How American Are You?

Allow me to put my tool belt down.

Tadashi Suzuki was sitting at the head of the gathering. This was in the summer of 1991 when I was in Toga Japan, studying with a group of international students at his invitation. We were assembled in one of the facilities that his acting company used in which to train. During the nearly two-hour question and answer period much was covered. This comment was one of several that have remained with me since. Suzuki was asked if he felt that there was a difference between Japanese and American performers. He had been working for a long time with both and so had some grounds from which to base his reply. But as you will note, his reply goes well beyond acting and the theatrical world. “Yes” he said, “I have noticed a difference”. “Americans are brave experimentators. They do many things. Their vision is wide and they are bold and try this and that. But they often stay on the surface”. “The Japanese are timid when it comes to experimenting and do not range widely, but once settled, they have the capacity to go very deep”.

I have auditioned twice now for productions of I AM MY OWN WIFE since first performing it at the Riverside Theatre. Both times I was asked why I would want to do it a second time. Well apart from the fact that it’s work and a paycheck, which of course would be a true but bluntly uninteresting answer, I tried to articulate something about re-examining…continuing to refine blah blah blah. Inside however I was thinking how American they were and how Japanese I wanted to be.

My wife and I were handed two tickets outside the Lincoln Center complex to see the second installment of COAST OF UTOPIA by Tom Stoppard which has been getting rave reviews by Ben Brantly of the NY Times. Our benefactor is a wildly wealthy American who, born with a silver spoon stuck somewhere, has had the luxury of living a life of higher learning and artistic consumption. Don’t get me wrong, he is in no way under achieving. He has an encyclopedic knowledge of theatre, classical music, literature and fine art, as well a speaking several languages fluently, including Russian. He has the energy of ten, and buys season subscriptions to dozens of arts organizations around New York, knowing that he will be unable to attend them all. He then befriends aspiring artists through various contacts and hands out his unused tickets as an encouragement to that community which enriches his life through the performing arts.

When he gave us our first row seats he said that he hoped we would enjoy it. I sensed something behind the sentiment and asked him if he had seen the first installment. He smiled and said that he had but then quickly added, “I’m sorry, but I have been in Moscow the past half year teaching and have gone to the theatre there as often as I can. It’s very hard for me to adjust back to American actors.” In Russia they often rehearse for up to a year (in America, four weeks). In Russia they bring back the same repertoire over and over again. In Russia an actor could spend a lifetime in the theatre and return to any given role hundreds of times.

In Russia or in Japan or Germany or France or Scandinavia or many other places, I would not be asked such a silly question as I was asked twice at an American audition. But I’m an American actor. Do I have the capacity to be otherwise?