The Job of the Actor

As I start/continue to pursue acting on a professional level, I have started reading old plays and curriculum from college. This week I picked up an amazing book from one of my acting classes "A Practical Handbook for the Actor" by Melissa Bruder and a list of others. The authors studied under David Mamet and and is full of clear ideas and explanations and is by far one of my favorite books on the subject. In the chapter for which entry is named, there was a passage that really stuck out to me:

"Acting requires common sense, bravery, and a lot of will: the common sense to translate whatever you are given into simple actable terms; the bravery to throw yourself in the action of the play despite hear of failure, self-consciousness, and a thousand other obstacles; and the will to adhere to your ideals. even though it might not be the easiest thing to do.

In our world, it is becoming harder and harder to communicate with each other simply and honestly, on a gut level. Yet we still go to the theatre to have a communion with the truth of our existence, and, ideally, we leave it knowing that that kind of communication is still possible...

The theatre may now be the only place in society where people can go to hear the truth."

I'll be posting more about this topic as I continue to dive further and further in, but I thought this was a great passage to get me started. It speaks to something beyond the art of acting - that our society is deprived of real communication. We sit at our desks with our AIM open having 10 conversations while our Gmail chat pings and our Facebook chat blips. All of this while updating a status for each in addition to our Twitter account.... from our Blackberry/iPhone... while driving.

I say this because I'm responsible for said communication cluster fuck (pardon the term). We've allowed ourselves to remove real interaction from our lives and replace it a watered-down version that requires little to no responsibility or reaction on our part.

Sorry. I digress. The passage also highlights the reason why I've always wanted to act. This idea of "communion" with reality is incredibly powerful. To have the ability to take however many people on a journey with you through the annals of the human psyche - to help them forget their own problems - to help them find a truth that they couldn't see before; and all of this simply from playing make believe. It's a wonderful gift. One that I am anxious and excited to pursue.