Is Theatre Dead…again?

Every new generation that comes along decides theatre is dying. Truly there are no new thoughts.

I recently joined a group on LinkedIn for theatre artists (partly in an attempt to understand what LinkedIn can really do for me,) and now I receive emails updating me on all the “conversations” happening in the group.

(I love how LinkedIn so badly wants to be the FB for professionals. Now if only G+ could figure out what it wants to be when it grows up, perhaps someday the interwebs will be complete…..but I digress.)

The first time I saw the topic come up I dismissed it. The second time I saw it come up, I thought, “Why are you talking about this?!“

It brought back memories of my youth, when people were concerned that  the invention of home videos would kill the cinema business (because now you could rent movies and not go to them) and the creation of electronic music (which could recreate the sounds of other instruments) would kill the orchestral and music careers of musicians everywhere.

For decades there have been worries that other forms of entertainment would sound a death knell on the theatre going in big and small cities.

It’s just not going to happen.

Yes, there’s competition, but the real competition is from the company or playwright or director down the street who has a better piece than you. If anything keeps people from going to the theatre—assuming they’re people who like to see live theatre, which is not everyone—it’s the quality of the work being done.

The other day I joined a group of actors in a reading of Tennessee Williams’ Camino Real. Written almost sixty years ago, it still resonates and it still reflects our current world and culture. Perhaps not in the same way it did when it premiered but it’s still relevant.

Good writing, good work. It doesn’t die.

So neither can the theatre.

A Short One-Man Show

My most recent post here was about a big audition where I didn’t know what I was doing. Well, twenty-some years later [aka just last week] I had another one where it may have seemed I didn’t know what I was doing. Only because it was a bit risky, and completely untested, and it was one of the most fascinating, challenging and interesting auditions I may have ever had.

I’m a huge fan of Sandbox Theatre and have mentioned them here before—they do original works that are company created, and typically in a very avant garde or expressionistic manner. When I first spotted their audition notice I was immediately excited at the opportunity (though I didn’t know any of these details.) I’ve loved their work in the past and think it would be terrific to get involved with them in some way, so I quickly signed up.

When I was able to snag a time slot and got the details I shouldn’t have been surprised. For the general audition for their Fall show they provided a few lines of text and asked people to create a one- to three-minute piece inspired by and using that bit of script. That’s it. There were no rules although there was encouragement to make it physical and to include anything that shows off your skills (duh. it’s an audition) so that could mean, singing, dancing, juggling balls of fire, whatever.

I thought this was the craziest thing to ask of someone at an audition (!) but then quickly realized that, of course, it made perfect sense for this company and the way they work, and I was pumped and inspired to put something together. I’ve written stuff before, I’ve adapted materials before, I’ve done original pieces as an actor and director, and I knew I could handle this challenge!

And then my mind went blank.

For two weeks I couldn’t get started, I couldn’t find inspiration from the bit of text they sent. I don’t sing well enough to call myself a singer, and I’m no acrobat and I can juggle three tennis balls well enough to say I can juggle but don’t make me move or throw in a fourth or light them on fire or the act is done. What can I do? What can I do to stand out and be interesting?!

I thought for a bit that I wasn’t going to be able to do this.

Then I realized that even though I don’t do those other things, what I can do and have done, is tell a story. And I have the skills to shape a story and craft one from new and other-used materials. Great! And I quit thinking about trying to be interesting.

So….what’s the story?

I couldn’t find the story…until one day, one line of the piece caught my eye:

“I…opened the window and started throwing out those things most important in life”

I realized I once knew a man who had done just that. He had thrown away everything, walked away from his life and his family and his loved ones with hardly a blink, and only years later realized what he had done. I sat down and started writing. I just needed to get words down on paper and trust that the flow of thoughts would come, things would take shape and I knew that no matter what I wrote I’d probably change it in a later draft anyway. I knew the story I wanted to tell, it was just a case of finding how to tell it.

Over the course of about a week I wrote about ten or twelve drafts of this scene, each one clarifying the story a bit more. The more I worked it, the clearer it became to me and the more I could see this piece not only being a viable audition piece for this company, but also a part of something larger. Perhaps it could be the starting point for a project I’ve been trying to find a way to write for a few years now. Perhaps.

