Blog Post 5: Artist's Statement

Visual artists create their pieces from scratch and choose their subject matter. Songwriters write their own songs, writers their own words. Photographers are blessed to be able to point their camera at anything they want. But actors are one of the few breeds of artists that build off of someone else's creation. How then, when I move from script to script, director to director, do I summarize my work? I spent some time considering this question. And by "some time", I mean roughly five seconds. The answer hit me pretty suddenly.

Unity. Stories that unite audiences in a common goal or idea, that bring them together through laughter, or simply those that remind the audience that no one struggles through life alone.

I have a lot of hate in my heart. People, places, technological snafus fill me with contempt, but my acting is always joyous. It's the one chance I have to share with everyone and anyone in the audience -- and in the play -- a sort of weighted optimism, a belief that this existence is good once you dig through all the bullshit. And whether the outcome of the play is lightheartedly silly, or bittersweet, or downright tragic, the fact that we share it together is beautiful.