Feelings about Theater

This was from a facebook post when I Hate Hamlet was beginning. The to be mentioned “break” from theater has since ended, but I needed something to start out the category for theater.

Repost

I Hate Hamlet opens tonight, and I have thoughts.

I was supposed to be the assistant director for this production, because I wanted to give directing a shot. But through an unfortunate side-effect of gravity, our Barrymore was taken out of commission and couldn’t be in the show. I had already kind of realized I wasn’t going to be directing in a real capacity as I had mentioned to the director that I would act if they needed me to, and then was asked to read for a character (Gary) at auditions when not enough men showed up. Long story short, I was cast as Gary. Read for him at the readthrough 1 time, and then the gravity incident happened.

I was playing Jack in The Importance of Being Earnest at the time, and in the receiving line I heard that our Barrymore had injured himself, and I got a “Chris I need to talk to you after you’re done” from the director. A fun time, receiving line, thanking people for coming out to see our current show, smiling at the patrons, while simultaneously worrying about a friend that had just been in a terrible accident, and the existential dread of what “I need to talk to you” could mean.

I learned that the plan was to have our Andrew move into the role of Barrymore, to move me into Andrew’s spot, and we’d figure out Gary in the coming days (spoiler alert: it’s Geri now). I was ok with this. I had said I’d act if I needed to and the need had arisen. Now, I did have some pause, mainly due to the initial casting of the play. See, Andrew has a girlfriend, Dierdre, and in the play there’s a fair amount of intimacy between them. We lucked out, as we had a husband and wife duo audition, and were cast opposite of each other, thinking that this would make the intimacy portion kind of a non-issue. I came to the realization at that point that, oh… oh jeeze… that’s gonna be me kissing this mans wife now. It was, how can I say, anxiety inducing. But it’s theater, right? These things were going to come up at some point in my acting career… Just thought maybe it’d be something I knew I’d be doing going into the production.

A little backstory. I have…. a problem saying no. This has led to me having some very lengthy consecutive productions under my belt. Oh no, there weren’t enough dudes in the 20-40 range for my play, let’s ask Chris, he’ll probably do it (spoiler: I usually do). Did I do it because I love acting? Yeah, of course. Did I do it because its fun? Yes definitely. Did I do it because they asked me? Unequivocally, THIS, is the main reason. I’m a vampire, I don’t do anything unless I’m specifically invited, and when I am, I feel great, like I’m wanted, or someone thought that maybe I could do it, and do it well. (this will all sound very familiar soon).

Rehearsals started, things were going well. The first few were just blocking, and I got to a part of the script that I hadn’t really read yet. I’ll paraphrase here, Barrymore- “Why did you audition” Andrew- “Because my agent made me… and because Dierdre loves Hamlet…. and…. because they asked me” Barrymore- “Because they asked you?” Andrew- “Because someone, somewhere thought, maybe, just maybe, I could do it” See? Told you.

From this moment on in the production I felt like Andrew was just, me. Sure I’ve never been on TV (aside from that one interview for The 39 Steps), but doing something because someone thought that I could, or that they just asked me to do it? Hi Andrew, its me. You.

It’s one of the first roles I’ve played where I felt like I had a motivation throughout the entire play. Not just for one scene where I could pull on something that vaguely felt like it could put me in the same mindset. The entire play.

To add to this, there’s another part of the play involving Andrew and having to decide between a very lucrative TV deal and playing Hamlet. In my mind, I had conflated this with the feeling I had every time someone would say that I needed to take a break from doing so many productions. Yeah, I need a break, but what I would gain from taking a break doesn’t compare to what I feel like when I’m doing this thing that I love. It made me think about what it would take for me to walk away from the theater forever, and 3 million dollars wouldn’t put a dent in it. Yes, this seems excessive, crazy, stupid, and absolutely not logical. But I work with logic every day in my job. I’m tired of logic. I just want to do things for the love of doing them. I always look for some kind of creative outlet and the theater IS that for me.

The play ends on Andrew recounting his experience playing Hamlet, and again, reading that monologue, watching people perform it on YouTube, it’s a great monologue, but everyone I saw was playing it as a comedy, and I don’t think that it should be. Sure there are bits of it that are meant to be funny, but treat the rest like it is, a mans stream of consciousness about something that means so much to him, and that’s just what I did. He talks about a kid in the audience that doesn’t want to be there, but after reciting “To be or not to be” he sees him again, and the kid is enthralled. Everyone is.

This moment I think is the most powerful for me. Our preview night went great, but when I got to that moment, and said that line “There’s the kid… and he’s listening. The whole audience. Complete silence. Total focus.” and heard the absolute silence in the theater, I wanted to cry. I still want to, and I’m sure that at one point during these next 2 weekends, I will. These moments are the moments that I live for in theater. To be able to have just one persons absolute attention, to wear my heart on my sleeve, show everyone what I’ve worked so hard for, and feel the emotions that I want to, NEED to feel.

Our Barrymore at one point praised me for how stoic I am when I miss some lines or feel like I had a bad performance. Most of the time yes, I am fairly stoic, I keep what I feel inside. But when I’m on stage, it’s my therapy (side note: I am currently in actual therapy, and it’s also helped out a lot lol). Everything inside of me is finally let out, and it feels amazing.

After this one I AM taking a break. I do need one, as I’d previously stated. (I’ll still build for whomever needs it, I like doing that as well, but I’m not acting on stage). You can bet that during this “break”, I’ll be hitting the voice acting stuff pretty hard. Can’t stop, won’t stop haha.

This play has meant a lot to me. It’s a culmination of all the notes I’ve received in every play I’ve been in. It’s the summation of all characters I’ve played. It’s me growing as a person, and I know that it will leave me in a better place than I was before I asked the director to let me assistant direct.

Since I’m still not great at doing this in person, and prefer to do it in an editable fashion, Nancy, Silas, J Paul, Christina, Shannon, Lauren, Jen, Jennifer, Ben, Leah, Andi, Tim, Frank, Bailey, Ollie, I love you all, more than you might think. I already can’t wait till my break is over. To paraphrase Andrew yet again, I love this theater because once upon a time, you lived here.

Thank you.