The Revealing Curtain

When I was thirteen years of age, life started to be pretty difficult for me. That's a pretty universal statement, I believe. I don't believe I've ever met anyone who said, "Thirteen? Oh man, that's just when things started to get GOOD! Everything came so easy, and there was no confusion--not like at five. Man, at five, things were ROUGH...." It has different flavors, but they all relate to puberty, and moving on, and beginning to get a sense that someday (possibly today) you will have to fend for yourself in a much more real sense than you ever imagined before. So I don't believe my experience was unique, per se, but perhaps a little more out-there than some.

One aspect of those difficulties was that one day, in the middle of

a math class

, I took a big ol' streeeeeeeeetch // en I woke on my side on the floor to discover my tongue was bleeding. I had bitten through it, you see, when I passed out.

A very involved story follows, with a lot of doctor visits, tests, etc., the which pretty much filled up my summer before starting high school. I was ultimately diagnosed with a condition called "reflexive

epilepsy

," (a diagnosis I have had some reason to doubt) which, in sum and substance, is identified by the tendency to short-circuit one's brain with a specific series of physical cues, such as stretching a particular series of muscles in conjunction. I was put on a drug called Tegratol, which I hated. It made me phenomenally sleepy around the afternoon and--so I diagnosed it--rather depressed, lacking in spark. Being thirteen and imaginative, I also came to convince myself that what I had glimpsed the few times I had the seizure was a kind of peek behind the curtain of reality. To sum it up--and at the risk of sounding even more pretentious than I already may--I thought I was catching glimpses of actuality beyond the world that we had created for ourselves, to occupy our senses and keep us sane. That actuality, was nothingness.

Which was a little depressing.

The seizures are (yes, I still have them from time-to-time) like this: Usually they result from a standing, full-body stretch--after I have been still for some time--with my arms raised above my head. As I'm coming out of the stretch, I feel a tingling numbness that begins somewhere between my back and neck, and rapidly races through my arms and legs. My head gets, well, warm and loud. But the loudness has no noise (bear with me here), it's just a silent over-powering of any sounds in the room. The last thing that happens is that an oddly cobweb-like curtain sort of envelopes my vision, and does so rather slowly, given the drastic nature of what seems to be happening to the rest of my body. I've always thought of it as a curtain, but maybe a cocoon is more apt imagery, because it seems gray, chaotically woven, and it comes in around the edges of my vision, narrowing into a point until rapidly fading to black in which time seems to stop until I open my eyes, a few seconds later and usually looking up at a ceiling.

This story, she does have a happy ending. Somehow, in the course of grappling with high school and all it tides, I learned how to stave off the seizures when I felt them coming on. (My parents always claim the Tegratol helped in that; I always want all the credit for myself.) It was strange to discover, and took what I believe to be a lot of the resources the Tegratol robbed me of: determination, focus and a little fire. The trick is rather simple, actually. When I feel the tingling, and the curtain begins to descend, I simply focus my will on whatever I can still see in the center of my vision and sort of fight the curtain back. (Don't ask me to describe "fight" in this context. Sorry. Couldn't say.) The only thing that happens then is that, occasionally, people around me will wonder why I've just stopped and stared for a few seconds all of the sudden. It it happens less and less, and gets easier to stave off, as I get older.

Which is pretty sweet.

As was last night's performance of

A Lie of the Mind

. (HA! Thought I'd left the show behind, did you? Don't worry; I won't analyze every performance for a month. Next week we'll be back to fart jokes.) That may seem like a lame transition, but it is intentionally obfuscational. (Is SO a word!) Because you have to understand what coming out of my seizures is like to get the association I'm about to make.

Where Wednesday's performance was taught and tense, last night's was more a fiery calm. It was still an explosive, passionate show, but we had all relaxed a notch . . . just enough to be a little more in the moment, a little less concerned with making an impression. I don't know how everyone else felt (no cast hangage after the second show), but for me it was magnificent. I felt in charge of my game (apart from going up

COMPLETELY

on a line in my first scene), and much more loving toward my own character. None of the whine came through. His fight was strong enough to stand up against all those obstacles (see

4/5/07

). Great, great stuff. I was so relieved, and yet still timorous over that last line and its delivery. I had to tell myself not to think about it prior to the scene. I was afraid I would psych myself out.

