Bruce's profile
"I look forward to an America which will reward achievement in the arts as we reward achievement in business or statecraft. I look forward to an America which will steadily raise the standards of artistic accomplishment and which will steadily enlarge cultural opportunities for all of our citizens. And I look forward to an America which commands respect throughout the world not only for its strength but for its civilization as well." John F. Kennedy, October 26, 1963
How My Work Is Represented
I did some math recently. If you multiply the number of theatre patrons (on average) in one of my audiences, by 30 performances (the average number of shows in a 4 week run), times five shows a year (I usually perform 4 or 5 shows a year), times 25 years, you get a number in the hundreds of thousands. This is roughly the number of people who have seen my work during my career. An impressive and humbling number and to know that I have touched that many lives is a remarkable feeling. That said, I am acutely aware of the ephemeral nature of what I do. Except for the people in the seats at the time, the various production photos and the archived videos kept at WAPAVA in DC, it's like the work never exisited. For example: I am reminded of a show I did at Everyman Theatre this past September. It was a complex set, complete with a revolve built just for the show and two towering shelving units packed with bric-a-brac. Two days after closing I began rehearsals for the next show (in the same space) and when I walked into the theatre for the first read, the stage had already been transformed: The house and back yard of a family home in Ohio. Ephemeral...like the blood, sweat and tears from the prior performance had never happened.
On this site you will see production photos, reviews and read my extensive accounting (for the first time really) of my life in the theatre. You will not see videos of my work for two reasons: One, I am a member of the Actor's Equity Association, the union of professional actors and they have strict rules about image protection. A quick side bar: For years actors were treated like cattle, herded in to do shows and then herded out with little money for their efforts. Often, conditions were not much better than a farm stall and actors were powerless to change this and the centuries-old attitude that actors were depraved gypsies. The AEA set about to correct this and in the intervening years have protected actors in remarkable ways. Not the least of which was to establish a decent (and regular) pay scale. There is still plenty to do but to have this influential backing is a relief. Video clips of my work are not allowed to be shown on a public site because, as an example what I do, the clips could be copied and my work used against my will. My art taken and reproduced without my permission and without compensation. Shades of being taken advantage of a century ago but in a more sophisticated and electronic way. Further, this protection extends to the artistic footprint of the designers of the set, sound, costumes, lighting, props and direction of the given production. There was the suggestion that I compile a series of clips to be viewed privately by the Baker judges but I have been told this would be at odds with the transparent nature of the award process. I understand this completely. Secondly, I entertained the thought of having someone professionally film me while reciting a monologue or in a scene with a friend but without the support of a full production around me, this leaves the viewer experience woefully flat and one dimensional. Me in front of a black curtain speaking Shakespeare? Me and another actor performing a scene from Angles in America with two chairs and a table? Doesn't make for very compelling art to be judged. Live theatre is meant to be experienced live. The actress Helen Hayes established the Helen Hayes Awards in DC years ago and it is an amazing arts celebration that takes place at the Kennedy Center each year. They are our version of the Tony Awards and she stipulated that the ceremony was never to be filmed but experienced in the seats, in the moment.
