The passion project you’re about to embark on will be harder than you ever could’ve imagined.
It will cost more and take longer than you think.
All kinds of things will go wrong that you never could have planned for.
You will be pushed to your absolute limit. And beyond.
Still want to proceed?
Good.
Because if you do, you’ll remember it for the rest of your life.
P.S. – Supposedly the explorer Ernest Shackleton took out the advertisement pictured above seeking crew for his infamous Antarctic expedition. He was flooded with responses. Over 5,000 answered his call.
One of the awesome things about being a writer or producer (sometimes you’re both) in a collaborative medium like theatre or film or television is you get to set the table for other talented artists to do amazing work. Your passion and persistence provides a platform for other artists. It’s an amazing gift for them and the audience who gets to see this passion in action.
In his memoir “Making Movies” (I highly recommend), the director Sidney Lumet recounts a conversation he had with Arthur Miller…
Arthur Miller’s first and, I think, only novel, “Focus”, was, in my opinion, every bit as good as his first produced play, “All My Sons.” I once asked him why, if he was equally talented in both forms, he chose to write plays. Why would he give up the total control of the creative process that a novel provides to write instead for communal control, where a play would first go into the hands of a director and then pass into the hands of a cast, set designer, producer, and so forth? His answer was touching. He said that he loved seeing what his work evoked in others. The result could contain revelations, feelings, and ideas that he never knew existed when he wrote the play. It’s what we all hope for.
“We know only too well that what we are doing is nothing more than a drop in the ocean. But if the drop were not there, the ocean would be missing something.” -Mother Teresa
“First do what is necessary. Then do what is possible. And before you know it you are doing the impossible.” – Saint Francis Of Assisi
“And…and you know what, maybe I’m crazy. But when I walk through a forest that I saved, when I hear the sound of wind rustling in young trees, trees that I planted myself, I realize that I have my own little bit of control over the climate. And if after thousands of years one person is happier because of it, well then…I can’t tell you the feeling I get when I plant a birch tree and I see it grow up and sprout leaves, I…I mean, I fill up with pride, I…” -Astrov in Uncle Vanya by Anton Chekhov (Anne Baker adaptation)
Yep, it’s true. That act of kindness, that helpful gesture, that small change you make isn’t a big deal. It’s just a drop in the ocean.
But what if your drop is the one that inspires others, especially our leaders? What if it’s the drop that breaks the dam open and leads to widespread, systemic change? The kind of change that makes the impossible, possible.
Do it. We need your drop. We need everyone’s drop.
“At around twenty-eight, twenty-nine, or thirty years old, after my kids were born, I figured I’d hit some plateau that was adulthood—where I believed things would just stay level for about forty years while I would do great work and have interesting experiences—then rather uneventfully I would begin to decay and die. But this was just not the case. I was not on a plateau. I was descending, tripping, stumbling, and burning. My whole being, or personality or self or whatever is supposed to be the seat of me, or the soul behind my eyes, was being boiled away in a giant iron cauldron like the flavor leaving a carrot.” –A Bright Ray Of Darkness, novel by Ethan Hawke
For the actor…
There’s a huge gulf between trying to get on top of it and being on top of it.
How much time is spent on the summit of a mountain versus the climbing up and down? Let alone the preparing for the climb.
“Trying to” involves struggle and obstacles. Internal and external. Real and imagined. It’s the struggle that’s fun to play and riveting for the audience. We wanna watch you go through some shit.
Resist the natural human impulse to want it to be easy. To be on top of it.
Get down in the muck. Litter the text with obstacles. Give yourself behavior that’s difficult to do.
The harder you can make it on your character to accomplish the objective, the more memorable your character will be.
P.S. – The pic above is from the original production of the play “K2” by Patrick Meyers at The Arena Stage in 1982. Legendary production designer Ming Cho Lee built an incredible set.
“The desire for security and the feeling of insecurity are the same thing. To hold your breath is to lose your breath. A society based on the quest for security is nothing but a breath-retention contest in which everyone is as taut as a drum and as purple as a beet.” ―Alan Watts, The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety
If we knew 100% it would all work out in the end, we’d probably endure just about anything, including being thrust in a pit of poisonous snakes, to get there. Remember the game show “Fear Factor”?…Contestants would do all these crazy hard, scary things. But if they completed the task, they’d get the reward.
What often stops us from trying isn’t hard work or the trials we have to endure.
It’s not knowing if we’re on the right path. Not enduring the right trial. Not doing the right kind of hard work. That maybe we should be doing something else. And what if we do our absolute best and it’s not good enough?
But we in the audience don’t. It’s our very first time.
Therefore, play each moment, each beat, each scene, as if you’re in the audience. Expect your actions and tactics to work. Fight for what you want right up until the very last line.
And who knows? Maybe this night will be different. Maybe this night you’ll break through to the other person. Maybe this night you’ll achieve your objective. It should feel like it, anyway.
“Good thinking is expensive. Bad thinking costs a fortune.
One way to force yourself to think is to write. Good writing requires good thinking.
Forcing yourself to make your thinking visible gives poor thinking nowhere to hide. You can’t simply take a few minutes here and there, get the gist of the problem, and expect to have clear writing. It doesn’t work that way.
Good writing, like good thinking, takes time.” -Shane Parrish
If you’re directing (or even producing) a film or play, one of the best initial practices you can do is write out a concept statement.
It’s basically a distillation of all your thoughts, enthusiasm and vision for the art you’re trying to make. It should be anywhere from a paragraph to a a few pages. No more.
Make it clear, concise and inspirational. Use it as a reference document to go back to when you’re struggling or feeling overwhelmed.
The process of writing one will clarify your thinking and strengthen your “why.” It will help you communicate better. And it will give you and your fellow collaborators more confidence for the journey that lies ahead.
Write your concept statement now.
Save a ton of time and unnecessary frustration later.
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. -poem, “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost
“Here’s to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes… the ones who see things differently — they’re not fond of rules… You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them, but the only thing you can’t do is ignore them because they change things… they push the human race forward, and while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius, because the ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do.” — Steve Jobs, 1997
If you chose to risk. Or live an artistic life. Or devote yourself to loving and serving others, for better or worse, you’ve chosen the unusual way.
You. Chose. It.
Therefore, embrace your unusual choice! And stop looking to the world for the usual way.
For the usual reward.
For the usual validation.
For the usual praise.
For the usual success.
For the usual status.
For the usual wealth.
For the usual power.
For the usual guidance of how to think and do and be.
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