insatiable curiosity

This week has gone by quick-quick.

After (most) of the cast memorized the show for Monday (4 days after we got the script), we jumped into running and perfecting it.  This week has been a huge week of ultimatums.  We have ranged from full runs to scene hash outs, too slow to too fast, not enough to too much.  But here we are at the end of the week-with 3 more rehearsals left till opening; and I feel as if we're in a good place.  As I reflect back on how I was feeling a week ago today, I am grateful for the progress I've personally made (its been a week of first timers: 2  week rehearsal period, playing in a farce, playing this type of character, living in a new city). Good grief, how in the world did I get through it all?

I think it was curiosity.

I just realized this today actually, after I spent some of my morning at the local farmers' market (3 stands on one block - Goshen, be grateful for what you have) and got to know some of the vendors there. I want to know how, why, when, where, who - its a time of 'sponging' for me both in my work and 'play'.  THIS is the performer's job: curiosity.

Anna D Smith calls it 'insatiable curiosity' in the 'Reaching Out' section of "Letters to a Young Artist" (p 81). She acknowledges that artists don't necessarily have to experience the whole ranges of emotions to convey them in their art - they just need to communicate them as if those feelings were their own.  Smith says it "is a process of reaching out from.  That is different from avoidance and denial, it is reaching out from your pain, to see and understand the pain of others" (p 81-82).

So my requirement as an artist is to soak, to exude curiosity, to converse with farmers at the market, to observe strangely dressed golfers, to seek the truth in my character no matter how awful he is.

That's why I love my work.  I get paid for my curiosity.