Some Quotes
"Bruce is a lovely collaborator and actor who I had the pleasure of working with on the premier of Dead Man's Cell Phone at Woolly Mammoth Theater." Sarah Ruhl, playwright, Eurydice, The Clean House and The Vibrator Play
"Bruce Nelson is a complete delight to direct. In both Taming of the Shrew and Dead Man's Cell Phone he was a terrific collaborator - playful, whip smart, open hearted, curious... His performances in both were perfection. I hope to work with him again, again, again." Rebecca Taichman, director
"An Everyman subscription is a treat I give to my husband and me. We have taken our teenage son and daughter, both involved in theater programs, to see how Bruce Nelson captivates his audiences by weaving his subtle magic to infuse each new role." Eileen O'Rourke, Everyman Theatre patron
Some History
I started acting by accident when I happened into a late-afternoon drama class, like so many actors I know. 1982. Wilde Lake High School in Columbia, MD. I would go on to play Rump in a production of Grease (10 years later I would become a professional union actor in an Olney Theatre production of The Elephant Man as John Merrick). What high school sophomore wasn't awkward and what high school drama class wasn't a place for the awkward to feel welcome? My own mix of wild emotions ready to be funneled in a creative way landed me parts in some early plays (the aforementioned Grease, then Welcome to the Monkey House and Pippin. A 5th grade turn on the stage as Santa was a fluke.) It was here that I cut my teeth on the acting craft. (I remember being amazed when a director told me that to make it look like you are having an upstage conversation during a show, whisper the words "peas and carrots". I have since learned that whispering "watermelon" works better. So much for craft. Kidding aside, I've learned a lot since those very early days.) Clearly, I didn't know what I was doing but I was having fun and felt included...acting was a nice by-product of being a member of this adopted family. It wouldn't be until my studies in the Theatre Department at Towson University that I would start to make sense of this art but really end up with more questions than answers. My relationship to acting has been mostly love and sometimes hate. Love: The attention, making a difference in people's lives, educating an audience about a character. Hate: The doubt, worry and rejection, auditioning. Despite the ups and downs as with any career, I have a resume filled with remarkable experiences, developed a local fan base that I absolutely adore and people tell me that I've emerged as a supremely skilled actor. One day I might believe them, then again, not believing the hype (good or bad) has kept me in the stable center. For now I'm going to keep my head down, stay humble and keep doing what was said in a 2009 Potomac Stages review: "Bruce Nelson proves that, as far as his profession is concerned, he has used his life to date well indeed, honing his talents with dedication to develop the craft of acting."
First Steps
I am a 1988 graduate of Towson University where I received a BA in Theatre. As a junior at Towson, I was presented with the Theatre Humanitarian Award and in 2001 was recognized as an Honored Theatre Alumnus. Immediately following college I toured with the National Players for three years in Much Ado About Nothing, Animal Farm, Midsummer, Nicholas Nickleby, The Taming of the Shrew and The Elephant Man. I briefly toured with the Children's Theatre Association of Baltimore and brought several adapted children's stories to elementary schools in Maryland, Delaware and Pennsylvania. In 1993 I helped found the Baltimore-based Improv group The Flying Tongues that enjoyed entertaining local audiences for several years ending with a tour to Arizona, California and Wisconsin. At Howard Community College I taught acting and Improvisation for several years establishing the Yo' Mama's Cookin' student Improv troupe and in 2002 I was made Outstanding Adjunct Faculty Member in HCC's Theatre Department. Currently I teach Improvisation at Stevenson University, with Project Access at Howard Community College and Basic Acting at Everyman Theatre. Privately I offer acting coaching in my home and over the phone I Life Coach performers looking for guidance and support in their careers. In 2008, along with two former students from my adult Improv classes, I helped found Catapult, an Improv group that draws upon social concerns as the basis for a more structured, longer form of improvised storytelling.
A Career
As an actor and Company Member at Everyman Theatre, favorite productions have included: Private Lives, All My Sons (Baltimore City Paper Best Actor 2011), Shipwrecked! Our Town, The Mystery of Irma Vep, I Am My Own Wife, "Art", The Turn of the Screw, The School for Scandal, The Cripple of Inishmaan, The Drawer Boy, The Pavilion (Baltimore City Paper, Best Actor 2004), As Bees in Honey Drown, The Crucible, Hedda Gabler and Watch on the Rhine. At Rep Stage in Columbia I have been seen in The Goat, Hysteria, Bach at Leipzig, Stones in his Pockets, Santaland Diaries, Neville's Island, Kimberly Akimbo, The Lonesome West, Travels with My Aunt, The Violet Hour, The Dazzle, and Faith Healer. I have been nominated 5 times for the Helen Hayes Award and won twice for my roles in The Dazzle and The Violet Hour. I am also a member of the Acting Company at Woolly Mammoth Theatre in Washington, DC where I was recognized as an Outstanding Emerging Artist in 2000. Favorite productions there included: Wonder of the World (original production...meaning it's first professional showing. All these years later, how cool is it to read on the inside cover of the published play that I originated one of the roles), Big Love, Dead Monkey, Dead Man's Cell Phone (original production), After Ashley, Wonder of the World and Fuddy Meers. I have also enjoyed work at the Folger Theatre, Olney Theatre Center, Center Stage, Signature Theatre, Washington Shakespeare Company, The Shakespeare Theatre and Baltimore Shakespeare Festival. From 1998 to 2007 I was a professional book narrator for the blind at the Library of Congress and in 2002 received the Torgi Literary Award for my recording of As Nature Made Him by John Colapinto.
