And the Award Goes To... (2)

Over there on my sidebar you'll see a link to A Choreographer's Blog, curated by one Miss Melissa Riker. You might not know it immediately from her 'blog, but Melissa is one of the most positive, infectiously enthusiastic, flirtatious artists I know. I mean, she's got one of the darker quotes about hopefulness from Leonard Cohen at the footer, and most of the entries lately have featured photographs of a prone woman in a ripped wedding gown. Add to that Melissa's penchant for incomplete sentences and/or affection for the creative use of line breaks and you've got yourself one intense-seeming 'blogger. And she is, intense: her 'blog is about her work, the which she takes very, very seriously. It's just that, when you meet Melissa in person, odds are your heart will melt just a little bit at her openness and she will be hugging you before you know exactly what happened. These aspects of her do not stand in contrast to one another. No, they are fully integrated, somehow. Harmonious.

Melissa is, to me, something of a magic trick.

When I wrote of Friend Patrick's 'blog (see 8/5/08) I explained that he and I met on a show called Significant Circus, a show that certainly lived up to its name for me. After all, I also met Melissa there. Actually, we practically met with our fingers mutually entwined in Patrick's hair. From there we have variously performed circus-theatre together (my feet know Melissa very well indeed), leapt about in lofts and parks and even tried to choreograph me in modern dance. And Melissa has been a part of The Exploding Yurts right along with us and Friend Kate, so she's one of these friends who has had a lot of intimate insight into my creative processes. That's a strange intimacy to share. ("Strange Intimacy" would be a really good name for a rock band with Mel as its lead singer.) By and large, the effect Melissa has had on my creative process has been to remind me of the use of spontaneity -- which I tend to shun in favor of more rigid structure -- and the supreme value simply in loving what you are doing. Love takes one a long way in any endeavor, but especially in the more hopeless-seeming ones, like art.

The beauty of A Choreographer's Blog is that one is immediately inside an artist's creative process. There's no safety net, no explicit or intentional censorship, it's just -- thwack! Hi! Welcome to my mind/heart/soul! Which, really, is quite like Melissa herself in performance. It's a very honest, vulnerable place, but you almost don't notice, because its presented without shame or apology in the slightest. That's something most every artist should aspire to, and that Melissa seems to do quite effortlessly. Not that she doesn't work very, very hard; it's just that the part that seems to be hardest for most is her most natural talent. So go to A Choreographer's Blog when you feel isolated, or less than profound. It's a little like discussing a project with Melissa herself. She'll immediately get very excited about what you're talking about, and then share the ideas it gives her, some of which will sound at first to you a little tangential, or unrelated. Then, about three days later, you'll look back on the conversation, chuckle at her joy, and realize she wasn't off in the slightest. She had just gotten to the crux of the emotions much faster than you did.

And so, this award goes to Melissa Riker.

I Wasn't Kidding

I've

written here already

about my recent exploits in (read: surrender to) teh Facebookz, and how I think it relates to my general life and specific creative journey, blah blah blah. Embracing my past yadda yadda savoring the moment etc. etc. and so on. And so on. As usual when I'm writing about anything in the moment of experiencing it, I have found that I was completely wrong or, at least, utterly naive. That's a bit harsh: I was assumptive in my appraisal of the over-all effect of going all-in on a "social networking" site. Teh Facebook(c) has reached deeper into my history than I had imagined it would and, owing largely to the way in which it is structured, has allowed me to contact and be contacted by people I

really am curious about

from my sordid suburban past. Last night, I reconnected with my first-ever drama (you called it "drama" in my neck of the woods) teacher. This is the guy who got me seeing what I do today as something more than showing/goofing off, something that was done. And now I can check in with him anew. Madness.

One interesting personal side-effect I've noticed from this world-wide-interwebz experience of mine is that people I know, know one another, too. This is not surprising in the big picture; actors tend to spend much of their social time together throwing out names to establish connections by association with one another (an occupation I loathe...but could probably benefit from learning to enjoy, somehow). People know people. That's how people are. This isn't Russia. (Is this Russia?) This isn't Russia. [ <-Ahoy, movie quote! ] It's not absurd to find connections between dots when you bother to search. I just don't search very often, and now the Internet does it for me. Thanks, Internet!

