glass concentration

our production of THE GLASS MENAGERIE opened last night. i don't generally like opening nights because the performance energy is too high-- you don't get a true experience of the play (as an actor or as an audience) because of all that nervous tension which comes from the actors having an audience for the first time. 

i felt pretty good about the performance last night, until my speech at the top of act two. i had a mini-panic attack and left out a huge chunk of the monologue. though it wasn't a glaring mistake, it worried me. i have been thinking about it and analyzing it all day, in typical over-sensitive andy manner. 

the last time i forgot my lines onstage was in mamet's OLEANNA, where many of the speeches contain overlapping meanings, and the speeches are threateningly long and intense, and that intensity needs to be sustained in order for the play to work properly. on the other hand, during the last play i was in, LINCOLNESQUE, i spoke long speeches directly to the audience, and never had a problem getting distracted or losing my text. in GLASS MENAGERIE i also speak directly to the audience, so i've been wondering what the difference is-- why did i have that mini-panic attack during this show, and not in the other?

i'm thinking a couple of things...

1. tennessee williams' writing is not functional or utilitarian; it is poetic and elaborative. much of it, in terms of plot line, is unnecessary. it says the same thing in four different ways, and my andy brain doesn't really work like that; i don't say things like that, i just state the facts and shut up. usually.

but more importantly,

2. i have identified this character very much with myself. other than a modest vocal change, i have not done any real 'character' work, meaning i haven't really added any character traits or qualities that would suggest someone else. this was also true of my interpretation in OLEANNA. however, it wasn't true of LINCOLNESQUE-- in that play, i felt i was playing, through a deeper part of myself, someone quite different. 

so my hypothesis is: without a certain veneer or shield of character added on as protection, i seem to be more vulnerable to distraction onstage. it's almost as if my own persona were being attacked by those eyes in the audience; whereas if i were a character, or someone else up there, i would be completely protected and impervious. 

i don't know how true it is, but it occurred to me, so i thought i would write it down.

i'm a little nervous about tonight's performance, but doing my best to relax and see it more from a character point of view, or a different emotional reality, in order to achieve that protective confidence.