An Acting Process
I am waiting in the wings at a local theatre. Places have been called and in just a few minutes I will enter the stage. I am nervous, more than usual, and I suddenly remember my father Robert Nelson. He was charming, outgoing and loved being at the center of the attention. He was brilliant, highly intellectual, an oral surgeon in the Army. From my dad I got my gregarious personality and my love for performance. Mom is trickier. Brilliant in her own right as a nurse, she was well loved and happy to remain "in the wings" while occasionally offering some spot-on wit. From mom I learned subtlety, nuance and grace that finally I have come to embrace as an actor, foregoing the splashiness on stage in favor of the simpler acting choices. I also got shyness from mom. Sounds paradoxical for an actor but sometimes I don't want to be "on" and at a party it's not unusual to find me quietly observing the action from a corner. Still waiting backstage, these thoughts subside and the worrying starts again. I remember that a friend told me that "the good actors always worry...they care too much, it's the bad actors who are always too relaxed and aloof". I guess that's something. A fellow actor/friend of mine still worries before lights up and he's 70. This suggests that the nervousness is here to stay. An inevitability and necessity in an acting career (necessary because of the energy it provides.) Backstage I remind myself (for the 100th time) that the audience has no idea what to expect, they aren't sitting there with a script, following along to make sure I'm word perfect. Also, they are not some nebulous mass ready to point the finger and judge. They are friends, family and yet-to-be friends here to support me and eager to be educated about my character. I'm here to have fun. I silently repeat my Marianne Williamson mantra: "Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others." The backstage worries dissolve, perspective and calm take over. The lights go to dark, I enter and position myself on stage, the lights shine and I am gone.
Like any art, the art of acting is a mystery. (Although more and more I feel like I finally know what I'm doing and that I'm able to live with the mystery. Mystery is probably an inherent part of art-making and to track down a root cause is ultimately futile.) Technically, I know where to stand, how to make my body movements seem natural and spontaneous, how loud I have to be so the audience can hear the lines and which words to emphasize so my lines make sense. Beyond that, a mystery. In general I am aware of everything that is happening, constantly taking inventory of all the technical aspects of performing while balancing character and effortlessness. Every so often I will have a performance when all the thinking stops and I transition into what Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi discusses in his book Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. "On the rare occasion that flow happens, we feel a sense of exhilaration, a deep sense of enjoyment". The audience and I and the words are one and I'm floating: Powerful motivations and impulses expressed on an unconscious level whose method of manufacture I will never be able to put my finger on exactly. It's not uncommon for me to leave the stage after a show and have the stage manager say: "Great show. Loved that new moment you added" To which I say: "I don't know what you mean?" The exchange continues with me having no memory of what I did. I know that something happened but the details escape me as I was so lost in the moment I was creating. A mystery. And as I pull together the specifics of my career in this Baker posting, you the reader and I are, for the first time, unlocking that mystery together. A shared experience, not live unfortunately. Never before have I taken the time to comprehensively define my process. That said, I have definitely developed a style over time. Most of what propels me is some instinctual feeling. When it comes to rehearsing a part, I have few social boundaries. Right, wrong, good, bad are suddenly on hold and I let go. Feelings, impulses and random motivations concerning the character spontaneously manifest themselves as a physical move across the stage or as an interpretation of a line. Much like improvisation, I work very quickly in the rehearsal process and purposely avoid thinking about my in-the-moment actions. Thinking about what I do often leads to questioning and then judging my choices as unworthy. I leave those decisions to the director and hopefully a director who knows how to gently steer and mold an actor without harsh criticism. Because my impulses come from such a personally-derived place, they are personal and I rely on a director to kindly collaborate with me in discarding those stage choices that don't serve the play. Through this organic process of elimination my character is born and will (hopefully) continue to grow during rehearsals, through the run and until (hopefully) that final curtain on closing night. I say hopefully because some characters get stuck and for whatever reason don't grow. Not that they aren't fine to watch but sometimes, like people, their progress is stunted at a certain level. I remember being in a production where a director had such specific ideas about how to perform the role in which I was cast, that it left little room for my personal mark on the process. I was directed to stay within some very tightly drawn character boundaries and was afraid to grow. Stunted. When asked about more freedom in the role I was told: "We're not researching Cancer here, you're taking this far too seriously". I think sometimes that what I do is like approaching a life or death situation. Theatre helps people continue to live every day. Rather than fight him on the finer points of my character, I fell in line and did as he said. The reviews were uniformly raves. A mystery.
