Let it Be

The last few months I've been thinking a lot about the next step in acting that I need to take. I've gained valuable technical skills and mastered them fairly well. I am now lacking the deep heart and soul to bring life to my work. Misha told me that I have the ability not only to make people laugh, but to make them cry. How does one go about being so real in their art that the viewers are literally drawn in and will laugh and cry at the same time because what they are seeing is truth?

It's a journey. You begin by trying to be in control. That first run of a scene, or the beginning of the rehearsal process, or your early career is a time of trying to be in control. Slowly your give up control. You stop trying so hard and you do nothing. You get to the point where you're not trying anymore. The lines are dull and flat and the movements are few and small. You've turned off the conscious control that tells you that you need to do something. At this moment magic occurs. Your subconscious takes over. You start to come back to life. The movements and inflections and tactic changes aren't motivated by an actor who feels like he needs to do something, rather they are driven from the inner soul of the artist. They are real. They are natural. They are truth. At this point the audience stops breathing. And leans in.

You have to trust your self to get to this point. You prepare and rehearse and research and memorize and work and work and work and work. Then when the time comes, you let it all go. You simply give yourself over to the piece and the power of your inner soul. You release control. You turn off the little voices in your head telling you that you're doing it wrong. You fight off the fear that you need to do something. You allow everything to happen to you and you respond naturally.

This is how Chekhov must be played. We've gone through the first phase with Uncle Vanya and we are passing through the second phase. Already I've begun to see the third phase emerging and it is beautiful. I know the play and I'm still sucked into those moments. They are vibrant. They are full of subtle and beautiful life. They are truth. When the actors finally stop trying and allow ourselves to be out of control, beauty happens on stage.

I leave you with these two quotes from great artists:

“To serve a work of art, great or small, is to die, to die to self. If the artist is to be able to listen to the work, he must get out of the way; or more correctly … he must be willing to be got out of the way … in order to become the servant of the work.”
-Madeline L’Engle
(Walking on Water)

"When [the actor] reaches the region of the subconscious the eyes of his soul are opened and he is aware of everything, even minute details, and it all acquires an entirely new significance. He is conscious of new feelings, conceptions, visions, attitudes, both in his role and in himself. Beyond the threshold one’s inner life, of its own accord, takes on a simple, full form, because organic nature directs all the important centres of our creative apparatus."
-Konstantin Stanislavsky
(An Actor Prepares)