Permission to Play..Badly

In my mind, there is one skill that, if done well, can almost guarantee success and growth for any actor. In fact, without it, your life on stage can become stale and lifeless. The skill is not for the faint of heart and does not offer immediate gratification, but if done often enough, can lead to great leaps of creativity and higher levels of mastery. It is also a skill that is rarely practiced.

So what is this secret skill that can build a long and fulfilling career on the stage?

Give yourself full permission to act badly.

Let me explain. Theatre is a collaborative art, and sets itself apart from other art forms in one obvious way. You see, a visual artist can work through several incarnations of a painting until a final piece is proudly on display. A writer can generate numerous drafts until he is satisfied enough even to hand it over to editorial eyes. In acting, however, others are always present to witness the process of your creation, in rehearsal, previews, etc.

We've all been there before. The eyes and ears of too many people in the room seem to target us as we falter through a scene. At the same time, we are desperately trying to silence our own violent censor that chokes our creative impulses. So the only true antidote is the continuing practice of 'permission to suck'. Go ahead...read it again. I said 'suck'.

There is a link with this practice and a similar spiritual practice in zen traditions. It's called cultivating the 'beginner's mind'. It is about forgetting what you think you already know about acting, creating, and experiencing, because that road leads to imitation, lifelessness, and death.

When you can learn to be vulnerable with your peers and co-creators, then you learn to be vulnerable to your audience, and your audience will follow your open heart to wherever you want to take them.

Perhaps it is not so much a skill to practice, but a frame of mind to adopt.

So have I mastered this mind frame myself?...absolutely not...but I'll be embracing my inner 'suck' right along with you on stage!