I remember a teacher telling my college acting class that if you could do anything else besides a career as an actor, you should. He went on to say that if you do decide on pursuing acting, the most discouraging part of the career will be the rejection. Rejection is dreadful and when I don't get the part, I have learned to be patient and remember the larger picture...acting is part of my life, not my entire life. I have also had to work hard at letting go of the pangs of jealousy that take over when a friend gets cast. My default is sometimes "What about me!?" and I have to remind myself that there are enough parts to go around, my time will come and in the meantime I can enjoy my friends' success. I have had a lovely career and if it were all to end tomorrow, it has been a glorious ride. Part of what the would-be actor works against is the fact that since acting looks like life, it is perceived as easy. It's a profession where you could wake up one morning, walk into your first audition and based on a certain look, a clear voice and a body and heart that connect easily, get the part. I remind myself that these are not the skills of acting but happy genetic coincidences. The truth is that many hours of intense work and training, like any other job, are required.
In 1988 as college graduation approached, the question of making the move to New York loomed. The cultural belief is that if you are an actor and want to consider yourself legitimate, you go to New York. Anywhere else you land as an actor is just that, somewhere else, not legitimate. At the time I agonized over the move but 25 years later I have no regrets about remaining a Baltimore-DC actor. It is said that to become an actor one must make their home in a certain place, work as much as possible and still expect to wait in upwards of 10 years to make a name for yourself. In staying local I have done just that and I am blessed to be a steadily working actor in this area.
A Teaching Philosophy
In 1998 I taught my first acting class and my life was changed. I instantly knew that teaching would parallel my acting career. I have dedicated my teaching efforts to empowering people to connect (and more often than not re-connect) with their creativity via acting and improvisation classes. My teaching has taken many forms. In the corporate arena I offer teambuilding and presentation skills workshops and have worked with: Cho Benn Holbeck Architects, IMRE Financial Services, PW Feats Event Planning, Community Conferencing Center Family Mediation, Korean Resource Center, Human Genome Sciences, Grimm and Parker and ING Financial. In the public arena I offer acting and improvisation classes at Everyman Theatre, Stevenson University and Project Access at Howard Community College.
My teaching method has shifted and changed over the years. Using approaches that I picked up in college (Stanislavski, Strasberg, Adler), reading books on acting techniques (Misner, Hagen, Mamet, Fine, Chekhov) and offering exercises that I hoped would be fun for the students, made up my patchwork classes. I would attempt to explain that the actor's essential task is to reproduce a believable reality on stage, based on a close observation of the world. Some context about the craft: It is important for the actor to recall emotions genuinely if they are to be believed by an audience. This requires enormous concentration and commitment by the actor and the healthy cultivation of a "life of inner feelings." Accessing this "inner life" requires single-minded awareness of all the information coming in through the senses. Acting asks you to stop and ask why and as a deeply personal process, demands that you bring all of who you are to the stage when you perform. Your sensibilities, strengths and insecurities are the building blocks for your stage characters.
The Prize Money
Off and on I've been thinking about what I would do with the Baker grand prize and for the longest time I have had the desire to open a school. As my teaching has evolved and my confidence as a teacher has grown, more and more I want to establish an acting studio in Baltimore. Routinely I teach adult learners...those individuals who are looking for later-life enrichment. Not completely sure how they want to spend their time but who are well aware they have a creativity in need of expression. My favorite kind of student is the retired business-person who always had a desire to act but for various reasons had to put this on the back burner. It reminds me of my father who, upon retirement from work as an oral surgeon in the Army, returned to school (UMBC) to major in theatre. Upon graduation he embarked upon a second career as an actor that gave him great pleasure. A peak moment for he and I was the chance we had to perform together in a local production. An acting school that gave this kind of fulfillment to an adult demographic sounds like a possible future plan and the Baker money would help fulfill this.
