Steppenwolf Theatre Company Blog – Chicago Theater, World-Class Ensemble

Kelly O’Sullivan, who plays Cheryl in Good Boys and True (and who plays her like a violin, in case you haven’t had the opportunity to see her), and I were talking about when the previews and knocking knees and expectations and overwhelming excitement and opening are over, you’ve got a job to do. This is where the real job starts. Keeping the story and your character fresh. Every single performance.

When you’re getting ready for your big scene and you feel dry as a bone inside. Nothing’s working. All your emotional songs on your ipod have lost their juice. And you’re so terrified to let down all the people waiting in the audience that when you walk on stage, you just know that your scene partner sees the terror in your eyes and is saying to you, “Hey, I got you. We’re OK.” And you breathe easy because you know you’re working with the best. (Thanks, Stephen.)

But it’s still live theater. ANYTHING could, can and does happen. For example, last week as Stephen and I were running off stage after our first scene, his foot got caught in his gym bag, sending him straight to the ground. Bad for him, but he unwittingly made a perfect cushion for me to fall upon. (Except for the area where the rest of my body weight could land on my knee, leaving a bloody trail running down my leg during the next scene.) To add insult to injury, during my big emotional scene a cell phone went off. Another night I inexplicably forgot how a door knob works and smacked my head into the glass.

These occurrences are funny. Now. At the time you feel like you let down the play, the playwright, the director, Steppenwolf, your fellow actors, the gracious audience, yourself, and pretty much the entire world.

And I’m again reminded that the job of being an actor is hard. There are nights when you don’t really feel like doing the show. When you had a bad day and are tired and don’t really want hundreds of people looking at you. But you do it. You have to. And here’s why I do it:
In my research for this play, I reread some books that were really important to me when I was in high school. One of my all time favorites that I read is Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger. At the end of the book, Zooey recounts a time when he didn’t want to shine his shoes for the weekly radio program he was on. He was furious at everyone, the audience, the announcer, the sponsors. Their brother Seymour told him to shine them anyway. To shine them for the Fat Lady. And so he does. And he tells Franny, a former actress, that there isn’t anyone out in that audience that isn’t Seymour’s Fat Lady. I don’t know why, but this really makes sense to me. I’ve got MY image of the Fat Lady. And when I don’t want to do the show, or I feel like I don’t have the energy, or I feel like I’m an awful actor, I stop and think about her. About the Fat Lady in the very back of the audience. Who only comes to the theater once a year. Who put on a nice dress and traveled a long distance to be here. Who really can gain something from this play. And I do it for her. And that’s enough.

Thanks, Lady.

This entry was posted by Tim Rock on Friday, January 11th, 2008 at 12:50 am and is filed under Good Boys and True. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.