The scene arrived, I opened my eyes, and there was Todd, playing my brother, barely holding it together. My character feels relief to see him in that moment, and I felt a relief at how

there

he was. His tears got through to me, and I knew if I could keep those feelings alive, blow on their embers, I'd be okay for that last line. But the audience is literally two feet away to my left, and I have to say that damn penultimate line expressing confusion over Jake's actions, and I know Laura is actually the director's girlfriend, not Todd's wife, and why can't I have a wife already anyway and what if I go up on my

last

line, too . . . . But then Laura, as Beth, says her line: "I remember you now." She's not weeping as she has before, but she sounds so fragile, so very very certain, yet scared, and I'm back. All I have to do is . . . not. Not do, anything. Be there. Just be there. If that's a difficult thing to do, I don't know about it right then, because I can't, because if I do I'll lose this . . . I've got to let it flow through me, I can't just hang on to it, but I've got to trust it'll still be there. Don't let it go. Don't hold on to it. Be. Be.

It was as though I could feel that curtain again, not around my eyes, but around my heart. (We're speaking metaphorical heart here.) And it's woven together out of all the experiences I've had that have taught me to have perspective, and protect myself, and to equate that rationale/ity with self-worth. It's me, this curtain. It's a part of me, and there's no abolishing it, but last night I held the cords and I had the strength. And the line came through the tears, and I saw and was seen clearly.

Gang, I don't know if I've nailed it. I rather believe tonight I'll have another experience of shut-down, sort of a backlash from last night's success. But maybe not. I hope not. I can't antagonize myself over it, because that only decreases the likelihood of being in that moment again. All I can do is my best, and try to learn from the worst of it.

Oh right, right! And as for actuality being nothingness: I decided it's cool to have a choice. I choose somethingness.

Repeatable Action

This was a very necessary skill for an actor, according to my dearest college acting teacher,

Gary C. Hopper

. He was the one who enthusiastically took on all the Freshman classes for their first year of training, like some kind of manic

Gunnery Sergeant Hartman

, and took a very personal interest in each and every one of we chosen few (seventy-five to start, I believe) forgetting all we thought we knew and undertaking his approach to creating believable, effective moments on stage. It was always with a huge, toothy grin that he would offer scathing criticism of our naive little choices, and with said same grin he gave us his own pearls of wisdom regarding the oldest art. Acting axioms, if you will:

  • "In general" is the enemy of good art. (This one is stolen, I believe.)
  • Would you like some fries with that Big Mac? (Translation: There are no discernible stakes to what you're doing, so why are you even on stage, you douche bag?)
  • Acting! Theatre is my life! (Translation: People must be able to see, at all times, that glint in your eye that tells them you derive your greatest joy from moments spent in rehearsal and on stage.)
  • His intensely formal formula for explicitly stating one's intention in each scene: "Because I feel _______, due to having been _______, I want to _______ [NAME OF CHARACTER], so that s/he will feel _______, resulting in _______."

Apart from these axioms (I know that last one isn't an axiom, and I would ask you to kindly shut the hell up), he would also use these little phrases to recall to our minds earlier lessons. Case in point, his sing-song recitation of the words "Repeatable action!" whenever you failed to fulfill established blocking, or claimed you could juggle and proceed to drop a ball. It's common sense, especially for a theatre actor. That actor must be able not only to produce genuine moments on stage, but do so with consistency every performance.

I am magnificent at this. I won't lie to you (not even in my Mind). At this, I rule. One director, who worked with me on Proof and Over the River and Through the Woods... out at The Northeast Theatre, once wrote me that I was "the most consistent actor" she had worked with. But it is a double-edged betleH, this madness of skill. I mean, who delights in the knowledge that they are non-deviant when it comes to art? Reliability is a good thing in one's fellow actor, I agree, but we'd all rather have a moment on stage be alive than choreographically consistent. And supposing one's consistency is actually a regularity of badness or, worse yet, mediocrity?

My love of the repeatable action has deep roots in this kid's psyche. (By "this kid's," I am of course referring to myself in the third person, thereby cautioning you that a. I'm about to get all psychoanalytical on yo' ass, whilst simultaneously consoling you that b. I appreciate the dramatic irony of self-aggrandizement and how it relates to an actor talking [much less writing] about his or her person.) I was pretty much always a guy who appreciated a good plan. In school, I used to get tense about going into a class without knowing what we were supposed to be doing that day (see 3/8/07 for analysis of my absolute need to know everything about everything ever). One of the main appeals of theatre, in my earlier days of interest, was the presence of a script. When I would get into arguments with my friend Bridget (sorry to put you on the spot, B, but you were the only one I fought with when I was growing peach fuzz) I would actually kind of have to step out of them in order to gather my thoughts. I couldn't just get mad and say irrational things. That would have been, you know . . . irrational.

