Wallace...The path to finding Wallace has been one of self examination. It is
uncanny how much Wallace's life mirrors my own yet we are still very different.
As I move into the final days of rehearsal, I look back at my work and remember
a phrase from the play.
"There is a certain kind of agony that seers the s oul of an average man
yearning. Who sees, you know? What might be if he were just a little bit
more..."
Every night, I get the chance to tell the story of a man who yearned to become
more, just like me, and every night I am tested, prompted, and pushed to achieve
that goal. To show who this man was and to try to do it well, that's all I
expect of any creative person and Wallace was as creative as any. In a show like
this, for me, it is not about Jerry, the audience, Jennifer the writer, or
Richard, it's about me and Wallace. He lurches over my shoulder and taunts me to
do the work, his work. He is the muse and he whispers ever so softly and
requires of the listener, me, a state of absolute focus and perfect delivery.
This is the kind of role an actor dreams of and dreads, putting everything you
have to the test. In my eyes it is the greatest challenge of my acting career
yet and I owe it to Wallace and I to do it justice . "To make manifest my own
clarion call, to sing the notes the I have written and to know that they are
beautiful." And in the end, when all is said and done, I will take the weight of
portraying a revolutionary off of my tattered shoulders and keep faith that the
audience received the right message. The message that just like Wallace, I am a
human being, nothing that is human is alien to me.
"Oh fyah, fyah lawd, fyah's gonna burn my soul. "
Carleton Bluford
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Wallace
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