Personally
I have been a proud Baltimore resident off and on since 1993. I am the father to a beautiful son and somewhat late in life find myself in a loving, partnered relationship.
How My Work Is Represented
I did some math recently. If you multiply the number of theatre patrons (on average) in one of my audiences, by 30 performances (the average number of shows in a 4 week run), times five shows a year (I usually perform 4 or 5 shows a year), times 25 years, you get a number in the hundreds of thousands. This is roughly the number of people who have seen my work during my career. An impressive and humbling number and to know that I have touched that many lives is a remarkable feeling. That said, I am acutely aware of the ephemeral nature of what I do. Except for the people in the seats at the time, the various production photos and the archived videos kept at WAPAVA in DC, it's like the work never exisited. For example: I am reminded of a show I did at Everyman Theatre this past September. It was a complex set, complete with a revolve built just for the show and two towering shelving units packed with bric-a-brac. Two days after closing I began rehearsals for the next show (in the same space) and when I walked into the theatre for the first read, the stage had already been transformed: The house and back yard of a family home in Ohio. Ephemeral...like the blood, sweat and tears from the prior performance had never happened.
On this site you will see production photos, reviews and read my extensive accounting (for the first time really) of my life in the theatre. You will not see videos of my work for two reasons: One, I am a member of the Actor's Equity Association, the union of professional actors and they have strict rules about image protection. A quick side bar: For years actors were treated like cattle, herded in to do shows and then herded out with little money for their efforts. Often, conditions were not much better than a farm stall and actors were powerless to change this and the centuries-old attitude that actors were depraved gypsies. The AEA set about to correct this and in the intervening years have protected actors in remarkable ways. Not the least of which was to establish a decent (and regular) pay scale. There is still plenty to do but to have this influential backing is a relief. Video clips of my work are not allowed to be shown on a public site because, as an example what I do, the clips could be copied and my work used against my will. My art taken and reproduced without my permission and without compensation. Shades of being taken advantage of a century ago but in a more sophisticated and electronic way. Further, this protection extends to the artistic footprint of the designers of the set, sound, costumes, lighting, props and direction of the given production. There was the suggestion that I compile a series of clips to be viewed privately by the Baker judges but I have been told this would be at odds with the transparent nature of the award process. I understand this completely. Secondly, I entertained the thought of having someone professionally film me while reciting a monologue or in a scene with a friend but without the support of a full production around me, this leaves the viewer experience woefully flat and one dimensional. Me in front of a black curtain speaking Shakespeare? Me and another actor performing a scene from Angles in America with two chairs and a table? Doesn't make for very compelling art to be judged. Live theatre is meant to be experienced live. The actress Helen Hayes established the Helen Hayes Awards in DC years ago and it is an amazing arts celebration that takes place at the Kennedy Center each year. They are our version of the Tony Awards and she stipulated that the ceremony was never to be filmed but experienced in the seats, in the moment.
Some Quotes
"Bruce is a lovely collaborator and actor who I had the pleasure of working with on the premier of Dead Man's Cell Phone at Woolly Mammoth Theater." Sarah Ruhl, playwright, Eurydice, The Clean House and The Vibrator Play
"Bruce Nelson is a complete delight to direct. In both Taming of the Shrew and Dead Man's Cell Phone he was a terrific collaborator - playful, whip smart, open hearted, curious... His performances in both were perfection. I hope to work with him again, again, again." Rebecca Taichman, director
"An Everyman subscription is a treat I give to my husband and me. We have taken our teenage son and daughter, both involved in theater programs, to see how Bruce Nelson captivates his audiences by weaving his subtle magic to infuse each new role." Eileen O'Rourke, Everyman Theatre patron
Some History
I started acting by accident when I happened into a late-afternoon drama class, like so many actors I know. 1982. Wilde Lake High School in Columbia, MD. I would go on to play Rump in a production of Grease (10 years later I would become a professional union actor in an Olney Theatre production of The Elephant Man as John Merrick). What high school sophomore wasn't awkward and what high school drama class wasn't a place for the awkward to feel welcome? My own mix of wild emotions ready to be funneled in a creative way landed me parts in some early plays (the aforementioned Grease, then Welcome to the Monkey House and Pippin. A 5th grade turn on the stage as Santa was a fluke.) It was here that I cut my teeth on the acting craft. (I remember being amazed when a director told me that to make it look like you are having an upstage conversation during a show, whisper the words "peas and carrots". I have since learned that whispering "watermelon" works better. So much for craft. Kidding aside, I've learned a lot since those very early days.) Clearly, I didn't know what I was doing but I was having fun and felt included...acting was a nice by-product of being a member of this adopted family. It wouldn't be until my studies in the Theatre Department at Towson University that I would start to make sense of this art but really end up with more questions than answers. My relationship to acting has been mostly love and sometimes hate. Love: The attention, making a difference in people's lives, educating an audience about a character. Hate: The doubt, worry and rejection, auditioning. Despite the ups and downs as with any career, I have a resume filled with remarkable experiences, developed a local fan base that I absolutely adore and people tell me that I've emerged as a supremely skilled actor. One day I might believe them, then again, not believing the hype (good or bad) has kept me in the stable center. For now I'm going to keep my head down, stay humble and keep doing what was said in a 2009 Potomac Stages review: "Bruce Nelson proves that, as far as his profession is concerned, he has used his life to date well indeed, honing his talents with dedication to develop the craft of acting."
