Sunday afternoon I saw Carson Lake, an adaptation of Euripides' Hyppolytus.
What struck me most about the performance was the embodiment of my actor habits played out before me. It was very apparent that the actors had prepared diligently, that they were pouring themselves into the work, that they were striving to feel and experience the moments, and that they were struggling against themselves to do it. They were trying to show us what was happening in the play--something that I for the longest time believed was my job to do. Actors act, right? They lead the audience through the plot and come out on the other side with them.
No. Well, they shouldn't anyway.
For the last several weeks I've been working against this desire to "show" what I'm thinking, feeling, experiencing, what's important, what people should take away from watching this production; the audience does not require me to do this, in fact, it hinders them from experiencing the story and the characters in it. Would you absorb a novel being read to you if the person reading it was constantly bumping you with the book, prodding you to see if you were paying attention or to emphasize passages? No, it's more likely you'd be distracted by the efforts of the reader. That's what "showing" does in acting; it assumes the audience can't experience for themselves and takes away the opportunity for them to be enveloped in the world of the play/movie/etc.
But how do we do this? How do I let go of the moment and trust that it will come out in a way that reaches the audience?
The truth is I don't know, and that's scary... but it's also exciting.
Tonight we step in to rehearsal for A Midsummer Night's Dream and my greatest ambition is to leave the fear behind, to allow the character to come forward, to live in the moment, and to forget any notion of needing people to see or hear what's happening in the moment.
Wish me luck!
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