We have settled into the stretch run of Our Town: seven performances over the next five days.  Some nice photos over at our Facebook page.  The work has thus shifted from developing characters and relationships to consistently reproducing those characters and relationships.  Every night we need to give each audience our best performance.  And that requires a certain focus and energy. 

I've been thinking more about what I had written earlier about Taoism and acting, especially in light of my continuing experience with the Our Town company.  Also, I had some good conversations with my college roommate, who came with his beautiful family to stay for a few days, about the show, which he saw, and the philosophy of acting.  He brings a Buddhist perspective to my Taoism and we have much to talk about.  I should also note an exchange with a local friend (thanks Tracy!).

In any event, earlier I had suggested that philosophical Taoists would look askance on acting because of it innate artificiality.  John pressed back, in a Facebook message exchange, arguing:

…but i'm thinking that it's of particular interest for all those who
investigate the human experience with the idea of letting go of the "i"
and "mine" of it. in this regard actors are particularly blessed having
the opportunity to shed their skin and inhabit the lives of others, the
success of which is rooted in their understanding of "being human" and
not necessarily "being me."

I think this is right and consistent with a Taoist presence in the world.  While there may be a kind of artificiality to it, acting also opens the way for shedding the ego, for dispensing with a settled acceptance of the "self," in exchange for a momentary experience of another "self."  And this brings the Tao Te Ching 22 to mind (one of my favorite passages):

In yielding is completion.
In bent is straight.
In hollow is full.
In exhaustion is renewal
In little is contentment.
In much is confusion.

This is how a sage embraces primal unity
As the measure of all beneath heaven.

Give up self-reflection
and you're soon enlightened.
Give up self-definition
and you're soon apparent.
Give up self-promotion
and you're soon proverbial.
Give up self-esteem
and you're soon perennial.
Simply give up contention
and soon nothing in all beneath heaven contends with you.

It was hardly empty talk
when the ancients declared in yielding is completion.
Once you have perfected completion
you've returned home to it all.

Maybe acting provides a means of giving up self-definition.  When we "yield" to the character we assume, we merge it with something inside of us, but we also give up some of our "selves" to realize its particularity.  And in that there can be a kind of "completion." 

Of course, some actors, the mega-celebrities, can succumb to a new kind of self-promotion and egoism by crystallizing their identities as "actors" or "stars" or whatever.  When that happens an opportunity for opening to Way is lost, not unlike most human pursuits.  But for those who resist the temptations of self-aggrandizement and self-defense, acting may well offer a practice for letting go of the self, for getting out of the self, in a manner that reveals the obstacles the "self" poses for the apprehension of Way.