The other interesting thing that I've noted brings us back around to the actual mission statement* of Odin's Aviary (*Now 12%** more missionier! [**Actual missioniness subject to personal experience and position of Saturn at time of missionesque experience.]). Specifically, I'm invited to re-explore the origins of my bizarre and unnatural quest to infuse my life with acting gigs. Some people you get back in touch with are naturally from your later life, or even as far back as the transition from youth to adulthood. Still others show up from times of sleep-overs and recess. Most recently, owing in large part to being found by my old theatre teacher, I've begun to get back in touch with people I knew in that most developmental of educational stages:

intermediate school

. Or: middle school. Some even call it "junior high." But in my aforementioned neck of the woods, it was "drama class" and "intermediate school." This was the time in my life when a real stage entered it -- as in the wooden kind, with curtains and lights and EVERYTHING. The smell of sawdust in an largely abandoned school building on tech day. The temper tantrums of students and teachers alike. The declamatory style of eleven- and twelve-year-olds playing middle-aged characters (my particular forte at the time). Intermediate theatre.

In so doing, the people I used to know now know that I'm still doing what we did. Before. Which is to say, not everyone who participates in theatre in high school and junior high continues to do it. I know: It's SHOCKING. I kid (ALL CAPS = sarcasm), but I keep getting notes from people saying that it's nice to see I'm still at it, and all I can keep thinking is,

You mean you're not?!

Yet another thing I haven't thought through. I believe everyone is inclined to imagine the people they used to know in the same or similar context as that in which they used to know them, but for me to assume everyone found as formative an experience in their 7th grade as I is a bit beyond the pale. Still, I can't help but mirror their surprise at my continued involvement, and marvel at their lack of involvement. I want to ask them when the last time they set foot in a theatre building was. I want to know where that all went for them, if anywhere.

And then: Is it surprising that I'm still doing this? I mean, discounting for a moment the possibility that the people I grew up with might view a career in theatre as a childish or irresponsible thing (and I really hope to give them more credit than that), was there anything about me in my youth that suggested I wouldn't keep at it this long?

Come to think of it, there may have been a thing. Or two. Let's face it: Every effort up until one is old enough to reap a few consequences can be filed away as experimentation, or a learning experience. There are even some times of life when this is so expected as to be nearly ubiquitous, such as the teenage sexual experimentation, or the toddler this-whole-walking-thing learning experience. I know people who've written off everything that happened to them prior to year 20. Plus, when I started theatre, I had far fewer advantages than now. Theatre taught me a lot about how to effectively interact with people, gave me tools for overcoming my social awkwardness, and a good dose of metabolic puberty didn't hurt, either. Come to think of it, if I had known me back then, I would have penned me for an English teacher myself. So there were a few reasons why my far-flung friends of yesteryear might be surprised to find me treading the boards to date. Oh, and one more reason, at that.

I didn't learn to act for about a decade.

In some sense, one is never done "learning to act," of course, but that's not what I'm referring to. No, I mean to say that for the seven-odd years prior to my college theatrical experiences, I thought I was acting, and I simply wasn't. I was working hard, and I loved what I was doing, and I was doing a great many things as well or better than some, but acting was not one of them. It wasn't until I got to my third official acting teacher, in college, who had a penchant for axioms and anagrams, that it sank in. He says, "Acting is reacting." I don't know how many times he said it before this happened, but one day: PING! Acting is reacting. There's a lot of ways to express this idea (or, really, host of ideas) -- listening is key, don't "act", stay in the moment, make the other person look good, etc. I try to comfort myself for what would seem like wasted time with an idea from Sanford Meisner -- that it takes at least twenty years to learn how to act -- but of course all the years spent

not

acting were in fact necessary for me to learn this lesson. Some people understand it intuitively, even at eleven years of age. I was not such a one.

What I did understand from a young age, even before I understood that I understood it (take a moment; that was almost as self-referential as an actor's 'blog), was that I wanted to do this, whatever it really was. I remember watching older actors doing their thing, kids in higher grades than I and movie stars alike, and thinking,

God, what do they do that makes this so good?

That's a question that has driven me a long way, down a windy road, and it still takes over the wheel now and then at that. Good thing, too, because I still have a lot to learn. When I would see videos of myself on stage in intermediate school, I would wonder why it looked and sounded so different from my inner-perception of it. At age eleven, when most of my friends were doing their damnedest to get off school property just as soon as they could each day, I was disappointed if I didn't have rehearsal to stay for. I didn't realize I had made a choice about the rest of my life, but every time I got to take the stage, my world aligned somehow and I meant everything I did, even without really knowing what I was doing.

It's good to remember that. Thanks, friends, both old and new.

