So, bear with me here for a bit.

We’re back at the Banff School and I’m in my second summer there (1963 now), this time in the newly formed Musical Theatre Division, headed by Theatre Giant Brian MacDonald, with Billy Solly and John Stanzl (all still an amazing memory). There were about twenty of us sitting on the floor in a studio one day. I had been asked a question by Brian and started to answer. He said, “Stop!” I stopped mid-sentence and my heart stopped beating. “Do you hear your ess’s?” “Yes”, I said, becoming very aware of my sibilance. “Well, STOP IT!!” he shouted at me and continued on with the class.

Flash forward to Sir George Williams University in Montreal and my second year in the Theatre Department. The University had just moved into the new Building on Maisonneuve Boulevarde and we were in the brand new Douglas Burns Theatre (there’s nothing like a new Theatre!). Canadian Theatre Legend, Norma Springford (and she WAS legendary!) was our teacher, a tiny, oh-so-elegant lady with her hair always pulled back in a tight bun and with huge glasses perched at the end of her nose. The class was preparing for some scene work and moving furniture around the room. A loud screech from a table being dragged across the floor pierced the air. “Hold on!” yelled Norma (as much as Norma ever “yelled”), shedding her elegance for a moment! Everyone froze. She slowly folded her arms looked around the room and then looked down at the floor. Words of wisdom were now to follow. She looked up at us and quietly stated, “We always LIFT in the Theatre”. (Pause) Continue”. The scene change took place in silence.

There was Mr. Harding, my high school English Teacher, a disheveled, highly enthusiastic Welshman who never did a great job shaving and always had dried blood on his neck and chin from razor nicks but masterfully made us aware of the detail and luxury of the words of Charles Dickens. There was Mr. Scott, my high school Music Teacher, a fiery Presbyterian Scotsman, bald, with a moustache, and gnarled hands that would slam into a desktop if the all-boy chorus was not singing “Guide Me, Oh Thou Great Jehovah” loud enough to make the fixtures in the Choir Room rattle and for the entire school beyond to hear us. There was Professor O’Brian who taught English 101 in my first year of University, a very dapper Englishman who read us Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales” in Middle English and urged us to learn it that way. (I can still recite the opening lines – “Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote/The droghte of March hath pierced to the roote” – in Middle English). They all left their impressions indelibly upon me.

Years later, I accidentally fell into teaching myself. I had acquired a modicum of success as an actor on stages in Portland, Oregon, and was constantly being asked if I was teaching any classes. Thanks to a lifelong friend, Isabella Chappell, who was the GM of Portland Civic Theatre at the time, I began some workshops at the Theatre. (I eventually became Head of the revitalized School and ended up with an incredible Staff and almost a thousand people a year going through all kinds of Performing Arts classes). Suddenly thrown into the deep end, I had to come up with some kind of approach to “teaching” acting, and I began to think about my school experiences. Why had those particular teachers stuck with me for so many years? Rather slowly, I came to the realization that it was not WHAT they had taught me, but rather HOW they had taught me. Their approaches stay with me even now, viscerally, even after a half-century. Their passion for what they did was certainly a foundation for their careers, but it seemed to me that connecting directly with a student and making them “aware” was the answer, making the experience of learning come to life by somehow, mystically, focusing our minds. It was never a case of them telling someone what to think, but rather of provoking someone to think.

Focus and awareness are difficult challenges to the learning experience. Actually, they are difficult challenges in everyday life. Just think of a group of high school or college students these days … one word – “iphone”! So I began to develop exercises that would address, if only for the moments in the class, those two challenges. One exercise that I still use today is a “Chaos Exercise”. The class arranges itself in an inward facing circle. The first of the continuous instructions is to simply breathe, regularly, quietly. Now, of course, I can hear the minds thinking, “What is this nonsense?”, “Geez, we’ve done all this before!”, “What is this jerk making us do this for?” The next instruction asks them to let sound of the breath be heard. Next, make a quiet vocal sound on the breath. The focus starts to shift a bit now because there are specifics being required. They’re relaxing, but there are still wandering minds – “Where should I go for lunch?”, “What’s on TV tonight?” The next instruction asks the individuals to quietly sing a musical note on the breath, any note. The final instruction goes like this: “Now, on “three”, I want you all to sing the SAME note. One …Two … STOP!”  In the space between “one” and “two” the temperature in the room rises as I hear the mental collective yell “Wait, WHAT?”, and between “two” and “STOP”, a palpable tension (“What? How? Huh  …?”) becomes very apparent. There is suspended moment after “STOP” and the room suddenly lets out its tension and breaks into chatter. For a moment, a communal awareness and pinpoint focus was achieved. It is like the Hadron Collider of Theatre where everything coincides, all thoughts are the same and energies are defined and specific toward a singular goal. Yes, the path toward the achievement was through some chicanery and manipulative. But the focus was real. The awareness was real, if only for those few seconds. The engagement of the group was profound.

We always talk following that particular exercise. The expressions of the mental upheaval, chaos, surprise and apprehension in the lead up to being told to “stop” always have laughter associated with them, a laughter that comes from the realization that one has created a momentary reality out of something artificial and seemingly inconsequential.

There are constant moments in everyday life when we are suspended, moments that last for only a nano-second when you must decide, when you have to choose between stay or go, turn right or turn left, accept or reject. Those are the moments when we’re most engaged, when living becomes vital and full, when we decide to “Stop!”, “Lift!” and “Sing Louder!” We reach our best in those moments because we think and feel inside our personal Chaos and, amazingly, create Order.

(And just so you know, the exercise is repeated twice more during the class. The second time, they are told, again, to “Stop” before reaching the sung note. The atmosphere leading to that moment is very different from the first time because they now know what the objective is. The third time, they are given the “Three”. What happens then is … well, try it and see!)

More later.