.
Once the audience understands the circumstance, the actor no longer has to explain it. They simply have to live inside it.
Instead of trying to express loss, the actor simply experiences the cup...the chair...the small ritual they've carried forward.
The emotional life grows naturally from that experience.
To me, that's the beginning of a textural journey.
The story isn't being carried by dialogue or emotion alone. It's being carried by the texture of the world—the weight of a coffee cup, the softness of a felt cap, the quiet care of wiping away the last bit of foam.
Those textures become places where memory, relationship, and longing can quietly live.
And when an actor experiences them truthfully, the audience doesn't simply understand the moment.
They begin to experience it too.
For me, that's one of the great joys of acting. Not trying to make an audience feel, but inviting them into an experience and allowing the feeling to arise there.
The Shaded Tree
A woman walked onto the patio of a coffee shop carrying a paperback tucked beneath her arm and an iced coffee.
She didn't hesitate long. She scanned the patio once, looking not just for a place to sit, but for a place to settle.
Most of the tables were in full sun.
A few sat close enough to neighboring conversations that privacy would be borrowed rather than owned.
Then, almost on cue, a couple stood up from a table beneath the largest tree on the patio.
Before they had even stepped away, she was moving.
Not rushing.
Certain.
She reached the table with quiet relief, pulled out the chair, and before sitting, gently rested her hand on the back of it for just a moment.
Then she lowered herself into the seat with unusual care.
She wasn't collapsing into a chair.
She was arriving somewhere.
She set her coffee and book down.
Looked up through the branches overhead.
Then smiled to herself.
Only then did she begin to read.
-Looking a Bit Deeper-
She didn't simply find a chair.
She found shade.
Privacy.
Time.
Permission to stay.
Actors often think relationships exist only between people.
But every moment of our lives is relational.
We have relationships with chairs.
With rooms.
With weather.
With the corner booth in our favorite café.
To one person, a chair is furniture.
To another, it's refuge.
If I were coaching this moment, I wouldn't ask an actor to play relief.
I'd ask them to discover what the chair is giving them.
Treat it with gratitude.
Receive it.
The audience doesn't need to be told what it means.
They'll feel the relationship.
The Flowers
I noticed them from across the parking lot. An Asian couple, probably in their forties, walking toward their car. He wore faded shorts and flip-flops. She wore a simple blouse, dark slacks, and low pumps. Nothing about them called attention to itself. They looked like any couple finishing an ordinary afternoon together.
What caught my attention wasn't who they were.
It was how differently they moved through the same world.
She walked in a perfectly straight line toward the car. Not hurried. Not impatient. Just steady. Efficient. Once she'd chosen her destination, her attention rarely wandered. She wasn't checking her phone, adjusting her purse, or glancing into shop windows. Her pace never changed.
He seemed incapable of walking past anything beautiful.
A flowering shrub caught his eye. He slowed to take it in, not with a passing glance, but with genuine curiosity, as though he wanted to see as much of it as the moment would allow. The light on the petals. The richness of the leaves. Something about it invited him to linger.
Then, smiling to himself, he jogged a few steps to catch up.
A few yards later it happened again.
This time it was the clouds.
She continued at exactly the same pace.
He paused.
Looked.
Smiled.
Then hurried after her once more.
Neither seemed bothered by the other's way of moving through the world.
She never looked back to hurry him.
He never asked her to stop.
By the time they reached the corner, he'd caught up one last time.
Softly, almost absentmindedly, he reached for her hand.
Without breaking stride, she took it.
Together they disappeared around the corner at her pace.
I stood there smiling.
-Looking a Bit Deeper-
At first glance, I thought I was watching two people with completely different intentions.
One was captivated by the journey.
The other simply wanted to reach the destination.
But the longer I watched, the more I realized I wasn't witnessing conflict at all.
I was witnessing accommodation.
He wasn't trying to convince her to admire the flowers.
She wasn't trying to convince him to stop.
Years together had quietly taught them how to make room for each other.
For actors, this is where behavior becomes endlessly fascinating.
Character isn't only revealed by what someone does.
It's revealed by how they do it.
Not that he stopped.
How he looked.
Not that she walked.
How she walked.
Not that he took her hand.
How he took her hand.
Those small details aren't decoration.
They're evidence.
They're the visible expression of attention, habit, relationship, history.
As actors, we're often tempted to play ideas.
"She's organized."
"He's carefree."
Life rarely works that way.
Instead, we notice someone walking with quiet purpose.
Or someone lingering over a patch of flowers.
Meaning grows out of behavior.
The more specifically we notice, the less we need to explain.
Perhaps that's one of the quiet joys of observation.
If we spend a little longer with people, they usually begin telling us who they are—without ever saying a word.
The Mimic
I noticed him sitting on a bench across the street from the university.
He was perfectly still.
Not restless. Not scanning the sidewalk. Just looking across campus, as though something over there had quietly captured his attention.
I'd seen him before. On other days he shouted into an imaginary phone, carrying on conversations no one else could hear. But today there was only silence.
A man in a suit walked by.
Halfway down the sidewalk he suddenly stopped.
He patted his pockets.
His keys. Forgot them.
Without hesitation, he turned around and hurried back the way he'd come.
The homeless man watched the entire thing.
He stayed on the bench for another minute.
Then he stood.
He walked to the exact spot where the businessman had stopped.
He reached for his pockets.
Paused.
Turned.
Walked back the way he had come.
A few minutes later, he did it again.
Then he returned to the bench and continued watching people pass.
I never learned why.
What Stayed With Me
I couldn't stop wondering what this mimicry meant to him.
Maybe it meant nothing.
Maybe it meant everything.
Perhaps he was simply fascinated by the little choreography of another person's life.
Or perhaps he was trying something on.
Not the suit.
The behavior.
For a moment, I imagined what it would feel like if ordinary life had become something you had to study from the outside.
How carefully would you watch?
How precisely would you imitate?
How many small rituals would you collect, hoping one of them might help you belong?
I don't know.
I only know that after he sat back down, he kept watching.
If I were directing this...
I wouldn't ask an actor to "play mental illness."
I'd ask him to become deeply interested in another person's behavior.
Then I'd ask him to try it.
Not because he wanted to fool anyone.
Simply because something about that tiny moment felt worth borrowing.
I'd be curious to see what happened next.