Then came the sudden realization that I actually had to perform this and I had no idea whether it was crap or brilliant. I suspected it lay somewhere in between, but who knows? I was the only who had read it, wrote it or thought about it at all. Finally, with little time left I ran it passed a friend to give it the smell test.

It smelled fresh.

Still, the moment of the audition itself was nerve wracking. To do an original piece, that I wrote myself, that had never really, fully been done out loud and full out before, and had been given no outside direction (other than a few performance tips during the smell testing) made me feel, to say the least, a bit unsure of myself.

There I was again. Standing in an empty rehearsal hall, feeling naked and vulnerable, in front of a row of strangers (although considerably younger this time) behind tables covered in notes and papers and I tried to think back to that big audition I wrote about last week, and I tried to think of my previous accomplishments that made me feel confident I could create an original piece, and I tried to imagine the bigger stakes audition my nephew was having a thousand miles away at the same time and how I wouldn’t want for him to question his confidence, and I took a deep breath and I forgot all of it and just owned my original, never-before-seen, work-in-progress, short one-man show.

I simply began the story.

And it kind of rocked.

What an exhilarating, and memorable, audition.

An Audition to Remember

This weekend one of my nephews will be auditioning for Julliard’s dance program. The kid just might be talented and skilled, enough to get accepted. Whether or not he wants to go there or elsewhere (and whether or not my brother can afford it for him) are beside the point. I’m proud of him for taking a leap (no dance pun intended) into going after what he wants. I’m not surprised really. He’s been dancing since he was a little kid, and he’s been fortunate to have supportive parents, quality teachers and lots of access to classes and troupes.

It’s made me think of my own foray into performing arts education, over twen……many years ago. I was not so fortunate with pre-college training or experience, and I hadn’t been acting since I was a four years old, and I had little guidance from my high school teachers (or elsewhere) as to how to go about it all. I just tried.

I recall with a shiver an audition I did for a big acting program. I remember my grandfather taking me to it. I don’t think he quite got what I was trying to do, but he was glad I was going to college. I was so nervous in the car, but I couldn’t tell him that. He had to find a way to fill several hours that afternoon, while I spent time in rehearsal halls and hallways that smelled of hard and serious work. He dropped me off, said good luck and he’d be back in three hours to pick me up. I looked around the street, on that sunny Spring day in that gorgeous city neighborhood and imagined myself living there for the next several years, maybe longer, learning how to be an actor and building my career.

I wandered in to the century old building, found my way to the check-in table and signed in. I sat there nervously, waiting. I saw the other kids around me, and wondered at how poised they seemed. We did various acting exercises and interactive games, and I marveled at how clever they all were. I was doing my best to appear confident and to fit in. But really, I had no idea what I was doing.

When it finally came time to perform the two, short monologues we were to have prepared I was very nervous but I gave it my all. I couldn’t possibly reveal now what ridiculously poor choices I had made in those pieces, but I’m grateful I didn’t know that at the time. I had them memorized. I knew what I was saying, even perhaps why, and I knew all the right words to emphasize! (Yikes.) I’m grateful too that the long row of auditors—about five or six, older men and women, with serious looks on their faces, and notes and resumes and papers strewn about on the tables in front of them, with just me in a big empty rehearsal space standing alone, feeling vulnerable and on the edge —I’m grateful they politely listened, and thanked me for my time.

“It didn’t go too bad,” I recall thinking as I walked out, mostly relieved that it was over.

I had decided what I wanted to do a year or two before. I loved the theatre, and enjoyed acting and I wanted to learn everything there was about it. My drive and energy and gumption were all there. The only thing I didn’t have was what I didn’t know was missing —a clue about how any of it really works, or how to audition.

Years later I’d find myself grateful again for those auditors who didn’t accept me in to that program. They had a good and respected school, but I ended up in one of the best programs in the country, learned many valuable things, and developed the skills and basis of who I am today as a theatre artist. I’m proud to have graduated from Illinois State University’s School of Theatre. (I had a high school teacher who inadvertently pointed me in the right direction.) One of the many things I’ve learned is you never stop learning, not when you work in the arts. Each project, each year, is another challenge which shapes us and defines us further.

So this weekend I’m sending out good vibes and positive thoughts to New York, where Joey’s going to do what he does best and give it his all. And no matter how they respond or how the other kids seem or how serious the faces of the auditors or where he ends up for the next four years, I’m confident that years from now he’s going to look back at this weekend and smile from the memory of his gumption.