First Steps
I am a 1988 graduate of Towson University where I received a BA in Theatre. As a junior at Towson, I was presented with the Theatre Humanitarian Award and in 2001 was recognized as an Honored Theatre Alumnus. Immediately following college I toured with the National Players for three years in Much Ado About Nothing, Animal Farm, Midsummer, Nicholas Nickleby, The Taming of the Shrew and The Elephant Man. I briefly toured with the Children's Theatre Association of Baltimore and brought several adapted children's stories to elementary schools in Maryland, Delaware and Pennsylvania. In 1993 I helped found the Baltimore-based Improv group The Flying Tongues that enjoyed entertaining local audiences for several years ending with a tour to Arizona, California and Wisconsin. At Howard Community College I taught acting and Improvisation for several years establishing the Yo' Mama's Cookin' student Improv troupe and in 2002 I was made Outstanding Adjunct Faculty Member in HCC's Theatre Department. Currently I teach Improvisation at Stevenson University, with Project Access at Howard Community College and Basic Acting at Everyman Theatre. Privately I offer acting coaching in my home and over the phone I Life Coach performers looking for guidance and support in their careers. In 2008, along with two former students from my adult Improv classes, I helped found Catapult, an Improv group that draws upon social concerns as the basis for a more structured, longer form of improvised storytelling.
A Career
As an actor and Company Member at Everyman Theatre, favorite productions have included: Private Lives, All My Sons (Baltimore City Paper Best Actor 2011), Shipwrecked! Our Town, The Mystery of Irma Vep, I Am My Own Wife, "Art", The Turn of the Screw, The School for Scandal, The Cripple of Inishmaan, The Drawer Boy, The Pavilion (Baltimore City Paper, Best Actor 2004), As Bees in Honey Drown, The Crucible, Hedda Gabler and Watch on the Rhine. At Rep Stage in Columbia I have been seen in The Goat, Hysteria, Bach at Leipzig, Stones in his Pockets, Santaland Diaries, Neville's Island, Kimberly Akimbo, The Lonesome West, Travels with My Aunt, The Violet Hour, The Dazzle, and Faith Healer. I have been nominated 5 times for the Helen Hayes Award and won twice for my roles in The Dazzle and The Violet Hour. I am also a member of the Acting Company at Woolly Mammoth Theatre in Washington, DC where I was recognized as an Outstanding Emerging Artist in 2000. Favorite productions there included: Wonder of the World (original production...meaning it's first professional showing. All these years later, how cool is it to read on the inside cover of the published play that I originated one of the roles), Big Love, Dead Monkey, Dead Man's Cell Phone (original production), After Ashley, Wonder of the World and Fuddy Meers. I have also enjoyed work at the Folger Theatre, Olney Theatre Center, Center Stage, Signature Theatre, Washington Shakespeare Company, The Shakespeare Theatre and Baltimore Shakespeare Festival. From 1998 to 2007 I was a professional book narrator for the blind at the Library of Congress and in 2002 received the Torgi Literary Award for my recording of As Nature Made Him by John Colapinto.