And the patterns continue into Jeff-the-Present (as opposed to Jeff-the-Past, not Jeff-the-Absent, nor Jeff-the-Only-A-Card). All this circus stuff I've gotten myself into, you think that's solely because I wish I were a vigilante superhero? Predominantly, sure, but solely? And the clowning I've been working on, I suppose I just like the idea of self-imposed humiliation? (Well okay: You have a point there.) No, it's choreography. As is my tendency to take jobs with theatres with which I have previously worked, rather than putting my proverbial testicles on the metaphorical line and playing Rizzo in some West Village cabaret. Not loyalty, oh no: Choreography.

And step-ball-change, step-ball-change!

There's something to be said for choreography. Get not me wrong. Only what good is it without that certain indefinable passion, that razor's edge that makes everyone sit up and feel something? For the past several years I have worked hard at letting go of the need to be choreographically precise in my acting, and allowing that spirit of madness (this is the word a control freak uses to describe spontaneity) into my work. A Lie of the Mind is a pretty classic example of this effort on my part, and I don't write this solely for the purpose of pimping my show on you. (Predominantly, sure.) My performance only lives (I'm talking basic life support, here) when I let go of our decisions in rehearsal and let it all happen for the first time, yet I resist this condition, I suppose because it feels hokey, or irresponsible, to me. Well, to my left brain, anyway. And let me tell you (I'm here to say [even for me, the parentheticals are getting out of hand in this one]), if I'm at one end of the control/chaos spectrum, Friend Todd is at the other. He's brilliant at letting go. In a way, this contrast between us makes for perfect casting of these roles. Still, I feel a need to rise to his level in that ratio of consistency and life. I have a lot to learn from Mr. d'Amour.

Because I feel limited, due to my inhibitions, I want to kick ass in this show, so that the show will feel sufficiently ass-kicked, resulting in my career rocketing to new artistic heights.

Repeatable action is a valuable skill in theatre and film, but talent trumps all. (As to defining talent, someone once said, "Talent is like pornography. You can't define it, but you know it when you see it.") In life, I think the talent is in determining when a repeatable action is really called for. It can be easy to get stuck in a rut, and scary as hell to come bounding out of said rut headfirst. Yet necessary, I believe. We were not made for ruts. I applaud people who stick to their principles, but I shout for them that break the rules in order to learn something new.

Reunity

Oh 'Blog, you knew I couldn't stay away from you, didn't you? You've known all along, and yet you allowed me to play out my delusions, my fickle little fantasies of not needing you with an intense, feral desire. Only you hear me, 'Blog. Only you . . .

understand

me.

My hair is quite long now, and it isn't getting cut any sooner than the end of April, when

A Lie of the Mind

closes. (The director wants that "

Remington Steele

" look.) As with most issues concerning my self appearance, I vacillate wildly in my feelings about it. I have good hair. Shit man, I have

great

hair. I'll say it. It's soft and fine, without being too thin--it has just that right amount of body, so I don't really have to do anything with it if I don't feel so compelled . . . and I rarely do. In fact, the only complaint I ever have about my hair is that it tends to make me difficult to recognize from situation to situation. It's a proven fact: My hair length and style changes my face significantly, so much so that people I've worked with more than once will sometimes not place me when I see them again--say a month later--if I got a haircut.

{

I'm really worried about Jeff...he just keeps talking about his hair...I think he might be self-obsessing a little bit...then again, it is a freaking blog...I mean: " 'blog "...}

One thing having long hair makes me think about is the past. The reason for this is two-fold. Fold one is that hair is a record of cells gone by, so when I wear it long, I occasionally think about what was going on in my life when the cells at the tips of my current hair were dying and being expelled from the pores atop ma' noggin. At this length, I'd have to guess it was when I was doing

Operation Opera

(actors measure their lives in shows [actors: holla if ya hear me]), maybe propagating a flock of follicle fronds whilst singing a Queen cover, or enjoying a fire in David Zarko's fireplace.

Fold two is a memory of the time in my life when my hair was longest. Said time was the end of my Freshman year of college; a strange time. It wasn't particularly memorable in the moment, but in retrospect, about a million things were going on beneath the surface that would later sprout up and change my life for good. (Like hair, dare I suggest? [Too much there? {That was too much, wasn't it?}{Shit.}]) I won't (can't) get into all of that here, at least now, but it shaped me as an actor, a person and--more specifically--as a newly minted adult.

{...he's claiming a lot of self understanding now...what's he selling here?...at least he isn't talking about his damn hair anymore...}

I was a little miffed about not having permission to cut my hair for an occasion I attended this past weekend. That occasion was a sort of reunion, at least on my part.

