Always say YES! A Canadian inspiration…

Colm Feore

On my drive to Ottawa this weekend, I listened to an interview Jian Ghomeshi did with Colm Feore on the March 31st edition of CBC's "Q" radio series to promote The Borgias mini-series he's starring in. (If you listen to the podcast, it's the second interview, 21 minutes in.) In it, Jian prefaced his interview remarking that at this stage of his career, he could pretty much pick and choose whatever script he 'd want, to which Colm responded, "… I don't know what gave you that impression. I've never been able to pick and choose. I do whatever I'm asked to do… I very rarely ever say 'No,'" which we later on learn includes college student films for free. I WAS FLOORED when I heard this. Near the end of the interview, he expanded on this by noting that everything he had done always leads to accumulating experience.

What this tells me is that what I do here at Actors' Playground is so important. We don't work with directors, but rather challenge ourselves to slowly explore a text by allowing our inspirations to challenge our choices so that when it comes to working on paying gigs, we have a plentiful well to draw from. It's quite an exciting thing to be a part of.

Last week, I found myself in a bit of a depression. After giving myself permission to play at the Playground and allowing myself to trust in spontaneous choices with my peers watching my back helped to charge my batteries…

“No one — not rock stars, not professional athletes, not software’s billionaires, and not even geniuses — ever makes it alone.”

— Malcolm Gladwell, "Outliers: The Story of Success"

To learn more about AP, please go to actorsplayground.ca. To see more photos (with descriptions) of what's been happening, click the Photos tab/link near the top of the same web-page.

Play hard and be happy!