An Acting Process
I am waiting in the wings at a local theatre. Places have been called and in just a few minutes I will enter the stage. I am nervous, more than usual, and I suddenly remember my father Robert Nelson. He was charming, outgoing and loved being at the center of the attention. He was brilliant, highly intellectual, an oral surgeon in the Army. From my dad I got my gregarious personality and my love for performance. Mom is trickier. Brilliant in her own right as a nurse, she was well loved and happy to remain "in the wings" while occasionally offering some spot-on wit. From mom I learned subtlety, nuance and grace that finally I have come to embrace as an actor, foregoing the splashiness on stage in favor of the simpler acting choices. I also got shyness from mom. Sounds paradoxical for an actor but sometimes I don't want to be "on" and at a party it's not unusual to find me quietly observing the action from a corner. Still waiting backstage, these thoughts subside and the worrying starts again. I remember that a friend told me that "the good actors always worry...they care too much, it's the bad actors who are always too relaxed and aloof". I guess that's something. A fellow actor/friend of mine still worries before lights up and he's 70. This suggests that the nervousness is here to stay. An inevitability and necessity in an acting career (necessary because of the energy it provides.) Backstage I remind myself (for the 100th time) that the audience has no idea what to expect, they aren't sitting there with a script, following along to make sure I'm word perfect. Also, they are not some nebulous mass ready to point the finger and judge. They are friends, family and yet-to-be friends here to support me and eager to be educated about my character. I'm here to have fun. I silently repeat my Marianne Williamson mantra: "Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others." The backstage worries dissolve, perspective and calm take over. The lights go to dark, I enter and position myself on stage, the lights shine and I am gone.
Like any art, the art of acting is a mystery. (Although more and more I feel like I finally know what I'm doing and that I'm able to live with the mystery. Mystery is probably an inherent part of art-making and to track down a root cause is ultimately futile.) Technically, I know where to stand, how to make my body movements seem natural and spontaneous, how loud I have to be so the audience can hear the lines and which words to emphasize so my lines make sense. Beyond that, a mystery. In general I am aware of everything that is happening, constantly taking inventory of all the technical aspects of performing while balancing character and effortlessness. Every so often I will have a performance when all the thinking stops and I transition into what Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi discusses in his book Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. "On the rare occasion that flow happens, we feel a sense of exhilaration, a deep sense of enjoyment". The audience and I and the words are one and I'm floating: Powerful motivations and impulses expressed on an unconscious level whose method of manufacture I will never be able to put my finger on exactly. It's not uncommon for me to leave the stage after a show and have the stage manager say: "Great show. Loved that new moment you added" To which I say: "I don't know what you mean?" The exchange continues with me having no memory of what I did. I know that something happened but the details escape me as I was so lost in the moment I was creating. A mystery. And as I pull together the specifics of my career in this Baker posting, you the reader and I are, for the first time, unlocking that mystery together. A shared experience, not live unfortunately. Never before have I taken the time to comprehensively define my process. That said, I have definitely developed a style over time. Most of what propels me is some instinctual feeling. When it comes to rehearsing a part, I have few social boundaries. Right, wrong, good, bad are suddenly on hold and I let go. Feelings, impulses and random motivations concerning the character spontaneously manifest themselves as a physical move across the stage or as an interpretation of a line. Much like improvisation, I work very quickly in the rehearsal process and purposely avoid thinking about my in-the-moment actions. Thinking about what I do often leads to questioning and then judging my choices as unworthy. I leave those decisions to the director and hopefully a director who knows how to gently steer and mold an actor without harsh criticism. Because my impulses come from such a personally-derived place, they are personal and I rely on a director to kindly collaborate with me in discarding those stage choices that don't serve the play. Through this organic process of elimination my character is born and will (hopefully) continue to grow during rehearsals, through the run and until (hopefully) that final curtain on closing night. I say hopefully because some characters get stuck and for whatever reason don't grow. Not that they aren't fine to watch but sometimes, like people, their progress is stunted at a certain level. I remember being in a production where a director had such specific ideas about how to perform the role in which I was cast, that it left little room for my personal mark on the process. I was directed to stay within some very tightly drawn character boundaries and was afraid to grow. Stunted. When asked about more freedom in the role I was told: "We're not researching Cancer here, you're taking this far too seriously". I think sometimes that what I do is like approaching a life or death situation. Theatre helps people continue to live every day. Rather than fight him on the finer points of my character, I fell in line and did as he said. The reviews were uniformly raves. A mystery.