I detest reunions, sort of for the same reasons I resent New Year's and Valentine's Days; it's an occasion where everyone is

trying so damn hard

to have a good time. And not just a good time, but the

right kind

of good time. That judgment, hanging about like smog, affects me, perhaps more than it should. And at reunions it's freaking LA smog, because everyone is taking stock of their lives (read: judging themselves against others). I favor a quote which refers to that notion, today's finsky quote:

"I know everybody's coming back to take stock of their lives. You know what I say? Leave your livestock alone."

This reunion was actually a wedding. The girl I moved to New York to be with got married on St. Patrick's Day, and I was there. Don't worry: I was invited.

Why was I invited?

I can't say I really know. The break-up was fairly amicable, at least inasmuch as it could be with two very hurt people with rather little life experience involved, and I've made a point of staying friendly with her and her family. I still consider it pretty unconventional to invite the big ex to one's wedding, but ultimately I decided that it was their decision, and I wanted to go. I wanted to bear witness to the marriage of two people who love each other, and I wanted the brief reunion with people who had been my loved ones.

I guess I have to admit I'm taking stock of my life a bit, too.

{...oh God...here he goes...this is where it gets ridiculous with embarrassing clothes-rending and gnashing of emotional teeth...where's my iPod...I need to block out the sounds of his self-pity...}

It was amazing. Really amazing. Someday I'll devote a 'blog entry just to the adventure of getting to the church on time, but for now the amazement is from how welcomed I was, and how full of love the experience was for me. I was busy trying so hard to be as unobtrusive as possible, particularly at the reception, yet people sought me out, and everyone I caught up with I also shared a memory or two with that I couldn't have remembered without seeing him or her again. Sure, there were some more or less awkward moments for me (like when the Maid of Honor mentioned in her speech that my ex hadn't been seeing anyone while they were on tour together...suppressing laughter at that point was one of the more Oscar-worthy moments of my life to date) but all that was trumped by getting a rare and beautiful moment in life to remember someone I used to be, and say goodbye to him with fondness.

I don't know if I'm the only one who feels this way,

{...oh God, here he goes again...}

but I often wonder

{..."he wonders while he wanders"...dear Lord, save us from these musings...}

if I haven't

{...oh, hasn't he?...and what horror will--

Hey. Hey, Super Ego.

--me?

Yeah, you. Knock it off. You're being kind of a d&%k.

I'm doing no such

You're being kind of a d&%k. And I don't appreciate it. Now knock it off, before I'm forced to start following the "

The Secret

" program just to spite you.

{}

Anyway. I often wonder if I haven't lived so much, changed so much, that I've lost track of more versions of myself than I could possibly keep track of. Not that I essentially change, necessarily, and maybe this is just a matter of perspective. Some probably see their lives as fully integrated journeys of evolution. I can see it that way, too, but most of the time I look back and feel a great distance from my past thoughts and actions. It's a little bit like most plays I memorize. I can do a full production of a play, spend months learning and then performing lines, yet when I read the play a year later it seems alien to me. Then again, I know some words by heart that I may never lose, for no special reason. I mean, do you ever wonder if you're still who you've been before? Is this some kind of demented syndrome hatched from the habits of an actor, always moving from role to role, or is it more common than that? What do you think of yourself as you've been; and, when you think of him or her, do you feel better about that person, or the one you are now?

I was sought out recently by a fellow journeyman on

The Third Life

(tm), and an alumna of

my college

, one

Jason Carden

.

Jason

has been on the west coast for years, and I hadn't seen nor heard hide nor hair of him since he graduated, a year before me. We did two shows together in college,

The Three Musketeers

and

Stand-Up Tragedy

, and in the latter we sort of co-starred. About a month ago (whilst I was still in California: see

2/19/07

), Jason emailed me to see if we could catch up now that he was in New York for a while. I finally coordinated that with him tonight (a real miracle, given our combined schedules) and we met for dinner.

Once again I had the experience of recalling memories I never could have without the other person present. I was grateful that we didn't have to worry about one of those horrible one-ups-man-ship conversations actors can so easily fall into when catching up with one another, and before long we were confessing how much we hate the idea of reunions. Yet there was nothing awkward, or judgmental there. What there was, was a kind of understanding about the people we had been when we both had Richmond zip codes, and a curiosity about who we were now. And that was welcome, because not having to be explicit about who you are or where you come from is a relief as long as, at the same moment, a mutual respect is implicit.

Two struggling actors re-met in a restaurant today, and by the end of their conversation they were on the subject of

Batman

. Icing on the cake.

