I had at least one acting teacher tell me to "fill my mind with images of magnificence" while I was onstage. This was a way of conveying the truth that the tawdry everyday images were not where the mind should be while playing a character onstage. The stage requires a level of reality that is beyond ordinary, even when it just appears to be ordinary.
Stage life like poetry uses compressed and intense language, precious moments in time, multilayered shadows of reality, complex remembrances of experience. Nothing is meant to just "fly by" onstage. The moments linger; time stops; the eye sees within; the heart pounds in slow beats; the audience hears what your heart whispers. You are under the microscope with everything fully exposed.
The importance of all these warnings of depth -- is to make sure the actor is totally inside his role and not just playacting at it. Why should an audience pay to see an actor portray a character inauthentically? What makes acting worthwhile to watch and listen to? Why should anyone care what an actor "portrays"? And what level of life does the portrayal actually reference? Where does an actor "live" when he is acting?
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