My Preconceived Notions Are Wrong, Apprarently

As I think I've mentioned before, I recently cut back to a part-time schedule at work. The idea was that I would reduce work-related stress that was not only weighing on me, but Honey, and allow myself to re-evaluate my priorities and explore other activities and interests a little more. I've discovered that I really do like a part-time schedule. The last time I worked part time was about three years ago, and though I wasn't particularly thrilled with the actual work I was doing then (kind of as now), I found it worked well with my personality and temperament.

Despite the fact that I've not blogged as much as I should, I have been finding more opportunities to write - and about movies, no less; a personal favorite. And last week, on one of my days off, I decided on a whim to go to a casting call for a commercial. It was an open audition, the call for which crossed my inbox by way of a professional listerve I belong to. I hadn't been to a call like that in years. At least nine years - since before I moved to the east coast. I dressed the part, as well I could (outdoorsy early-30s mom) and just figured I'd go to get an idea of the experience. Not only had it been a long time since I'd done a casting call, I'd gone to precious few in the past, so I really did just want to get an idea of how these things ran. I got to the casting office, signed in, and was a little nervous; despite my attendance solely for the sake of curiosity, nerves still kicked in. Then I started looking at all the women there reading for the same part that I was there for. They were all at least 2" - 4" taller than me, and quite visibly leaner. I easily had 10 pounds on each of them. Their hair was better prepared and their make up more immaculate. Once I realized I was out of my league, I actually relaxed a lot more. They're not going to cast me. My resume is terribly thin, and most of it is related to Clinton-era college shows, and for as "outdoorsy momsy" as I may look in real life, I've worked in and around media enough to know you have to hire a hot mom, not a real mom. This isn't my primary career anyway, so I really have nothing to fear. I can just get this one under my belt and learn more for next time. When it was my turn to go into the room, I slated for the camera, did a few readings of the lines, adjusting them according to the director's requests, and was out in less than 3 or 4 minutes.

As per usual, I replayed the whole action in my head on the drive home, wondering if I could have done anything differently that would have made a better impression. Could've done this; could've done that. Oh well; these are definitely notes I'll remember for the next time, whenever the hell that may be. Also part of the mental meanderings on the ride home were: "Wow, that was fun! Do I want to get back into this? I know don't want to pursue a stage career, but what about commercials and the like? That's short; good for my interest span. But I hate hustling. But maybe I'm a better place in my life to do this now than when I was out of college. Hmm."

Then, the improbable happened. Yesterday afternoon, I was just plugging away at work when my cell phone rang. I didn't recognize the number, but answered anyway. It was the casting agency. Oh, this is the "thanks, but no thanks," call. I wasn't expecting it, but I think many places do that sort of thing, so ... "I'm calling to let you know that they'd like to use you," the agent's assistant stated matter of factly. "Okay," I replied, not missing a beat or betraying the extraordinary surprise I was actually feeling. She gave me the information I needed and later I talked to the stylist a couple of times in the evening to get an idea of what kind of personal wardrobe to bring, in addition to what she was bringing.

I was in a tickly haze for about an hour after the call. I went to this audition, as a whim; as a shy toe to test the water. I wasn't expecting to be cast at all. I'm terribly excited - scared, since I'm normally before a live audience, not a camera - but excited. I'll be getting call time and more information later today. We'll be shooting outside, so I'm sure it'll be seriously cold, but as I'm positive I'll have a lot of nerves racing, I don't know that I'll be freezing. In retrospect, maybe they cast me because I really do look like I could be someone's mom, not an unattainable, idealized hot mom. Maybe I exude a playful nurturing? One of my best friends thinks it helps that I have a very corn-fed, middle-America look (think Jessica Lange or Jodie Foster) ie, prone to be outdoors. So my strawberry-amber mane, my stubborn jawline and my ample hips and bosom paid off for me this time. Who'd've thunk?

All I know is: I'm more comfortable with the idea of my being cast, now. And I've decided to approach this with a sense of fun. When I'm thrown into performance situations with new people with whom I've never performed, I find I'm braver in my performances, because I have no preconceptions. Well, this will be an all new bunch for me. Preconceptions are just speedbumps. This will also be a good learning experience. Hopefully, it'll help me decide if this is something I am interested in pursuing more regularly. I'm not competitve by nature, and when I was in college and immediately after, I felt like auditioning was competing and I hated it. But I'm older (hopefully wiser) now, and maybe I can change my attitude: it's not a competition, it's a chance to play and have fun. I perform - and audition - so much better when I have fun.

The shoot is a day away. Right now, I'm calm and eager. If I can just stay out of my head, it'll all be great. Deep breaths; load the iPod; no preconceived notions.

