This has been a sad time. The drama group I've been part of for more than forty years has finally bowed to the inevitable and folded. Our lighting and sound equipment has been donated to other local am dram groups, village organisations and a nearby primary school. Our props and flats are destined for the tip in the next few weeks. It's the end of an era.
Acting has been part of my life since I was four years old, and I've been fortunate to play a huge variety of wonderful roles (and some crap ones, but I don't talk about those). I miss it, but much less than I thought I would, because writing has more than filled the void. Looking back, I can see how closely the two activities are related, and recognise that for me it was the acting that opened the door to becoming a fiction writer.
Most writers are classic introverts, and I'm no exception, so standing up and emoting in front of thousands of people – cumulatively, that is, not all at the same performance – seems counterintuitive. It evokes the same kind of nervous excitement as sending out a piece of writing I love to be scrutinised by other people, and the same exhilaration when the audience enjoys what I put in front of them.
On the stage, I am no longer myself. Putting on that metaphorical mask, I can adopt another identity, and say and do things that I never would in real life. Similarly, when I write I can create a character I would never be; I can put words in their mouth that I would never utter, or make them violent or passive, abusive or vulnerable, brave or pathetic in ways that I could never permit myself to be. It is both cathartic and exhausting. It is also immensely freeing, removing the self-imposed bonds of social conformity.
Actors and writers are required to be honest. To convince the audience or the reader, what we show them must be based on truth. What we portray needs to have a foundation in real feelings that they can identify with. It doesn't matter whether our character is a police officer or a princess, a vicar or a pantomime villain, unless we can show that they have human qualities they will never be believable.
As writers we're frequently told to 'write what you know', and just as frequently we ignore it. But nobody suggests to actors that they should confine their performance to things that lie within their personal lived experience. Yet the fundamental process is the same: using a commonality of emotion that resonates with every reader or audience member, we immerse ourselves entirely in someone else's head. That character may be very different from ourselves – physically, intellectually, socially, or in terms of nationality, sexual orientation or gender – yet we can understand what motivates them, what drives their thoughts and actions because we can share the same emotional impetus that pushes them in one direction or another.
Total immersion, at times bordering on obsession, is something else shared by actors and writers: constantly thinking about the character, dreaming about them, devising their backstory, and knowing how they would react and what they would say in any given situation. I once had a role in a three-hander one-act play in which I had only twelve lines to say. But I knew everything about that character, down to the pattern on her settee and the colour of her wallpaper, the name of her ex-fiancé and the reasons they broke up. This was pure invention on my part and none of it was referred to in the play, but to me it explained why she disliked the main male character and felt protective towards the other female because I could see things through her eyes.
The desire to write or to act may come from the heart, but mastering the craft is essential in both disciplines. Actors rehearse endlessly, writers edit and rewrite and edit and rewrite over and over. Rhythm, tone, pace and expression are adjusted to wring the maximum response from the audience. And even when things seem close to perfection, stage fright, writer's block and good old imposter syndrome are always waiting in the wings for their cue to make a grand entrance.
My days treading the boards may be behind me now (although never say never), but crossing from stage to page still allows me to feed the craving for applause, the desire to be in the limelight occasionally. And there is enormous power in being the one who writes the words rather than the one who merely repeats them.
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