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Friday, April 06, 2007
Life, Art and Dreams
"Because it is my name! Because I cannot have another in my life! Because I lie and sign myself to lies! Because I am not worth the dust on the feet of them that hang! How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; leave me my name!"
~ John Proctor, The Crucible.The floundering of the human spirit to seek reprieve within his martyrdom against a lost cause. Fuck. Sometimes we make martyrs of ourselves not directly for a larger cause. Sometimes, we seek merely to ease the magistrate that sits within our hearts. The need to ease our own conscience is a somewhat larger driving force than the righteousness within us we feel we owe towards society.Fuck. That's one good play. I can't remember the last play that moved me and gripped me as much as The Crucible did.But, is one's name worth more than one's soul? I cannot help but be shaken by the ridiculous nature of this quest.And sometimes, to achieve real solace, we have to let go of the comforts that hold us back. To Let go of the blanket of assurance, and come face-to-face with the enemy within that speaks the truth, and whom we have to yield to. As Geoffrey Rush did beautifully in Exit The King. Fuck. Another tour-de-force. His yielding to his futility; the slow eventual collapse of his castle: how the cloth framing the imaginary window and the cloth cyclorama held up precariously by cables descended ever so slowly unto the ground as he succumbed his will, inch by inch, to the ascend of the throne. How ironic, that in accepting our frailty and faults, it is when we truly ascend unto our thrones and attain a sort of power over our lives and truly attain immortality. This is Theatre that challenges. This is Theatre that probes. This is Theatre that invokes. Oh when will Singapore see such plays? Enough with frivolous pantomines and re-stagings of past hits and controversial gender/sexual-issue plays. Give me theatre that strikes one's heart and takes one's breath away. Let Theatre leave me breathless. Bid me hold my breath, take me on a journey, make me feel what you're feeling too.And with the tilting of his head back unto the throne, with his final gasp, the lights snap off too, as if they thrived upon his live, or, they were representative of his life's essence. Save for that one naked iridescent tungsten bulb hanging at the back. And that light fades to black. And so Exits The King.What is this business we call life? What is this business we call acting? Ahhhh, the beauty of it all. How unreachable."This acting business is hard." - Peter OystonAnd so it is, and therein lies the appeal, charm and beauty that's gotten such a strong hold on me.Oh, if ever I could be to Singapore, or anywhere, for that matter, what Geoffrey Rush is to Australia, what Sir Ian McKellen is to Shakespeare. I could not ask for more then. If I can inspire just one person as much as I am inspired by Geoffrey Rush or Ian McKellen, I'd die a fulfilled actor. I'd have lived a fulfilling life.
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