Acting

A Hollywood director once sent out word that he was looking for an actor to play the role of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. The actor was to be over six feet tall, young and vigorous and have an excellent command of the language. On the day of the casting call, many fine tall young men showed up, but among them was a little old Jewish man with a heavy Yiddish accent.

The director picked him out immediately and asked, “What do you want?”

The man answered “I vant to be an hector. I vant to play Hemlet!”

“Are you kidding or just crazy?” the director asked.

“You are only five feet tall and you have an accent so thick I could cut it with a knife. What can you possibly do?”

The little man said, “I vant to hect. Giff me a chance.”

Finally the director gave in. “Get up on stage and try it.”

The little man stepped out onto the stage.

Somehow he looked much taller and full of energy. He began to speak with a booming voice and the perfect king’s English: “To be or not to be....” When he was finished, there was a hush. Everyone was amazed. The director said, “That’s unbelievable!” The other actors said, “That’s wonderful!” The little Jew just shrugged his shoulders and said, “Dat’s hecting!”

Acting is the most spiritual of professions for the simple reason that the actor has to be in a paradox: he has to become identified with the act he is performing, and yet remain a watcher. If he is acting as Hamlet he has to become absolutely involved in being a Hamlet, he has to forget himself totally in his act, and yet at the deepest core of his being he has to remain a spectator, a watcher. If he really becomes absolutely identified with Hamlet, then there is bound to be trouble. The real actor has to live a paradox: he has to act as if he is what he is acting, and yet deep down he knows that “I am not this.” That’s why I say acting is the most spiritual of professions. The really spiritual person transforms his whole life into acting. Then this whole earth is just a stage, and all the people are nothing but actors, and we are enacting a play. Then if you are a beggar you play your act as beautifully as you can, and if you are the king you play your act as beautifully as you can. But deep down the beggar knows, “I am not it,” and the king too knows, “I am not it.” If the beggar and the king both know that “What I am doing and acting is just acting; it is not me, not my reality,” then both are arriving at the very center of their being, what I call witnessing. Then they are performing certain acts and witnessing those acts, too. So acting is certainly the most spiritual profession, and all spiritual persons are nothing but actors. The whole earth is their stage, and the whole of life is nothing but a drama enacted.