PERFORMANCE: The Actors' Roundtable: "Talkbacks"

For 12 weeks, Paden Fallis posed one question each week to a group of professional working actors from a variety of backgrounds in an effort to dig a bit deeper into their artistic working processes. In this second series of 12, an expanded group of actors explores where their art fits into the larger cultural context. ACTOR’S ROUNDTABLE: TALKBACKS A “talkback” of sorts happened on January 5th, 1935 in New York City. The Group Theatre was performing Clifford Odet’s Waiting for Lefty to an unsuspecting audience. As Group member Harold Clurman recalls in his book, The Fervent Years, this performance was an event “to be noted in the annals of American theatre.” Actor and audience became one, as the audience hung on every word, shouting their approval, applauding, whistling, and cajoling as they became caught up in the show before them. They left the theatre unified, inspired by what they had just seen, eager to enact change in the world around them.  We have talkbacks today as well. From where I stand, they are soulless, contrived, and add nothing to the experience. However, they have become a staple in modern theatre. If there is a show, there must be a “talkback” scheduled afterwards for the patrons to ask any and all questions of the actors and design team. These talkbacks appear to be with us until the bitter end. So, help me here. How do we fix talkbacks? Or, do they need fixing? - Paden Fallis, Performing Arts Contributing Editor

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PERFORMANCE: The Actors' Roundtable: "The Empty Space"

For 12 weeks, Paden Fallis posed one question each week to a group of professional working actors from a variety of backgrounds in an effort to dig a bit deeper into their artistic working processes. In this second series of 12, an expanded group of actors explores where their art fits into the larger cultural context. ACTOR’S ROUNDTABLE: THE EMPTY SPACE In 2011, The Intiman Theatre, a powerhouse in the Seattle theatre scene, abruptly cancelled their season due to financial troubles and a 2.3-million-dollar debt. The entire staff was laid off and the long-running, award-winning theatre’s future was up in the air. In other news, at the start of Peter Brook’s seminal book, The Empty Space, published in 1968, Brook says this: I can take any empty space and call it a bare stage. A man walks across this empty space whilst someone else is watching him, and this is all that is needed for an act of theatre to be engaged. Brook’s thoughts. Intiman’s predicament. What am I missing here? Discuss…  - Paden Fallis, Performing Arts Contributing Editor

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PERFORMANCE: The Actors' Roundtable: "Politics"

For 12 weeks, Paden Fallis posed one question each week to a group of professional working actors from a variety of backgrounds in an effort to dig a bit deeper into their artistic working processes. In this second series of 12, an expanded group of actors explores where their art fits into the larger cultural context. ACTOR’S ROUNDTABLE: POLITICS Are you incredulous when you hear an actor is a Republican?  If so, why?  If not, why not? - Paden Fallis, Performing Arts Contributing Editor

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PERFORMANCE: The Actors' Roundtable: Awards Meat Parade

For 12 weeks, Paden Fallis posed one question each week to a group of professional working actors from a variety of backgrounds in an effort to dig a bit deeper into their artistic working processes. In this second series, an expanded group of actors explores where their art fits into the larger cultural context. ACTOR’S ROUNDTABLE: THE AWARDS MEAT PARADE “Demeaning” and “a two-hour meat parade” was how George C. Scott described The Oscars upon being nominated for his role in the movie Patton. He won, but did not attend. He was also nominated for his work in The Hustler, but did not attend. George C. Scott was, without a doubt, tightly wound. And yet I don’t think any of us would deny that the myriad of awards shows that seem to crop up year after year, have nothing to do with the work of an actor. However, does this need to designate winners and losers do a disservice to our work? Do we all lose something by playing into the “two-hour meat parade?” - Paden Fallis, Performing Arts Contributing Editor

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PERFORMANCE: The Actors' Roundtable: Art for Art's Sake

For 12 weeks, Paden Fallis posed one question each week to a group of professional working actors from a variety of backgrounds in an effort to dig a bit deeper into their artistic working processes. In this second series, an expanded group of actors looks at where art fits into a larger cultural context. ACTOR’S ROUNDTABLE: ART FOR ART’S SAKE We have taken it into our heads that to write a poem simply for the poem’s sake […] and to acknowledge such to have been our design, would be to confess ourselves radically wanting in the true poetic dignity and force: —but the simple fact is that would we but permit ourselves to look into our own souls we should immediately there discover that under the sun there neither exists nor can exist any work more thoroughly dignified, more supremely noble, than this very poem, this poem per se, this poem which is a poem and nothing more, this poem written solely for the poem’s sake.  – Edgar Allen Poe Or as the French would say, “l’art pour l’art.” I’m a staunch “art for arts sake” guy. I don’t believe, as artists, we serve any other masters. However, with so much unrest, malaise and confusion in the world, is this too high-minded and narrow an idea? Should art not be more than for its own sake? Where do you stand? Do you see art and your work in theatre/film as intrinsically self-sufficient or do you see it as being its strongest when serving another aim? - Paden Fallis, Performing Arts Contributing Editor

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