Get On With It...
I am not a big proponent of any particular form of acting theory. Unless the whatever-gets-the-job-done is an actual school of drama...
Actually, I am very much a just-get-on-with-it sort of performer. I have lately observed a certain tendency as an actor, particularly as a solo performer.
In my show CHOP there is a segment, a portion, where a character chops off another character’s arm. The moment has quite a steady build of tension right before the actual moment the axe is brought down. There is this delightful sense of anticipation between myself and the audience as I stand there, the axe held aloft over my head.
This is a moment where it is profoundly easy for me to ruin everything. If I drop that tension, slacken it, the spell is broken. But, also, like a rubber band that is stretched to the limit, the moment is finite. It cannot be milked forever. And if I do not GET ON WITH IT, the spell is equally broken.
This getting on with it takes fortitude and courage. The impulse is to linger as long as possible in that drawn-out “moment before…” Even though I know (and the audience doesn’t) what is coming, I feel this urge NOT to go on. But if I do not, the play stops and I lose the audience at precisely the point when I most don’t want to.
So, I go on. I must. I plow through. And I bring this up right here because it seems most like how life works to me. Just when going forward seems to take the most energy, confidence, strength, whatever… That is the moment I must push ahead. Like I do in the play.
I drive the play forward, not slowing, not backing away, especially at the moment of the chop. It takes more from me to do so, it is not easy, but it must be done. Head down, forward march.
Otherwise, everything is ruined…