Day Five, the Draffin workshop

One thing that I am realising – something that is being highlighted by the Draffin workshop – is the extent at which I am terrified of having nothing to show for my (our) work in January. That’s why I push so much, I think. I want to be certain. I want to be safe. I want it to work.

To yet, the responsibility of a director involves clear decisions – actors neither want nor respect a director who doesn’t know what they are doing. And so I find myself in somewhat of a contradiction – feeling the imperative to be in a certain place by a certain time; and terrified by the prospect that I will not be.

We have been working a lot with “trusting the moment”.. trusting something will emerge… because life naturally has a rhythm – we only have to listen. And this rhythm is naturally dramatic – mind is naturally polar; if we stay at one place for a while, it gets restless, and something else is born. So the trick is not so much creating new material, but to follow the shifts in the unfolding.

“Do less, experience more…”

Part of the trap is when I think I have a certain degree of competence, and I want to prove it to the world. “Look how good I am! Look! Look!” I want so much to prove my worth, that I stray from what is authentic.

And so, ironically, I get particularly tense at places where I know I can create something good. Contact improv being one of them.

Let go… and listen…

Yes, I’m finding it difficult to need to pitch the piece to actors, when I don’t really have anything in my hands. Before I can get them to trust me, I need to trust myself. I need to trust that something interesting can come out of the Concrete Jungle. There is something, I know…

Well, basically I need to trust. I think that’s pretty much the bottom line. Trust… to trust my creativity…