I remember a teacher telling my college acting class that if you could do anything else besides a career as an actor, you should. He went on to say that if you do decide on pursuing acting, the most discouraging part of the career will be the rejection. Rejection is dreadful and when I don't get the part, I have learned to be patient and remember the larger picture...acting is part of my life, not my entire life. I have also had to work hard at letting go of the pangs of jealousy that take over when a friend gets cast. My default is sometimes "What about me!?" and I have to remind myself that there are enough parts to go around, my time will come and in the meantime I can enjoy my friends' success. I have had a lovely career and if it were all to end tomorrow, it has been a glorious ride. Part of what the would-be actor works against is the fact that since acting looks like life, it is perceived as easy. It's a profession where you could wake up one morning, walk into your first audition and based on a certain look, a clear voice and a body and heart that connect easily, get the part. I remind myself that these are not the skills of acting but happy genetic coincidences. The truth is that many hours of intense work and training, like any other job, are required.
In 1988 as college graduation approached, the question of making the move to New York loomed. The cultural belief is that if you are an actor and want to consider yourself legitimate, you go to New York. Anywhere else you land as an actor is just that, somewhere else, not legitimate. At the time I agonized over the move but 25 years later I have no regrets about remaining a Baltimore-DC actor. It is said that to become an actor one must make their home in a certain place, work as much as possible and still expect to wait in upwards of 10 years to make a name for yourself. In staying local I have done just that and I am blessed to be a steadily working actor in this area.
A Teaching Philosophy
In 1998 I taught my first acting class and my life was changed. I instantly knew that teaching would parallel my acting career. I have dedicated my teaching efforts to empowering people to connect (and more often than not re-connect) with their creativity via acting and improvisation classes. My teaching has taken many forms. In the corporate arena I offer teambuilding and presentation skills workshops and have worked with: Cho Benn Holbeck Architects, IMRE Financial Services, PW Feats Event Planning, Community Conferencing Center Family Mediation, Korean Resource Center, Human Genome Sciences, Grimm and Parker and ING Financial. In the public arena I offer acting and improvisation classes at Everyman Theatre, Stevenson University and Project Access at Howard Community College.
My teaching method has shifted and changed over the years. Using approaches that I picked up in college (Stanislavski, Strasberg, Adler), reading books on acting techniques (Misner, Hagen, Mamet, Fine, Chekhov) and offering exercises that I hoped would be fun for the students, made up my patchwork classes. I would attempt to explain that the actor's essential task is to reproduce a believable reality on stage, based on a close observation of the world. Some context about the craft: It is important for the actor to recall emotions genuinely if they are to be believed by an audience. This requires enormous concentration and commitment by the actor and the healthy cultivation of a "life of inner feelings." Accessing this "inner life" requires single-minded awareness of all the information coming in through the senses. Acting asks you to stop and ask why and as a deeply personal process, demands that you bring all of who you are to the stage when you perform. Your sensibilities, strengths and insecurities are the building blocks for your stage characters.
The Prize Money
Off and on I've been thinking about what I would do with the Baker grand prize and for the longest time I have had the desire to open a school. As my teaching has evolved and my confidence as a teacher has grown, more and more I want to establish an acting studio in Baltimore. Routinely I teach adult learners...those individuals who are looking for later-life enrichment. Not completely sure how they want to spend their time but who are well aware they have a creativity in need of expression. My favorite kind of student is the retired business-person who always had a desire to act but for various reasons had to put this on the back burner. It reminds me of my father who, upon retirement from work as an oral surgeon in the Army, returned to school (UMBC) to major in theatre. Upon graduation he embarked upon a second career as an actor that gave him great pleasure. A peak moment for he and I was the chance we had to perform together in a local production. An acting school that gave this kind of fulfillment to an adult demographic sounds like a possible future plan and the Baker money would help fulfill this.
Personally
I have been a proud Baltimore resident off and on since 1993. I am the father to a beautiful son and somewhat late in life find myself in a loving, partnered relationship.
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