I love theater. When I was in high school, I was heavily involved in the music program. As it relates to theater, I mostly did pit orchestra. Pit orchestra was hard! The key frequently changed. Going from 3-sharps, to 4-flats, to 6-sharps over 10 measures (or less!!!) was not unheard of. The time signatures weren’t a piece of cake either. They changed constantly. Oh, and the vamping. It seemed like we would repeat forever before we got the key to stop. Finally, let’s not forget that the notes may not actually line up on the staff properly because the carbon paper wasn’t lined up properly when it was being duplicated. Despite those challenges, I would never want to be on stage. Standing on a stage, memorizing lines, forgetting lines in a public place and letting everyone down…I would much be in the pit that had a bit of a safety net. The music was in front of me, I was usually hidden from the audience, the only people who knew I messed up were usually the people in the pit…and if I played softly enough, maybe they wouldn’t know!

I did once audition for a play. My high school did Bye, Bye, Birdie. I made it into the chorus. That was pretty safe. I could sing in a group on stage. After that short forway onto the stage, I was back to the pit. That is until winter of 2016…

I heard in December of 2015 that I was being recommended for Tenure. Yay! In January, I was musing about picking up a new challenge. Maybe I would learn a new instrument. After all, I had been wanting to join the Chinese Music Ensemble. Maybe I would pursue a new fitness challenge. I met my goal of doing a pull-up in 2014, so it could be time for a new goal. It was during this time that David Wiles (Associate Professor of Theater, Carleton College) approached me about being in his play, Harlem Nocture, that was going to be performed as a Carleton Players production. He said, he was especially thinking of me for one of the parts and that I only had about 30 lines. After looking over the script I said yes.

I’m not sure that if I had known that I had to memorize more like 200 lines, I would have done it. (It turns out you need to know the lines before and after yours to know your cues and the direction of the scene.) But I was already committed. It’s possible that because my husband, Bryan, is a semi-professional actor that David figured I knew about memorizing lines and also how to prep for the role. I did not. I enlisted the help of my husband, who was a phenomenal, if not cautious, coach. (One of the ways one can stress a marriage is for one partner to try to teach the other about something they are an expert in and the other partner is not.)

It was definitely hard, but I learned a lot about theater and about myself. First of all, I should say that I was successful! I played a character based on Jackie “Moms” Mabley, a Black Vaudeville performer in the 40‘s-70‘s. Although we probably have a similar sense of humor, I am definitely not like her is most other ways. [For this role I had to wear a dress, something I avoid at all costs, and wear a pink dress at that!] I would definitely not have been a Vaudeville performed! I made it through all the shows and survived. Although I was certainly critical of my performance, the audience seemed to enjoy it. They emoted at the right times and clapped at the right times.

Second, I learned something about myself and actors. My best performances were the ones where I became Jackie. Where I assumed her identity as best I could. I wasn’t reciting her lines, rather her lines were a natural consequence of who she was. So I wasn’t acting, I was just Jackie! When I tried to play Jackie and recite her lines, that is when I messed-up my lines.

Third, even when I missed my lines, it wasn’t catastrophic. No one boo-ed. I just went with the flow, made up new lines (if necessary) to continue the scene, and kept going.

Fourth, this was a very interesting way to engage with students. David and I were the only members of the cast that were not students and even we spanned different generations. Explaining to the students our experiences of the history discussed in the play, listening to their conversations in the green room, dealing with awkward interactions between my flirty character and the students’ characters were all very different ways of engaging with the students and I enjoyed the challenge of each of those aspects of doing the play.

Finally, I would do it again. Not soon, mind you. But it was worth the effort to try to figure someone else out. To get into their shoes and try to understand their deep motivations. This was a much more powerful exercise than creating a caricature of the character.

As I engage people that are different than myself, especially people that I don’t understand, I think that the experience of being Jackie has and will be helpful. Although I watched lots of videos and read lots of articles about Jackie in order to learn about her and consider her motivations, I can learn to listen to those around me and ask questions that require me to listen more in order to try to understand another person’s motivations. Rather than creating caricature of someone I disagree with and engaging with the caricature, I can learn to respect the person and engage with them as another human being.