* photo courtesy of Penguin Feeding Time via Flickr Creative Commons

Maybe I was wrong

After I hit "publish" on my last post, I approached Honey and asked him if there was any book or work of art that changed his life. Without hesitation, he answered that a symphonic poem (whose title I can't recall) changed his life, and also gave me the title of a book that did, as well. The music wasn't earth-shaking, for him, but did measurably shape the way he thought about music. The novel was eye-opening for him and, according to him, changed his perception of life. Though, he admitted that I'd caught him at a moment of clarity and had I asked him the same thing after a long day of work, he'd've probably grunted and responded in non-sensical monosyllabic neologisms. When I told him I couldn't think of any work of art or book that changed my life, or measurably changed my thinking, he called me out.

"Annie changed your thinking," he responded, half in disbelief.

Because I'm a reflexive contrarian, I immediately dismissed his assertion, but he pushed it. "Before you saw Annie, you probably thought orphans were scary, or being an orphan was scary. But when you saw how all the orphans got to sing and do flips and have adventures, you got to thinking, 'maybe not having any parents isn't so bad.'" I don't think about it as having a profound influence on my thinking, he argued, because I was exposed to it at such a young age.

Score a point for Honey. Though, I contend that Annie's influence on my perception of life had less to do with her family situation and more to do with her will and resilience. And even Annie had her moments of self-doubt, which is kind of reassuring. Remember when she was hanging from the drawbridge by her fingernails and Punjab is attempting a helicopter rescue? In addition to Annie's optimism, I think that movie taught me that virtually every moment in life deserves a musical number. (Stop cringing Darla!) I'm not sure I would've deduced this with just any musical. Possibly, but damn Annie has spunk. I still wanna be her when I grow up. (Just look at my profile pic!)

So, I've been thinking this week about other works of art and books that changed my life. It's still hard for me to say any of these have been explosive revelations - most are small - but here goes nothin':

A Human Being Died That Night: A South African Story of Forgiveness - Pumla Gobodo Madikizela. I read this en route to, and during a vacation in, South Africa, 5 years ago. (One of the most inspiring travels of my life. How I long to return.) It's a moving memoir of torture and the post-Apartheid Truth and Reconciliation Commissions. Forgiveness was a huge theme in the commissions, and also in the book (hence the subtitle). However, this book was the first time I'd encountered the idea that forgiveness may not always be spiritually appropriate. Not forgiving is the opposite of what I was raised to believe. However, after I read this book, I sympathized with the notion more and no longer believe it is something every wronged person should necessarily do. Nor do I believe that it is always necessary to healing a wound.

Gandhi (directed by Richard Attenborough). Also released in the summer of 1982, this movie was probably almost as influential to my childhood as Annie. Dad took me to see it, I'm sure, because he wanted me to see a dramatization of the moral ideals he aimed to instill in us. What he didn't expect was that his 6-year-old daughter would not only sit through a 3-hour movie, but that she would fall in love with it and ask to see it again and again. (Thrice that summer, that I can recall.) Like Annie, this was so long ago, I can't recall the immediate impact. But I'm positive my aversion to institutionalized violence was influenced greatly by this movie. Additionally, because I enjoyed the story of Gandhi so much, and Dad revered him as an agent of goodness, it probably nudged me toward disallowing religious dogma to be the sole definer of my perception of, and relationship with, God. If God could use a Hindu like Gandhi to do Christlike work, then I couldn't believe he'd be punished in Hell just because he wasn't a Christian.

The Theater and Its Double - Antonin Artaud. Artaud wrote that theater's mission should be to evoke public catharsis. I agreed whole-heartedly when I read it as a 19-year-old theater student, and thought that ethic should also underscore religious worship. Might we be a kinder society if we had public spaces where we could meet and lather ourselves into a sob? It's hard to hate people when you see them a their most vulnerable and pitiful. It's also hard to dominate someone when you allow yourself to be seen vulnerable and pitiful. I still agree that catharsis, or at least perception-challenging, should be the main mission of theater. I'm more interested in storytelling these days - which originally lured me to the stage - but the higher notion of catharsis still informs my experience in a theater.

Sunday in the Park with George - Stephen Sondheim. This is one of those subtler life-changers; it's like a lover whom I discovered I loved only after years of platonic friendship. Joss Whedon, on Fresh Air yesterday, captured it best when he said that the first act of Sunday in the Park is about the burden of being a genius and the second act is about the burden of not being a genius. The first act of this musical deals with the drive of George Seurat as he works on his most famous painting, "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte." The second act focuses on his possible (and fictional) direct descendant, George, a modern/performance artist, about a century later. I suspect most artists, when we're (dare I include myself?) in "the groove" of our endeavor, can identify with the first act George. But it's the second act that speaks to me more. Specifically, the duet "Move On." There's an exchange of lines between the descendant George and Dot that always rips at my heart -

George: I've nothing to say ...
Dot: You have many things ...
George: Well, nothing that's not been said
Dot: Said by you, though, George.

