The Inception of Innerstage: a brief personal history

I'd like to take just a moment to communicate the true story behind Innerstage and what led to its inception.

I, Joel, graduated from a small, but fine conservatory theatre program in Pittsburgh with a Fine Art's Degree in Acting Performance. Almost immediately after graduation, I found myself working in prominent theatres in Western PA. And so I continued to work in theatre in Pittsburgh, gliding effortlessly from one role to another, and surviving the leaner times by taking any type of work I could find, from painter, admission counselor, waiter. etc. The familiar and numbingly cliche life-path for the performing artist.

Now because Pittsburgh is a comparatively small market, and I was becoming a larger fish in the proverbial pond, my work would often be observed by directors and producers in the Steel city, and I'd be invited to audition for roles in the surrounding houses. In some ways I was lucky. I was able to perform in quite a few productions, and create wonderful pieces with many successful theatre artists in the area. On the flip side, I was completely under-developed in any kind of business savvy and marketing skills. My circle of influence was relegated to this pond only.

At the same time, I found my development as an artist to be sporadic, and often quite accidental. My undisciplined approach to my own development as an actor and human came with severe costs to my emotional and spiritual health. And I had deep sense of my own short-comings on and off the stage.

I was losing my grip. I was becoming more and more isolated and less and less authentic as a performer and human.

In desperation, I turned to the more spiritual wisdom traditions for guidance. I started a meditation practice, and devoured wisdom literature from both the East and the West, and slowly, in contemplating my own precarious situation, it became obvious to me that I was missing some vital life-training on and off the stage.

As actors and performers, we use our entire beings to create and commune with our fellow beings, yes?

And yet most our training is compartmentalized and focused on very specific tools. We train the voice, we train the body, we train the imagination, and we train the intellect, we train a method (or two or three). Often one module of training is taken and practiced in isolation from the others.

But how do we train empathy? How do we train access to higher consciousness? Creativity? Most would answer: Hard-earned life experienced. And they are absolutely right...

But what if we were to add the ingredients of the reflective aspects of wisdom traditions east and west to assist the actor in this more holistic human development. And further more, can we develop ways to access higher levels of creativity and connection to the source through this more integrated approach? Not just theoretically but practically?

I am not suggesting yet another acting method. Most actors I know do not consciously employ methods in their work anyway. Can actors find a way of working that makes room for any approach they choose to employ in the moment? And what does 'being in the moment' mean?

The GREAT SUMMARY:

Question 1:
Can we help the actor find a way of working on themselves on and off the stage?

Question 2:
Are they not the very same thing?