And the Award Goes To... (1)

Recently, I was honored to receive the coveted "Brilliante" 'blogger award from

Friend Patrick

. This is an award that functions rather like a chain letter or, perhaps I should say, it's rather an ever-expanding, world-wide web of love and appreciation. I was honored more by Patrick's comments about the Aviary than by the award itself, I must admit. It may be my recent grapples with a theatrical competition, or my reading about the founding of American business practices within the first three decades of the 20th century, or it may simply be my elementary-school self rearing his pudgy head, but I'm a bit turned off by the appearance of competition of late. (Not just the

practice

, but the

appearance

, mind. I hereby willfully acknowledge that such is silliness. Nevertheless.) So I wanted to move this honor of Patrick's forward, but eschew the conventions of the award itself. Plus, I kind of wanted it all to relate to this here 'blog's

mission statement

. So instead of listing here my choice of seven honorees, I'm going to do a few entries, now and then, in honor of fellow 'bloggers within my circle who help me with my struggle to live fully, freely and honestly. This being the first.

It's only proper to begin with Friend Patrick. His was one of the first 'blogs that I added to my little sidebar of links, and he's done a lot with

Loose Ends

. It's probably the strongest of his web presences in terms of representing him, as I'm not aware of any website he has set up. If you poke around a little, you may find

his Friendster:) page

, and various mentions of him as an actor or director in various biographies and reviews. You could be inclined to mistakenly take him for the un-photographed "Patrick Lacey" who appeared in

Babe

, but you'd be wrong. I think. At least, I hope Patrick would have told me already if he (in particular) appeared in a movie with talking animals.

I met Patrick doing one of my first New York City shows--

Significant Circus

--that self-same show that introduced me to the colorful world of circus-theatre. He was playing a dog. Brilliantly, I might add. Some time later, certain of the creative relationships formed during that show maintained, and he,

Kate Magram

,

Melissa Riker

and I formed our informal creative-artist support group, The Exploding Yurts. We would meet with semi-regularity, and mainly discuss whatever self-initiated projects we were working on or toward. We were mixed disciplines, and Patrick and I were the actors of the group, so there was an immediate affinity there. Patrick also creates beautiful masks, so I consider him to be a talented visual artist as well. I'm not sure what came first with Patrick, that feeling of comradeship or the feeling of loving friendship, but we gots both now, and that's the way I likes it. You know how you never have friends quite like you did when you were young? Well, I think the same can be said of the first real friends you make upon moving to a new place. Patrick is one of those.

So I'm a little biased. I admit it. And you are free to judge for yourself how brilliant Patrick is; after all, you can read all about his mental processes at

Loose Ends

. You can decide if I'm off my nut when I say he's one of the most sensitive and daring actors I've had the pleasure of working with, who uses his body in such imaginatively expressive ways that I'm often stunned. You just go ahead and tell me if I'm off when I say of Patrick that he commits more concentration and thought to all his work--acting, writing and other craft--than anyone else I know. And hey: If you think his 'blog doesn't evidence a passionately intelligent mind, one that takes nothing for granted, as well as a beautiful spirit, one that reaches always for truth and beauty, you go ahead and comment to that effect. Plus he's viciously funny. Or so I think. You're welcome to disagree.

You'd just be wrong. No crime in that.

But to bring things back around to self-aggrandizement for just a moment: I've learned a lot from Patrick. Our differences and similarities are very well-matched, if you ask me, and I regret not having made more opportunities to date to work with him as an actor. We've only done so twice, in fact. In the aforementioned show, and a one-act play in mask:

Icarus

.

Icarus

was itself a learning experience for me that could probably take up a whole entry, but one of the plain ol' techniques I learned from Patrick in that process was how to rev up an internal engine of sorts of performance energy, so there was a lot of drive there, but allow it to translate into simple, specific, one-at-time movements, so elemental to gestural work. There are myriad little technical things like that I've picked up from Mr. Lacey. Most significant to me, though, have been our shared moments of empathy and discussions about life as an artist. Not specifically as actors, mind you, but as artists. Patrick has an abiding and unashamed affection for the notion of our work being artful, and that as much as anything else has fueled me through some very tough times indeed. We both acknowledge all the difficulties of being an actor, living in New York, being young, growing older, trying to love more and hate less, etc., etc. And what we come up with is that someday, yes, we will have it all. And in the meantime, despite all its worries and tribulations (or perhaps [for me, at least] because of them) the struggle can be pretty great, too.