Ice was all over the street today. After a little period of promising warmth, March has whipped the city with frigid weather again. As Jason and I started to chat on the way to the restaurant, he mentioned that he had his hair cut short just the other day, and now he was really regretting the loss of insulation. I had to smile, feeling warm and oddly young.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

At 9:00 tonight you'll be humming that to yourself, thinking, "What the crap? How did that song get in my head now?"

And I will laugh with wicked delight!

My college roommate of two years,

Durwood Murray

, had a spring tradition. It was this: We would walk the quad, or the Fan, and as we walked some young lady would invariably saunter past in shorts, or a tank top or both. Durwood would respectfully but noticeably appreciate this combination of factors and then say, to no one in particular, "Man, I love spring." Trust me when I say that, coming from Durwood, it was charming.

After a brutal half-week cold snap, it is warming up in the city. I doubt we're out of the lion days of March yet, but I take what I can get when I can get it. (How is it in the gutter there, mind[s]?) It enervates me, reminding me of just how much of my bouts with the doldrums lately have had to do with cabin fever and lack of light. My mood is sadly sensitive to a lack of warm light, undeniably; yet it is a response I can't help but wonder if I might not be having at this point had not someone once suggested the idea to me. Capiche? It's like you never ever see people in wheelchairs, then a book you're reading mentions them and suddenly they're

everywhere

. Sophistry at its best. Or worst. Whichever you choose to believe is right.

Yesterday was a highly productive Sunday, in part as a result of this (and in other part because I largely ignored my phone and had my roommate about, which somehow always motivates one to look busier), and one of the things I produced was to finally reduce the size of my pictures files from California (see

2/19/07

). My new camera (

Casio Exilim EX-S770

) takes poster-sized shots, and I haven't figured out how to recalibrate the camera yet, so loading up the shots onto my computer essentially obliterated what little storage space poor Grndyl had left. This simple, seemingly monotonous task turned out to be really interesting. Distance lends perspective, and I recalled that for a week I had an early spring on the west coast.

Last night

Anna Zastrow

--an amazing clown--came over and we met and discussed her full-length clown piece,

Breathe or You Can Die!

She showed me a DVD of its performance at last year's Fringe Festival, and we discussed what she liked and didn't like about it. Anna wants me to work with her on improving the piece; sadly, we both have continuously busy schedules. It will take some doing to find time. But I love her clown,

Helda

. A couple of years ago I helped direct her appearance in a show we were both performing in,

Madness & Joy!

, by Ruth Wikler's group,

Cirque Boom

. It was a great time, and it's rewarding to know that Anna apparently found my input helpful. Helda is a wonderfully sentient clown (which is probably why I identify with her so well), and Anna is a wonderfully committed and serious clowner. I hope we can work it out.

Must . . . tie . . . disparate portions of entry . . . together . . . . Can't . . . allow . . . for disjointed . . . personal narrative . . . .

Finally, last night Friend Adam and I caught a late showing of

300

, the movie based upon

Frank Miller

's amazing graphic novel of the same title. I love Miller's work (he wrote and drew my favorite comic in the whole world ever:

Batman - Year One

) and Adam and I have sort of a pact to see every comicbook adaptation together, yet I was reluctant to see the

300

. Miller's previous film adaptation,

Sin City

, was the most amazing translation of a comicbook to the screen I had ever seen (at that time), full of understanding and appreciation not just of the story and characters, but of the dramatic appeal of the aesthetic. And after I saw it, I knew I would never willingly watch it again. The grotesque acts of violence in those stories have to clobber you for the world to make sense, and Miller accomplishes this with ease in his drawings. The movie took such a literal approach to the translation of these acts, however, that when put in motion with real voices behind it, this translation created a running terror throughout the movie of wondering when the next holocaust remembrance would occur. It was terrible.

300

is a violent, violent movie. There is decapitation and evisceration galore. Yet the makers spared a thought or two to allowing the aesthetic of the film to convey the violence and stakes without necessarily conveying the horror of dirty deeds. Somehow, through the bodies piled high, the black blood flying in clumps through the air, the silhouetted limbs falling to the earth, the violence is glorified, occasionally laughed at and in some way justified. It helps to know the historical context of this movie (which isn't to say the film is at all an accurate portrayal of events). This battle was ancient Greece's Pearl Harbor, and without it and the sacrifice of Leonidas and his 300, Western civilization as we know it probably would not exist.

Make of that what you will.

Spring is sprung, the Persians are being gored gloriously on the screen and the clowns are coming out of hibernation. Lock up yer daughters, ye farmers.

"Lock it up!"

"No, you lock it up!"