When we’re in college, actors are told to do as many shows as possible to learn from different directors and to fill our resume. We take parts as trees, maids, zoo animals, and 3rd statue from the left in an effort to get parts under our belt. We play shows in small black box theaters that seat 45 and large houses that seat 3,000. We do shows in high school auditoriums and under makeshift tents. All to make us look more marketable to casting directors because we have a diverse skill set.
I have pounded the pavement in Los Angeles, Sacramento, Las Vegas and New York. I have played, amongother things, a drunk sex-a-holic in a hole-in-the-wall theater in NYC where they passed out beer to the audience during the show. I’ve played a catholic nun on a temporary stage in the cafeteria of a Jewish Temple. I’ve done shows where I provided my own costume, shoes, make-up and sound system. I’ve worked hard to build a resume that, little by little, is something to be proud of.
I do large productions to meet the people and move my career forward. This is part of networking and marketing yourself as an actor. You have to play the big houses in order to get bigger paychecks and meet the people who will hire you, and pay you, again. I take the smaller roles in the larger production companies because they are a leg up in the industry. I work the small theaters as leads to get a leg up in the heart of theater.
Driving home from rehearsal last night, after a day that started with me willing to shave my head if it meant I didn't have to out of bed, I realized that we also do shows to heal ourselves. We work on characters and their problems as we work on ourselves. We study histories and relationships while we study our own. Taking on a character doesn’t mean just our resumes get fluffed. Our lives get a little reboot every time we step into the skin of another being.
Even when she is a show-girl bird who leaves her baby with an elephant.
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