Now,

Loose Ends

is great for a variety of reasons. Perhaps it isn't the first thing you'll notice upon visiting, but Patrick is tied into an incredible network of 'bloggers. He gets anywhere from ten to 30 comments per entry, from folks of a similar mindset philosophically. Whereas

Odin's Aviary

tries and tries to stay within the borders of a kind of set of rules,

Loose Ends

weaves its way through every aspect of Patrick's life, rather like the trequetra that holds so much meaning for him. It's style is personable, and you never can be absolutely sure what you'll get. One day it will be a dialogue, the next a theory paper, the next a nature observation. The commonality is Patrick and all that goes with his personality, which is a lot. With other people, this kind of online journal might quickly be mired in ridiculous self-interest and immolating detail or preachy self-importance, but owing to Patricks's personal insight and outward-reaching philosophy you get quite a different experience. Identification and, occasionally, a much-needed pause to consider life outside of the rush of it all.

And so, this award goes to Patrick Lacey.

"Those Who Can't Do, Teach"

The implication being, naturally, that if one could really succeed at something, one would have neither the time nor interest to teach it. And, by inference, we can allow that to mean that to teach is a default activity. Teachers end up teachers because they could do nothing else, and teaching is an unsupervised, disinteresting field.

Now, I admit up front that I am about as biased as can be about this pithy little saying, so full of pith as it may be. My mom was an elementary school teacher for years before becoming a

minister

(which is in many ways just a different sort of teacher). My dad teaches college-level courses now. I have been teaching workshops in a variety of subjects to a variety of students over the past few years, and even spent a year teaching in an NYC school. I believe in teaching. In fact, if I have dogma of any kind, it probably lies in the practice of teaching more than it does the practice of religion. So be it. Can't disabuse me of it. Teaching, and teachers, are important. And further more, it's something that can be quite difficult to do well. I know the above quote is half-joking, but I still eschew it. It is totally and entirely eschewed by my person.

Some time ago,

Friend Heather

began a process to get

Zuppa del Giorno

signed up through the

NEIU

(no; the other NEIU) as an official "rostered teaching artist," and we passed our initial interview back in February. Last weekend, I took the road more-traveled, and landed in Scranton, PA, to complete the application. We received some brief orientation and demonstrated our ability to not-immediately-destroy malleable minds. We're in like Flynn, in other words, which bodes well for Heather's continuing struggle to avoid the confines of a day job. (Less so for me, as I stubbornly remain in NYC, where the cost of living is inversely proportional to the average pay for actors.) In fact, the good people at the NEIU seem quite enthusiastic about our participation in their program, which helps to organize residencies for teaching artists in public schools. We could be spending up to a month at a go teaching our unique brand of creation, development and performance to students we really get to know. It's an exciting move forward in our educational work.

In addition, we'll periodically receive free training in educational and personal interaction theories and techniques. They briefly described what to expect in terms of that, and it sounds both useful and interesting, focusing on reaching out to all different kinds of dominances in an individual's learning process, and without losing sight of the fact that at all times one is dealing with a person, a unique individual who exists outside of a classroom as well. When I worked for

Wingspan Arts

during the 2006-2007 school year, many were the times I wished I had more training in my interaction with challenging students. It seems as though I'll get some of that, finally, and at no cost to me. Additionally, I'm fascinated with the processes of learning and intelligence, especially so since tackling Italian. When it comes to a foreign language class, despite my best intentions,

I'm

the challenging student.

I used to regard "resorting to" teaching as giving up on my acting career, way back when I was a college student. College affords us a lot of space to draw conclusions unrelated to real-life experience. The fact is, I've probably learned more in recent years from being a trainer or teacher than I would have had I been enrolled in school the whole time. Plus, a teaching-learning environment is one of those unique opportunities in life to practice the craft of an actor without artifice, and I don't mean simply because one is often in a "stage" relationship to an "audience." In fact, in my opinion a good teacher uses that particular paradigm sparingly. A good teacher, much like a good actor, is more concerned with connecting to and communicating with his or her students than with enforcing any separation or dominating aura of authority. Sure, discipline enters into it, but discipline won't invite absorption of knowledge. Eye contact. Listening. Humor. These are the keys to transforming people into little dry sponges, thirsty for learnin'. And doesn't that sound appealing?

As I tentatively turn my interests toward directing plays, I'm reminded of something

David Zarko

once said to me about division in rehearsal (and, if memory serves, he was paraphrasing Brecht): It's important to keep rehearsal and training in separate spaces--not just in time, but if possible literally in separate rooms. The thinking behind this is that actors need to associate the space in which they work with how they're expected to behave. In a classroom, in training, mistakes can (

should

, in my world) be made, but the emphasis is on a narrow goal that can generally be defined in terms of right and wrong. Whereas, in an ideal rehearsal room, actors must allow for willfully getting things "wrong" all the time, in order to explore, to make discoveries, and above all make their work true. It may seem a subtle difference but, believe me, it's not.

