Going Home

Tomorrow, I'll be going back to my undergraduate stomping grounds as a guest. I've been invited by a class of graduating senior theatre artists to talk about the Boston theatre scene, my career and the artist community I found since I graduated Brandeis. I just spent two hours working on some notes and outline, and I have some interesting tidbits:

Theatres that didn’t exist before 1980 – The Huntington, ART, New Rep, Nora, BPT, Wheelock. One of the oldest we have is the Lyric, which was only founded in the mid 70's.

Shocking to think about...how young the Boston theatre scene is... Many of the aforementioned theatres are world are known internationally, and they're barely older than I am.

One of the topics I'll be speaking of is the sheer number of new companies that have popped up in the past decade. Many of which are even within the past three years. I've talked alot about community in this blog, and I think that's going to be what carries this movement through the next few years. I've recently gotten a wind of what the Small Theatre Alliance of Boston is up to. It's an exciting time to produce fringe theatre in Boston!

K

The Audience Dilemma

Hello everyone and welcome back from the weekend! As usual, I'd like to plug something (not so shamelessly!) before I get to the goods. Brandeis is having an alumni film competition and my friend Anthony and I created this film. I'm not sure if you'll get the jokes if you didn't go to Brandeis, but if you could at least click on the link, it will help us get closer to winning! Also, you know you want to watch me playing a pretty baller detective. Thanks faithful followers!

But back to the blog. Kenny has previously talked about how audience members influence each other at the theatre but today I'd like to talk about how the audience can impact the actors. I just finished my run of The Emperor's New Clothes. Now, the majority of our audience is under the age of ten years old which means that when they think something is funny they laugh out loud. They don't hold back! And, hey, as actors we are expecting them to. Hell, we're hoping that they will because we'll know we're doing out job right. But today's audience, while decent sized, was the silent type. They had weird bursts of laughter (mostly at rowdy children) but for the most part didn't laugh out loud. It didn't throw off the whole show, but it definitely shook the actors a bit. I know we're not supposed to TRY for the laugh, but you better believe that we want it. And every time the audience doesn't laugh, it makes us jump another hurdle in hopes of getting your attention and your approval.

I mean, that's the point of live theatre right? That each performance is different and the audience is one of those factors that makes each one unique. I've said this before and I'll say it again, the relationship between the audience and the actor is symbiotic. We give you our best and we hope that you'll help us along. But now I've started thinking, what happens when you're at a show that you're not enjoying? You can't walk out (well, you could, but I would suggest doing it at intermission, mid-show is plain RUDE not to mention TACKY) and you can't throw fruit as we're not in Elizabethan England. I mean, what if the actors are doing a great job but the script is poor? Or there's crappy direction? If you're losing interest because of one of those factors, it still effects the actors. I'm not telling you to fake enjoyment and I'm not telling you that you have to like everything you see. All I'm saying is, when you go to the theatre next, think about how once you enter the house, you are part of the show. Whew, thinking is hard. Your turn to tell me what you think! What is your relationship with the audience as an actor or the actor as an audience?

Why Kenny Does It

My life could be summed up by a string of key moments in which I received simple but profound words of wisdom. I am often asked why I chose the life I did, the life of an actor/director/playwright/artist. What sane person chooses a life on the edge? Artists of all types find themselves underpaid and overqualified for what they do, and we are sometimes tempted to apologize for the life we live, as if we feel guilt for not fulfilling our “potential for more.”

I am guilty of these things. Why do I do this? I stumbled onto the life of a theatre artist by complete accident. I come from an immigrant household that was constantly on the edge financially and emotionally, leaving me utterly unfamiliar with the concept of stability. For this reason, I sought education as a means to reach stability and become a productive, affluent and respected “contributor” to society.

I auditioned for my first play for the absolute wrong reasons. I attended a single-sex education high school, and at the age of 14 theatre was hands down the easiest way to meet girls. While the thought of trying to “get funky on the dance floor” horrified me (ironic, I’m sure, to those who know me now…), I found that the rehearsals after school were a comfortable and safe venue to show off what I desperately hoped was my “silly charm.” I did theatre all through high school and college under the assumption that my career choice would eventually jump out and whisk me away to an affluent future.

Theatre was a hobby, a hobby I took far too seriously. I studied acting and directing. Between classes and work, I spent all my extra time acting, directing or producing theatre. I found excuses to tie in all my other academic interests into theatre, even writing my final History paper in college on the leadership and artistic differences between Stanislavski and Strasberg. By the end of college, I had a major in History, but a "Super Minor" in Theatre Arts.

I became horrified at the realization that I didn’t have a passion…well, a REAL passion. “This theatre stuff is fun and I love it, but I’m not good enough to make a career out of it! I need a real job!” I knew that I desperately loved the arts, and felt truly alive when I was in the rehearsal room, but to embark on a life on the edge seemed a waste of my education, of my hard work, of my “potential for more.”

By the end of my junior year at Brandeis University where I studied acting, I had thrived as a director but became horrified at the prospect of a future without theatre. Where did I belong in the workforce? In the midst of my worries, I sought advice from professors, friends and family. The moment that changed my life wasn’t explosive or dramatic. The moment was simple, the words even more so: “This is all you do… You already know what makes you happy. Why keep searching when you’ve already found it?”

It’s been three years since, and I finally have an answer to why I do what I do: because I can’t be reasonably happy doing anything else.

While at Brandeis I had the pleasure of experiencing “The Collaborative Process”, both literally and figuratively. Just as I was to leave college and enter the workforce as an aspiring artist, I was given the greatest gift an artist can receive: the embrace of failure. I feared failure, just as we all do and will do for the rest of our lives. In the class that past and present students affectionately refer to as “Collab”, our instructor taught us a simple concept which guides me onward as I live this life on the edge: If you want to get yourself out of the “bulls***” world, you have to take yourself to the “oh s***” world. To paraphrase a common saying: "Courage isn't the absence of fear, but the action taken in the midst of fear."

Erika and I created The CoLab out of a desire to create theatre based on this idea, among many others. We hope to excite the theatrical community as well as reinvigorate the need for theatre in the world around us! Today, the CoLab is a small group of three artistic directors and community of artists, friends and well-wishers. We thank you for taking the time to investigate what is we do, and we hope to see you in our audiences, on the street and in the theatre!

Best,
Kenny