I suspect every artist feels this at some time or another. How can one person have anything insightful to add to the many comments on life that have already been produced? Is it even worth opening our mouths if we're anything short of blinding geniuses? But Dot encourages him. It's worth saying something because we're saying it. Later she sings, "Stop worrying if your vision is new/ Let others make that decision, they usually do!" How many times have I gotten the note from a director that I'm too much in my head, editing myself as I perform? I need to listen to Dot! It has changed my life, subtly, in that I've stopped thinking that just because I'm a middle-class white girl from a stable, loving family in a rich, democratic country, I have nothing of insight to add. I certainly need to produce more than I currently am, but we all have stories to tell and perspectives to share. Mine isn't any less important just because it's closer to "norm."

So there you have it: a few works that have changed my perception of life. I was wrong. Thanks for calling me out, Honey.

I'm closing with video from a performance from the 1984 run of Sunday in the Park with George. It's Bernadette Peters - of whom I was afraid until I was a teenager, because of her role in Annie - and Mandy Patinkin singing "Move On." I prefer the performance we saw several years ago with Raul Esparza and Melissa Errico; her voice was warmer and he didn't seem as broad. But I can't find video of that. The song ends around minute marker number 5. Enjoy!

Life-changing Art and Books?

Despite the silliness of everyone on Face book listing 25 random things about themselves, I must admit, I'd rather enjoyed quick-tour catch-ups on old friends, or learning more about new friends, and people I'm generally interested in. Now a college friend of mine decided she'd start her own "better-know-a-friend" note: name one book that changed your thinking.

My problem is that I can't. I'm not unaffected by what I read, but I'm hard-pressed to find a book that, when I put it down, leaves me feeling measurably changed. There are books that have spoken to some un-articulated truths I'd carried around inside me. God is a Verb, a book about mystical Judaism, articulated what I'd been growing to feel about our relationship with the divine. In particular, the notion of "creationing" or "raising holy sparks." It's been years since I've read the book, but if I remember, essentially, divinity is mutually nurtured by God and people (or, if you want to get into my micro-understanding: all creation). God communicates holiness to us via love and creation, and whenever we act in creation and mercy, we "raise holy sparks" back into divinity. And it's like an engine from there: God powers creation and creation powers God. A poor description on my part, but the book spoke to me, despite that I was wary because of the faddishness of Kabbalah. But it didn't change my thinking per se. It voiced what I already suspected to be true. Similarly, I ate far less fast food after reading Fast Food Nation, and I eat almost none, now. My response to the book didn't change my perception or action in grandiose ways. I'd worked in fast food before; I had family who had worked in meat-packing plants. The information wasn't new to me - just distilled. My pivot wasn't huge.

I'm always fascinated and confounded by people's claims that a work of art or a book or literature changed their lives. To be able to reflect and identify a piece of music, a poem, a painting, a play or whatever as a critical hinge in one's perceptions or an inspiration for action, suggests that that piece was personally earth-shaking. This leaves me wondering if I'm missing something. If other people can identify the piece of art, or the book that changed the way they viewed the world, then am I just callow? I'm not unaffected by art and literature. I'll reflect for days on something I've seen or read that's particularly good. And that reflection, I'm sure nudges my worldview in one direction or another. But nothing identifiably earthshaking. My earthshakings don't happen - or haven't yet happened - because of print or performance.

As earthshaking epiphanies go, personal experiences are my volcanoes, where art and literature are the geysers. Moving across the state, in the midst of puberty, to a much smaller town changed my life; living there for five and a half years changed my perception of it. Having to drop out of college after one semester due to lack of funds changed my life in that I had to start all over again. I ended up going to a different university where I made friends whose understandings of life shaped my understanding. There, I also met the man I eventually married. Dropping out of college changed my life. Getting married not only changed my life, but changed my perception of life. Moving across the country changed my perception of life. September 11 changed my life and my perception of life. The medical demons I've been wrestling the last couple of years have changed my perception of life, though not yet the way I live my life. If we ever have children, I anticipate that changing both the actions of my life and my perceptions of life. In fact I welcome the change - at least the latter.

Art was important to me during these shifts. Discovering that I enjoyed acting during my teenage years kept me emotionally intact and gave me a creative outlet for my frustrations. A few years later, the Chieftains and classical music lunch-hours serenaded my depression that resulted from dropping out of school. I read poetry during those months, which is something I'd never really done before or since. I also journaled like crazy, took a modern dance class that was a breath of fresh air and discovered, appropriately, Fresh Air. I can say with certainty that, during that time, Tchaikovsky's 4th symphony, especially the 2nd movement, followed by the 3rd, expressed the uncertainty of the those days, chased by the quirkiness and optimism that ultimately drives me. I fell in love with it. But did it change my life? Did it change my thinking? Did any of those activities or discoveries measurably change my perception of life? I'm positive they did, but their effects are very, very small compared to the events that drove me to them.

There probably is a book, or a play, or a film or piece of music that would rock the foundations of my world. But until or unless I come across it, print and art will slowly shift the ground beneath my feet, but the accidents and incidents of life will continue to the be the big shapers of the landscape of my perception. Am I alone in this?