I witnessed quite a fight this afternoon in the choir room at Carthage- and what made it especially upsetting was that it broke out between two students – Kristi Hamilton and Megan Mehl – who until today struck me as personable young ladies. It began with icy glares and muttered insults which quickly escalated to physical shoving, to the point where I actually fled to the other side of the room for fear of being caught in the crossfire.
I probably shouldn’t type another word without explaining that this “fight” was actually all make believe, as part of an acting exercise in musical theater workshop. My faculty partner, Matt Boresi, was working with two of the four ensembles we are preparing this semester – the quartet from Rigoletto and the Sandman/ Evening Prayer sequence from Hansel and Gretel. We began the hour with a quick run musical run through of the latter scene, after which Matt took over with an exercise designed to get Megan and Kristi to think and move and act like two young siblings (Hansel and Gretel) whose affection for one another quickly gives way to the kind of spat that nearly all brothers and sisters engage in on a regular basis. I’m not exactly sure what his precise instructions were to them, but it seemed to involve them pantomiming some fairly routine action- maybe walking down a path- and then gradually getting on each other’s nerves more and more to the point where it escalates into a full-blown fight.
As all of this began, I was feeling rather skeptical that it was going to be all that valuable. It had nothing to do with Matt himself- who is nothing short of brilliant- but rather some lingering memories I have of someone in my past – who shall remain nameless – who insisted on beginning every single evening rehearsal with the entire cast assembled for a round of theatrical games. I’m sure he or she saw real value in these exercises that might involve role-playing or wordplay or experiments in trust, etc. but I know for a fact that the young actors in these productions by and large were ready to strangle him or her because of what began started to feel like a COLOSSAL waste of their collective time. (I know it was especially irritating to certain cast members that they might show up at 6 for these games and then sit there for little or nothing else to do until several hours later – and in some cases were not needed for anything else the rest of the night.) It just felt to them- and I think with good reason- that this director was being incredibly insensitive and cavalier about other people’s time. And from my seat off to the side (usually sitting at the piano) the benefit of these games and exercises seemed pretty negligible. (I should add that I’m certainly no expert on such matters, but I’m still entitled to hold an opinion of something which I observed time and time again.)
So that gives you a sense of the healthy skepticism with which I watched the start of this little exercise…. fully expecting whatever happened to be mildly interesting and probably entertaining and funny but not profoundly useful. But boy, was I wrong! It literally took seconds for Kristi and Megan – two very sweet people – to transform into the petulant siblings of Hansel and Gretel. The metamorphosis was truly startling- far beyond what I would have expected to be possible- and it made me realize that Kristi and Megan will manage not only to sing this scene beautifully, but more importantly will manage to embody these iconic characters. The point of this exercise, by the way, seems to have been to leave quite a lot to the imaginations of these two young women. They were given a rather wide-open scenario with almost no specifics, and had to fill in the gaps themselves— and that was the true beauty of the exercise. And I’ve seen this time and time again with Matt…. his instinct of giving direction and guidance in very clear yet sharply limited fashion…. which is an exquisitely difficult balancing act. It’s one thing to give very vague direction and leave it up to your actors to fill in the rest and hope they figure something out in their frantic thrashing. Matt gives very focused, limited direction with the expectation that it will be a catalyst for their own imagination and creativity to take it from there. That is a skill I deeply admire – and envy- especially after seeing it play out today.
Speaking of ‘play’ —- I remember hearing Michael J. Fox (Alex Keaton on the old “Family Ties” sitcom) talk on a documentary about how he interacted with the very young actor who played his little brother on the show during the last couple of seasons. MJF took the approach – as did the entire cast and crew – that there should be no line drawn between “now we’re working” and “now we’re playing.” It was ALL PLAY all the time. . . and to some extent I think that was true not only in terms of their interaction with that young child actor, but with each other as well. What are we like when we’re playing? We’re free. We’re energized. We’re truly and fully alive. And if we’re playing with someone else, we feel powerfully connected with them, even if we’re not particularly conscious of it at the time. For all of these reasons and more, it’s exceedingly important to play. . . even when and especially when we’re working. And I am grateful to Matt and Megan and Kristi for so potently reminding me of that.
pictured above: Matt, Kristi and Megan talk over the fight exercise. In the background is Talia Nepper, who is singing Gilda for the Rigoletto Quartet.