When I teach, I have a concrete goal to be achieved, and that satisfies me. When I act, the goal is in the process, never-ending, which offers a rather unique series of satisfying moments. These bleed into one another in various ways. The success to be found in both, I think, is in doing them equally well.

The Continuing Story of Circus-Kid Kate

Some time ago, rather in response to a 'blog entry Leah Hager Cohen did about her, I devoted an entry (see 3/14/08) to Friend Kate Magram in tribute to the amazing things she's taught me. That, I had hoped, would spawn a tremendous groundswell of Kate-imonials, because she's really touched a number of people in her time as an active circus enthusiast. (And most of those touches weren't even inappropriate!) Well, my readership is too small, it seems, to inspire such swelling. I remain confident that it's not size that matters in this matter (of swelling, ground or otherwise), but I do wish I could have brought people's awareness of Kate a little more to the forefront of the national consciousness.

Fortunately, Mizz L.H.C. is a little more influential:

http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/names/bloggers/balancing-acts-blog

Sure. It's Good Housekeeping. But I still think it's hella cool. In the accompanying interview with Mz. Cohen they ask her if she's done any "acro-balance" moves lately, and she replies that she hasn't, but likely will the next time Kate comes around. That doesn't surprise me, because it only takes one acro session with Kate to appreciate that she's eager to do that work any time, any place, compensating for any injuries or social mores that may stand in her way.

Recently, I ran across a photo on a friend of a friend's Facebook(TM) page. (No, I'm not linking to Facebook; because it's ruined my life.) It was of my friend and his friend doing a thigh-stand in some public space, and looking pleased as punch about it at that. My friend is Kasidy Benjamin. (Okay, see? That's how Facebook's ruined me.) He found me in Legal Snarls, Zuppa del Giorno's second production, way back in 2004. Kasidy came with us to Italy for In Bocca al Lupo the first time we all went, and performed semi-improvised comemdia dell'arte in Italian for an Italian audience. He graduated high school last semester, and in the fall he's off to Dell'Arte International. And somewhere in all that, either I or Friend Heather (and I taught Heather) taught him thigh-stand.

Kate has a thing about the lineage of knowledge, particularly as it applies to the passing-down of skills. In her perfect world, everyone would know the family tree of everything he or she has learned. "I learned it from this person, who studied with this person, who was a disciple of..." Etc. I admit, it sounds very nice. Even noble. I also think we're a bit too far gone to get it done these days. I could certainly start now, though, and in the world of acrobalance my beginning begins with Kate. From Kate came all these good things. I owe Kate huge karmic residuals (which she would almost certainly rebuff for being inherently un-karmic [unless they manifested as money or free time, perhaps]).

Here's the thing I'm having trouble with: For various perfectly rational reasons, a few years back Kate drastically reduced her involvement in creating circus work and new circus performers. She is now hip-deep (occasionally eye-ball-deep) in the work entailed in becoming a physical therapist, and she'll be a good one. Her secondary passion to acrobalance when we worked together was making sure EVERYONE DOES THINGS SAFELY. Some of this, admittedly, may have had to do with liability issues, but I choose to believe the core of Kate's personality lies in a primal need to protect people; occasionally from themselves. That instinct, combined with her love of all things physical, makes her a prima candidate for becoming an involved and informed physical therapist. Can not complain about them apples. What I can moan about is Kate's self-removal, albeit necessary, from the regular teaching and choreographing of acrobalance. I don;t think this will come as any particular surprise to Kate. Unless she misinterprets my feelings as a criticism of her choices. Which they are not. Kate.

It's just that, dang it, she's good. Maybe she's not the greatest acrobat in the world, or even the most gifted teacher; she'd be the first to confess various stories of having missed this or that, wishing she could go back and do something different. But I think we all feel that way about our work to some extent, and the people who really fail in any meaningful sense do so because they fail to perceive their own mistakes. What Kate has that's so damn valuable is an effortless love for the work, and for the people who are willing to try to come to it with open hearts and minds. That love fills the room -- and sometimes, a good portion of Sheep Meadow -- when Kate teaches. I've tried to carry that on, that ethos, and I think I've done a pretty fair job. I enjoy teaching or skill-swapping in this vein for the moment it creates amongst all involved, and it seems that those moments can indeed carry out into the world and the future with the right people involved, like Kasidy. So it's good work. Time well spent.

Thanks again, Kate.