Actors and actresses play. They play with fire. They play with something that is very close and very intimate to us: human action—our actions. That is why we call them “actors”—because they shape actions; they perform acts.
All art, all play, involves distancing ourselves from the so-called “real world.” It requires that we step back from it in order to look at it as detached observers and, by taking control of this “real world,” allow a new reality to emerge. In this way, every art actualizes the efficacy of human freedom and makes it visible.
The material of the actor or actress, however, is specifically human action. Here, we see a human being who is able to stand outside themself and act on themself. They show that it is possible to freely grasp human action and give it shape. They prove the potential of human freedom up close and in real-time, so to speak. They awaken a higher self in us, the viewer, stimulating our ability to observe ourselves in the actions of our life and to break the mechanical chain of cause and effect of human actions—the causal chain that we sometimes call “karma.” That is why we need acting.
The art of acting becomes an alchemical awakener of this ability to transcend oneself, to overcome the chain of causality, of determinism, to create something new within destiny, within karma itself.
Translation Laura Liska
Image The Soul’s Probation, 1971, Mystery Drama by Rudolf Steiner. Lucifer: Cäcilia de Benedetti, Johannes: Klaus Brenzel, Doppelgänger: Ernst Thomann, Ahriman: Wolfgang Greiner. Photo: Werner Kehlert.
