Break a Leg - The Online Sitcom - Break a Leg - The Sitcom

So most of you should already know how much I love television. I don't know if I really went into exactly why, there are so many reasons.

As a footnote, I've just discovered USA Network's Burn Notice. Holy crap, new favorite show ever.

Moving along, I started thinking this week about something I think often about from time to time: acting. Surprised? I am, I actually don't think about acting per se all that much, I find the subject itself (as opposed to the practice) kind of boring.

One aspect of acting I do enjoy thinking about is acting on stage versus acting on screen. They're both very different, both very challenging, and one is better than the other (in my book) for non-obvious reasons (kind of like how Batman is better than Superman).

I acted for several years on stage only, mainly in my formative acting years when I was in school. That is of course where I fell in love with the art form, not unlike how little children first fall in love with the concept of superheroes by watching and reading about Superman.

I got involved in theatre for the same reason everybody else does: girls. Even girls get into theatre to meet girls, that's what's so hot about it. After my first night on stage in high school (as a member of the barbershop quartet in The Music Man), I had a dream that I was lost in a maze of wings. It was exciting and dreadful all at the same time.

Acting on stage offers that same mixture of terror and excitement every night, kind of like getting on the same roller coaster over and over. Except there's hopefully much less chance that someone on the roller coaster forgot their lines and it will send you hurtling off the rails to your death.

Stage acting also offers you something that screen acting cannot, by definition, ever really do: instant gratification. Along with that comes the interplay of your energy with the audiences, and the thrill of reliving the same moment night after night as if it were the first time. You also of course don't get any do-overs on stage, and that is where the terror and excitement all come to a head.

Acting on screen on the other hand has more subtle pleasures and nuances to the craft, though it lacks the aerobic quality that stage acting has. You never have to do the entire film straight through (there are of course exceptions), and for most films and TV shows you just couldn't possibly do so.

What screen acting does is force you to work, by yourself or with usually no more than one other person, by digging down deep and finding that place you're both trying to reach, without external influences to guide you. There's no audience laughter crescendo to pause for before moving on to the next line, no still and deadly silence in the dramatic moments that lets you know they're just as shocked by the dramatic turn in the scene as you are. It's just you and that guy across from you, trying to connect.

In its purest form of course, stage acting has that at its core as well, and some would say it's more challenging since you don't get to keep doing it and doing it until you get it right. You don't edit the stage picture in a dark room for weeks before revealing the finished product. You just get up there and do it, offering warts and all what you've rehearsed for weeks and months. If you trip on your entrance, you're stuck with it so it better damn well be a comedy.

That's all true. In that sense, you could say stage acting is "better" than film acting. It all depends on what yardstick you're using to measure it.

Imagine this: two painters. One locks himself in a studio for months before revealing his latest masterpiece, fully completed. The other practices his brushstrokes for the same amount of time, then creates his masterpiece in one session as you watch. Which painter worked harder? Which painting is more true to the form.

So I lied. I have no answer to which is the truer or better expression of the art and craft of acting.

Batman is still better than Superman.