In Which I Concuss Myself While On Stage

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If you're an actor, you know the moment.It comes soon after your lines are embedded, and that heady impulse to 'play' squashes all reason. Instead of walking the line,  you trip the light fantastic. Instead of being in the moment, you create one. One leap into the unknown, and you either fly, or crash and burn.

I crashed and burned.

It was near the top of Act II of KIMBERLY AKIMBO (playing through Nov. 5 at the Little Theatre inside Theatre IV.) I was sitting on a bed. In a moment of sudden exuberance, I threw myself forward and face-down, and cracked my forehead on the foot board.

I mean CRACKED. I saw stars. The audience groaned. I managed to turn upstage to my fellow actors and stage-whisper, "I'm all right." I sat back up, the fourth wall still intact. And for the next ten minutes, I heard audience members whispering to each other about the angry, plum-sized knot that was growing, right before their eyes, on my forehead. Talk about being pulled out of a scene. My little stunt almost pulled them out of the theatre.

It's been a few days and all is well. I don't see double and I know that the President of the United States is Abraham Lincoln. (Ha ha. Just kidding. It's Osama Bin Laden.) I'm trying to figure out what the teachable moment is. I've come up with these possibilities:

1. Just because you're feeling loose, that doesn't mean you should try new things. Recall the lesson of Icarus.

2. Consider your fellow actors. You're not up there by yourself. Unless you are. Even then, you might not want to fly too close to the sun.

3. Remember that time in 1999 when you fell on stage and the whole theatre shook? Yeah. That time. Disasters come in threes. Just sayin.

4. You're not 30 anymore. You're slower, and your instincts are duller. When you throw balls in the air, they come down harder and faster. Be prepared to duck.

On the other hand, the theatre is a playground. And they don't call them "plays" for nuthin. There comes a time in every performance when you leave the ground, whether you want to or not. Instead of concentrating on your lines, you start to listen. Instead of waiting to speak, you hear what other people are saying. You stop moving because you're supposed to. You move because you have to. And yes. Once in a while, you soar. And there is nothing like it. NOTHING.

Which is why there will be another fall, another head crack, another run-in with the fourth wall. But as long as I walk away with a beating heart, I'll strap on another pair wings, and hope I don't molt and slip on my own feathers.

Please come see KIMBERLY AKIMBO. Tkts 804.282.2640. 
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