I thought of the piece before I thought of the title actually, but it seemed to be apt. So at least I achieved self-revelation while offering enlightenment to the world. Welcome to my good deed of the day.
When I used to instruct beginning actors, they would usually at some point ask me what it took to become a great actor. I can't even remember now why I first thought of the answer, but it was I think always the same. "Have your heart broken twice. If that hasn't happened to you yet, a) you're lucky and b) work on your technique." To be honest with you, I just editorially tidied that up a bit, but I did always say the part about having your heart broken twice.
The thing was and is that in order to play the sort of emotionally conflicted people that populate the world of stage characters, it is necessary to have had your own emotions run through an egg beater the first time and the propellers of a Sea King helicopter the second time. You need something horrible to compare the first horrible too.
Not that (dear God this just occurred to me) I'm advocating randomly breaking hearts in order to further the art. Or possibly I've just accidentally hit on the explanation of why so many people playing believable beautiful parts are such complete sluts and assholes in their day-to-day life. They're making others suffer for their art. So let it happen to you accidentally. Be kind to those you have loved. And besides, the theatre needs makeup artists and front-of-house personnel too. You can be an integral part of theatre without tap dancing across the stage...although the tap dancing across the stage stuff is the most fun stuff.
The second piece of advice that you wouldn't want to actively seek out in your life but is surprisingly useful for a writer is: lead an odd life. Odd in the sense of live and work in a lot of different situations. It gives you stuff to talk about and lots of characters to turn into, well, your characters. If Kevin Smith had never been a clerk, would he have appeared in this sentence?
I'd truly never thought of it before and this might be boring as hell, but that's what blogs are for. It's the Golden Age of Diaries and personal ledgers. But here are the jobs I've worked at seriously:
Teacher
Speechwriter
Telemarketer
Journalist
Financial Consultant
Marketing Manager
Night Auditor
Theatre Actor/Director
Somewhere along the line I've missed on being a waiter or a cab driver. But fir now, i think I'll stick with the noblest of all callings.
Writer.
Be seeing you.
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