a poor player

Dunkirk, NY – It appears that my own personal entropy has gotten the better of me these past few weeks. I don’t know whether anyone else ever goes through this kind of situation, but often after completing a show I get what I call “post-show syndrome.” It’s generally a combination of feeling somewhat ill, combined with a general feeling of malaise, lack of motivation, and a hint of depression. Often when I’m in a show I get so focused that I can’t concentrate on anything else, and I have no doubt that I am carrying a lot of inner tension which keeps me from getting sick and missing a performance. My body also runs at a high level as well, expending large amounts of energy and then working hard to re-energize itself. When it all stops following the final performance, I think my psycho-physical being shuts down, and it takes me some time to recover.

I think , without knowing it, I just went through post-show syndrome upon the completion of my interim dean stint. Since my last post I have simply gone into a personal state of entropy, as it were, and found I had little motivation to do anything but sit around and revel in the fact that I had shed myself of all that responsibility. I spent two sessions breaking in the new dean, enjoyed a wonderful party thrown by my colleagues (who really spoiled me by giving me some excellent mementos), and began to move back into my old office. So hopefully this explains the absence here. Pure lack of motivation or desire.

But I promised a follow-up piece to the theatrical entropy post which would try to ask some of the basic questions people in theatre need to ask themselves as practitioners of the art form, so here we go. Fighting entropy really requires, not simply trying to shore up old concepts, but thinking about how new concepts and ways of working can be developed around these questions. Here then are 5 initial questions I can come up with:

Is theatre truly a viable art form at this time? A very cursory check of theatrical history shows us that theatre has had its ups and downs. For 500 years during the so-called Dark Ages there are no records of any organized theatrical endeavors. England did without theatre for about 18 years under the Cromwell era, and many countries saw maybe one or two flourishings of theatrical prominence and then not much else. It could very well be that we are living through an era where theatre, for whatever reason, is not and will not be a dominant art form. Other sorts of conditions will have to come together to make theatre flourish again; what they might be is anybody’s guess. In the meantime, we might have to be willing to swallow the idea that at this time in history the only real objective might be to preserve the art form in some way so that when times are more conducive to theatre, the idea of theatre will be still be there.

Who is my audience? This is probably the key question, and one which requires the deepest examination. I think the answer to any number of questions flows from this one. Theatre, it seems to me, is a useless endeavor unless one fully understands the nature of an audience. I don’t think in today’s theatre we give enough thought to this idea. We don’t really get to know our audiences, or if we even give this question any thought at all, sometimes I think we dream up an audience that doesn’t really exist. I think the first sub-question in this category has to be is my audience people who are like me, or not like me? Having some inkling as to the answer for this question will give theatre artists some clue as to what they are really about.

I point this out because I think that most theatre artists today receive training in an environment where success is measured by how well you please the people around you and appeal to their particular tastes. The very narrow intellectual confines of theatre training in today’s colleges and universities never really address the question of audience. Because educational institutions are so insular (as are their audiences), students tend to come out believing that the kinds of audiences they wrote/performed for in college are the kinds of audiences that are out in the everyday world. And they are right to some degree, as most people who have a taste for theatre today tend to have some college education. But there is a vast audience out there that has been successfully tapped only by the mass market, and has been effectively written off by most theatre artists. Another way of asking this same question might be do I want to create theatre for audiences who share my views and beliefs, or do I want to create theatre which speaks to audiences who don’t share my views and challenges even my own views? My opinion is that there is no reason at all to do theatre without a firm grounding in and connection to the day-to-day realities of the culture. Creating work only for an insular audience of like-minded people is the root of all marginalized art.

Do I want recognition within the industry, or will I be satisfied with simply making theatre wherever I can? Another way of phrasing this question might be do I expect to make a living from creating theatre? If the answer is “yes,” then your career path is pretty limited. It also means you have to determine what you mean by “theatre.” Many people, for example, start out wanting to make a living in theatre, but eventually realize they have to broaden that definition to making a living in the “entertainment business.” Most people also get sucked up into the idea that, in order to be a genuine artist, you must be making a living at it. That doesn’t separate theatre much from any other profession. The measure of success in our culture today is pretty much based on how much money you make and how high you rise in any particular industry. The entertainment industry, and indeed the art world, have adopted this same concept, which I believe has been to the detriment of art as a whole and its place in society.

Do I want my art to make a personal or cultural statement? This I think might be considered a moot question, because most every piece of art makes some sort of statement in some fashion. Even mega-entertainment Broadway shows present some kind of moral or message, even if the message is trite or culturally accepted as a norm (“you can be anything you want to be”, “follow your dreams”, “be kind to your neighbors”). The question which people really need to ask has to do with personal purpose. Theatre, as an art form, is by nature neutral; it is not designed for any one specific purpose at all. It simply presents to us a form of communication, and that communication can take any shape it pleases. What is of concern to me is the fact that so many people simply see the status quo and assume that’s the way it gets done. Many people, upon starting a career in theatre, get immediately sucked up into whatever comes their way without any clear idea of who they personally are or what they really want to accomplish in the business. No time is provided for them in their university training to deal with these sorts of questions. Without some examination of what you want to accomplish by doing theatre, you are vulnerable to letting the industry shape you rather than you having the opportunity to shape the industry.

Am I willing to collaborate? Without the ability to be a good collaborator, theatre becomes a frustrating and difficult business. Often, to create good theatre, you have to subsume your own personal pride, opinions and ego and fold them into whatever piece you’re working on. I believe good theatre is one of those human endeavors where the whole should always be greater than the sum of its parts. The only way to achieve this is to be sure that all the parts play precisely the roles they should play without any one part calling undue attention to itself. I am always reading about so many things in theatre where individual components of the process (actor, director, playwright, designer) assert their particular dominance in the process, and I always think that it’s a disservice to the art form to do that. If you’re not willing to collaborate, it’s best to recognize that and move to an art form where collaboration is not essential (novels, painting, performance art, one-person shows). I’ve always found a lot of joy and satisfaction in collaboration, and the recognition that other people create good ideas which come around to make me look good as well.

I think those questions are enough to chew on for the moment. As I begin a new semester teaching acting, I am hoping to be able to give to my students something I think I’ve never really done before, and that is the time to ask some of these questions and to dwell on the possible consequences and outcomes of their answers. Many of these questions should be asked from the start of someone’s training, and while the answers will change over time, I think the only hope of combatting entropy in theatre is the constant asking of these questions so that one can make the truly novel adaptations necessary quickly enough. The arcane behemoth we cal theatre today has let society dictate the terms of its existence because it simply will not ask the appropriate questions, and all the internal squabblogging in the world will not give us what we need to revitalize the art. I think that is where education plays the biggest role, and also where the biggest failures occur. I hope to start a series of posts which will take on some of the serious challenges facing educational theatre, sprinkles in with whatever else might come my way. -twl