It's About Your Essence

Last week at Rhodes was the August Wilson celebration, and I had the privilege of seeing Charles S. Dutton perform. Wilson was African-American playwright raised in Pittsburgh wrote a ten play cycle, with each play set in his hometown (appropriately named the Pittsburgh Cycle). Each one of these works describes the lives of African Americans in that decade, and Dutton has interpreted many of Wilson's characters in cities throughout the world.

Dutton's one-man show Goodnight Mr. Wilson, is a testament to the work of Wilson, as he works through the characters in five of the ten play cycle. I don't particularly want to talk about his stage performance, however; I would rather discuss what I observed of him around the theatre and in the conversations he had with the audience.

I was in the theatre the first night he was in Memphis and sort of poked my head around the door and watched him doing his warm ups. He was marking the show, putting on the different hats and delivering some of the lines. With no one in the theatre, his intensity and his attention to detail were incredible. And he preached this kind of dedication. In his after-show talk with the audience he described that the "great" actors, those who thrive in their work, put this attention into all parts of their performance. You must always be operating at the highest level from the very first performance; you must possess the technique to help you to get through those nights when you aren't "feeling it," and you have to be rehearsed well enough and live in the character enough that you give the same performance regardless of the time of day or the crowd.

His best explanation of this was after he had completed his monologues during his performance and took a break to talk with the audience about the various characters. He talked about the business of acting, how it isn't to be treated as some means of fame and glory; "if you want that, get in line," he said. Instead, it's about presenting a message, it's about filling a need in your life to perform, to give yourself to an audience. "Every time you step off stage," Dutton said, "you have to leave some of your essence out there in the character." That's what the great actors do, and that is what is required for the works of playwrights such as August Wilson.