Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Keeping Things Fresh

This article appeared a few days ago in the New York Times and I thought it was something you all would love to hear about. It's all about how actors keep things fresh in a repetitive job night after night.


One Role, With 10,000 Variations
By CATHERINE RUSSELL

ASK people to describe a typical day at work and some will say it’s impossible — each day is different. But there are other jobs where people do the same thing every day, like driving the same bus route, or performing the same role in a play year after year. I’ve played the psychiatrist Margaret Brent in “Perfect Crime,” an off-Broadway play, for almost 25 years, ever since it opened.

Friends ask me: “How do you do that every night? Doesn’t it get boring?” “Never,” I tell them. There are always external events that affect the performance, and there are things I do myself to make each performance a little different. I believe that anyone with a repetitive job can do things to make it more interesting. Traffic cops who dance while directing traffic are one example, and subway workers who broadcast entertaining announcements are another.

I’ve heard of employers coming up with ideas to stave off employees’ boredom in certain jobs, such as offering incentives, but for me, the audience does that. Audiences differ: some laugh more than others, for example, and that alters what I do. Near the end of the play, I tell the detective who is trying to make me confess to a murder that I love him. Sometimes the audience laughs, sometimes someone murmurs “Oh, my God” and sometimes the audience is silent, waiting to hear what the detective will say next. Each audience response changes the energy in the room — and our performances.

Then there are the decisions I make to change the role slightly. I say the same lines and stand in the same places show after show, but one night I might decide to be a little nastier to the detective who suspects me, for example. Or I might ask myself: Does she really love him when she says “I love you?” Depending on the night, my mood, the audience, and the particular actor playing the detective, that line changes. There are hundreds of ways to say “I love you,” and I have tried them all.

Just like other kinds of employees, I’m affected by things that have happened during my day. If I’ve had an argument, or if I’ve received good news, it affects how I perform that night. I think I instinctively incorporate my mood into my performance in subtle ways. When I have gone through emotionally difficult times, the comforting consistency of the work has helped me enormously, and I get to cry and to slap and kiss people, which is very cathartic.

Some jobs are more repetitive than you might think at first — even in professional sports. Last spring I posed for a publicity photograph with Cal Ripken Jr., who played for the Baltimore Orioles for 21 years, appearing in 2,632 consecutive games. People magazine called me “The Cal Ripken of Broadway” because of my long run in this play.

I’ll bet that people with repetitive jobs will tell you that they grow with the work if they’ve done it for a long time. I like to think that I’m a better actress after playing the role all these years, and I hope that I bring maturity to the role now.

I enjoy challenging myself to bring something new to the role every single time I play it. It’s enormously satisfying to know I can do the job well over and over. These types of jobs allow you — or perhaps even force you — to use different parts of your brain. I think employees are happiest when they can do that.

On the other hand, some people love rote or mechanical or mindless tasks because there’s still a sense of accomplishment after completing them. I’ve known people to find tasks comforting that others label busywork, especially when they’re going through difficult times. When I have that kind of work, it helps me clear my mind.

A  REPETITIVE job is a trade-off, too, because it can provide stability. That’s an intrinsic reward. I crave constancy in a field that doesn’t have a lot of security. I’ve missed only four of our more than 10,000 performances and those were for family weddings.

We had an unexpected night off during Hurricane Irene this summer and I almost didn’t know what to do with the free night. I’ve never had a vacation during this run, but that’s O.K. Doing the same thing over and over gives me pleasure.

I have done some television and film work, and although it is fun, waiting around on the set before you are called to perform makes me crazy. I love the idea that every night at 8 p.m. I will be onstage doing what I love. If I found it boring, I couldn’t do it. My job fills me up and makes me happy.

As told to Patricia R. Olsen. E-mail: preoccupations@nytimes.com.

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