You know how during a drought, just before the rains come, the earth seems tense, stretched, like it’s just begging for some relief, for Pity’s Sake?? And then it does rain, and everything relaxes. We can finally get some peace. We can stop having to try so hard just to do the things that normally come so easily.
Yes, we’ve been in a heatwave lately. And yes, there was a little rain today, with the promise of more throughout the next week. At long last, we don’t have to worry where our next breeze is coming from. Yes, that is a relief. But that’s not what this post is about.
It’s on a more personal level than that. And it’s shocking what little it took to get the clouds to break.
First, a little background: I won’t go into everything, because there’s a lot, it would take a while, and frankly, it’s personal and none o’ ya dang bidness. But I will say that I’ve felt blocked in more than one area of my life (home, work, art, romance, friends, …). I keep making mental lists of all that needs to get done, all the things I need to do to ‘fix’ my life. And there’s just so much. I mean, where do I start? Where could I possibly start? And it’s the same feeling in all of these areas. It’s felt like everything’s just bottlenecking, and if I could figure out how to get one thing started, the rest would come more easily and fall in line behind it, but I just have to figure out which one to start with and how to get it sorted out.
So the main thing, the thing that’s been most pressing, has been the show I’m working on. That sounds so shallow and “actor-y,” but there’s just something about this one. It’s difficult. And Good. There’s just something in it that connects with me, but I’ve not been able to express it. I can read it and understand it, but I haven’t been able to get it to come out right. I’ve been making excuses for myself:
…it’s too hot in the rehearsal space, …I’ll be fine once I get the lines learned solidly, …it’s a chemistry thing. And of course, all of that is complete rubbish. I just have to stop getting in my own way.
“Stop getting in my own way.” That sounds like such a cliché, so trite, and what does it really mean anyway?
Well.
Tonight we were in rehearsal, and I just wasn’t feeling it. I was tired, my back was hurting, it was probably 90 degrees in the rehearsal space, I couldn’t focus. I couldn’t get my head into the place it needed to be to do the scene
adequately, nevermind
well.
But the Director was being so very patient with me. She would call me on it when I wasn’t doing it right, but she wouldn’t yell or punish. She would just say matter-of-factly that it needed to be done differently.
And then we got to The Big Scene. I don’t want to give anything away to the one or two of you who read this that might get the chance to come and see the show, but it’s a big, emotional scene. Not the kind of thing you want to try when you’re having trouble focusing. We went through about half of it, and the Director stopped us. She gave us a couple of notes to try and then she said to me, “if it’s okay with you, when we run it again, I’m just going to put my hand over your stomach.”
“…Huh?”
“I’m going to put my hand on your stomach. I think it will help you.”
“But- …is it- am I not supporting my voice properly??”
“No, that’s not it at all. I just think it will help you emotionally.”
“uhm……Okay.”
And we ran through the scene again from the top. And she did what she said she was going to do. When we got to the tough bits, she stood behind me, and reached around and put her hand on my stomach. And she just left it there while I did my lines.
And I don’t know how it happened, but I haven’t wept like that in years. The tears weren’t coming out of my
eyes, they were coming out of my
soul. She helped me to get out of my own stupid way and just let go and follow where the text took me. And suddenly everything made so much sense. I understood way down deep why this character felt so strongly about what she was saying. I could see why she was fighting, what exactly it was she thought she was fighting for, and why it was so important that she lose that fight.
And oh, the relief, such sweet relief came flooding over me. I can't explain why this was so important to me, when others have so much more significant problems, other than to say that it goes deeper than a script, deeper than just acting. This. This is why I do "this acting thing." There's just so much more to it than simply "acting." It's the search for the meaning and the connection, the struggle, and the sweet unbelievable feeling of success when you find it at last.
I do so love the rain, don’t you?
