Your Character Can Free You

Your character can free you

When you do the work of an actor there is much more in the mix than we know

Something magical can happen

It comes out of the work

There is always some degree of alignment between you and your character

Sometimes a character connects deeply with something in you, something you’ve been trying to understand

As actors we often make intuitive choices that come spontaneously in the moment, as if a greater wisdom intervened.

Our character will uncover some way of being we are stuck in, that even undermines the very thing we want most in life.

In a recent class of young adult students, I was struck by comments like this: I was always quiet, stayed on the sidelines at parties and listened as the others talked and told stories and joked. But playing my character I was able to speak out. It was scary but I felt so free. I wasn’t expecting that until I decided that “he” needed to get his message out and my voice got bigger.

Or… I never knew how entangled I was… I always thought it was them doing it to me… it’s something I realized that I can change. I know what I can do… it wasn’t clear before.

And there is this marvelous wonder in the student’s face… the wonder of discovery, a joining with her character offering a whole other option in her life that she didn’t know was there.

This is where the fun is, watching actors free themselves through their characters. As they evolve this way, new roles become available that they never imagined they could play.

It feels like magic as if touched by pixie dust.

Over time, actors find that there are many dimensions of themselves. They begin to make new choices. They become bigger people. They don’t feel confined by who they thought they were.

I believe this is why people are drawn to acting.

There is always an unconscious pull to what we humans do. Acting provides a playing field that is full of gifts and surprises.

When you have a gnawing inside, something you want to be—become—something you want to free—a character will appear… maybe you chose the character randomly or someone suggested a character they envisioned you playing. Or, it may be a character you are creating and that character taps into something you didn’t know was there.

When actors let their imaginations go, gateways can open to what seemed impossible.

By stepping into the character new things happen; behaviors, emotions, new feelings of wonder and desire emerge.

The character seems to have her own mind as the actor is behaving in ways that feel unfamiliar… but tremendously freeing.

When actors grow in their acting, they discover the same in their non-acting lives too. Life becomes a play of new choices. There is a lightness…

And a side effect. The playing becomes a kind of healing. Spontaneity mixes in to the work breaking it into new configurations.

When we set something in motion that makes us live more surprises regularly happen, things seem to spring out of us, we are surprised about who we are becoming.

But it doesn’t happen unless you get in there and work. Mix it up.

It’s like anything that’s fun. With skiing, you have to work at it until it suddenly lets you go. Or writing, or dancing. As you accomplish the learning, new energy builds and something happens that is the magic. It happens with less and less effort—as if on its own.

This is what frees the character in you so she can live with her own mind, her own choices seemingly beyond you.

If you play a slice of a character your character will come across as one dimensional.

But, a “fully realized” character is a kite in the wind… dancing, dipping, climbing, sweeping with the current.

Engage the magical...