Over Thanksgiving break I saw No Man's Land starring Sir Ian McKellen and Sir Patrick Stewart.
To be completely honest, as much as it pains me to say it, I didn't like the play. It might have been partly because I didn't feel well and partly because I didn't do the proper research before hand, but I simply didn't get it. I think my sister put it very well, "There was nothing active." Nothing really happens. If you asked me to describe the plot- the problem, climax, resolution etc. I couldn't do it. It seemed to have no plot. More importantly however, the character's didn't want anything. Their objectives were not clear and so it was hard to form opinions of them. I wasn't emotionally involved with the characters and so when the play ended, I was confused as to why I had just invested myself for the past 2 hours. Except for the fact that, for two hours, I was graced with the honor of seeing two of the best actors (of our time) perform on the stage.
Whenever I see a show there is always a part of my brain that goes into note-taking mode. It tries to extract every detail of their performance, analyze it, and then commit it to memory - while the other part of my brain tries to simply watch and enjoy the show of course. In the case of these two actors, there is quit a lot to take notes on, and recounting it all now would take too much time. So I will focus on one particular point that I think is most valuable for me at this moment.
Movement. I think one of the tell tale signs of an experienced actor is their movement - or lack there of. As an inexperienced actor we often move to much, whether it be our hands, our focus, of heads, or our feet. We do this for several different reasons:
1. We have so many ideas and can't decide what to do because we don't make specific enough choices
2. We wrongly think it adds something to our performance, but it doesn't - moving for the sake of moving just looks silly
3. We use it as a distraction so we don't truly have to commit ourselves emotionally, because that makes us vulnerable (and we don't like that)
No matter what the reason we are all guilty of it, but I hadn't realized just how detrimental it can be until now. McKellen and Stuart are powerful actors, and their power lies in their stillness. They don't move, they are practically like statues, it's quit the thing to see. Their lack of movement allows you to see them, all of them, with no distractions. They are incredibly vulnerable but that's what makes them so extraordinary.
