The Performing Arts: Real

I’m an English major. I’ve read all of Shakespeare’s plays and sonnets (although don’t ask me for details about all those 150 sonnets). And the great truth about those plays? It’s a big mistake to read them. No one was ever meant to read them. The plays were written and designed to be performed. Hamlet on the page is a pale ghost of Hamlet on stage.

Actors know this. Everybody needs to see the experts’ work. Football players spend the weekday looking at game videos; painters go to museums to examine a genuine Van Gogh, and actors spend as much time as possible, attending performances. And we, in this latter day, are fortunate to live in an era of recorded performances. You can take in Laurence Oliver playing the melancholy Dane on YouTube without moving from your chair, and then you can turn right around and view Kenneth Branagh or Benedict Cumberbatch in the same role.

So when I took a class in the history of theater, we had a textbook and a reading list. But they were mainly a guide and a reference. The most important thing to do was to cue up the play on YouTube and view it. Suddenly dull screeds become riveting; pages of pointless dialogue develop focus. Everything suddenly makes sense!

What does this say about other art forms? Do you get the full benefit of music, when you listen to recordings? What are we missing, from the songs of humpback whales or dolphins? Do you have the sense, with some sculptures, that there’s a significance that’s sailing right over your head?

And this is the most important insight. The thing becomes real when it’s embodied.  Words aren’t enough, not on stage. You need the body, the actor standing there and saying the words. More than that: the actor has to act. The actor uses his body to give the words meaning, more meaning than words can carry by themselves. It’s an entire art form, a skill of great complexity, how to do that. I use my fingers and hands to create. Actors use their entire bodies! Is it too late for me to learn the trick? Let’s find out!