Why I became an actor
I became an actor to stop my brain from buzzing with words and thoughts and emotions I couldn't control. As an actor, it was my job to fabricate, memorize, control these uncontrollables in front of hundreds (or no) people.
I became an actor because of that inexplicable exhilarating feeling of being on stage under the lights unable to see faces in the audience, whispering, coughing, listening. Being listened to.
I became an actor to escape my house, my school, my city.
I became an actor because I was good at math and writing and could have been a doctor but I didn't think that doctors felt enough or they felt too much or they spent all their youth penned up in a classroom and I, I would rather be free and, er, penned up in a theater with dark red musty curtains and dressing rooms smelling of spirit gum and grease paint and sweaty costumes with people who swore and talked about sex and walked around in leotards and bloomers.
I went to university and rolled around on the ground making animal noises with the best of them, learned to suppress my T's and R's and speak from my diaphragm. I spent long nights facing brick walls in the basement rehearsing monologues and memorizing scenes.
I dropped out of school when I thought it was all a sham and went back when I realized that acting school really is a sham- but so is real life but with less sensitivity, so how lucky was I to even get to go to school to learn how to laugh and cry!
I left acting behind to travel, to write, to make money, to not deal with all the other actors pushing and clawing their way through cattle calls and unpaid shows and faulty directors.
And I keep coming back to acting for the reason that I became an actor: I want to feel. I want to crawl on the ground like a five year old growling and yelping and swatting at other adults growling and yelping and swatting back. I want to yell at the top of my voice in a room full of people. I want to feel. I want to wear gorgeous brocade dresses and paint my lips red and pretend I am Her, whoever that She may be. I want to feel this life unshielded, fully.
And it's really hard to do when you're not on stage.
I became an actor because of that inexplicable exhilarating feeling of being on stage under the lights unable to see faces in the audience, whispering, coughing, listening. Being listened to.
I became an actor to escape my house, my school, my city.
I became an actor because I was good at math and writing and could have been a doctor but I didn't think that doctors felt enough or they felt too much or they spent all their youth penned up in a classroom and I, I would rather be free and, er, penned up in a theater with dark red musty curtains and dressing rooms smelling of spirit gum and grease paint and sweaty costumes with people who swore and talked about sex and walked around in leotards and bloomers.
I went to university and rolled around on the ground making animal noises with the best of them, learned to suppress my T's and R's and speak from my diaphragm. I spent long nights facing brick walls in the basement rehearsing monologues and memorizing scenes.
I dropped out of school when I thought it was all a sham and went back when I realized that acting school really is a sham- but so is real life but with less sensitivity, so how lucky was I to even get to go to school to learn how to laugh and cry!
I left acting behind to travel, to write, to make money, to not deal with all the other actors pushing and clawing their way through cattle calls and unpaid shows and faulty directors.
And I keep coming back to acting for the reason that I became an actor: I want to feel. I want to crawl on the ground like a five year old growling and yelping and swatting at other adults growling and yelping and swatting back. I want to yell at the top of my voice in a room full of people. I want to feel. I want to wear gorgeous brocade dresses and paint my lips red and pretend I am Her, whoever that She may be. I want to feel this life unshielded, fully.
And it's really hard to do when you're not on stage.
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