An Actor

So I am going a little out of order today because my Weekly Obsessions post isn't quite ready yet (what I have been waiting for all week.)  Here is the next one on my list. 


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*I would like to make note that all views put forth in this post are that of the author's and there are many circumstances that this is not the case*

According to Dictionary dot com there are a lot of different definitions for “actor” but two stood out to me right away. Here they are:

1. A person who acts in a film, play, broadcast, etc.

2. Informal a person who puts on a false manner in order to deceive others.

So when I looked at both of them the first one was very common and exactly what I expected. The second one was not. It is true, from the sense that when one goes on a stage and acts as if they are Fanny Brice or Albert Peterson they are putting a manner that is untrue to them and are trying to cover up their true identity, but I looked a little closer into that one.

You don’t choose to be an actor. You are born an actor. A girl is born with the name Lily with brown hair and blue eyes yet her parents know nothing about who she is going to become. They can force her to play soccer and softball, they can have start her with dance lessons at the age of two, or they can give her a very sheltered life, but everything has a purpose and she is going to become what she is destined to.

I also believe that everyone has free will. I don’t believe however, that you choose to be an actor. You can choose whether to pursue the career, do stage shows or huddle up in your room all day never letting anyone see your true talent, but you don’t choose the talent.

Many people I know who are not actors would choose to be one any day. It seems like such a wonderful thing: to be able to put forward a persona that shows you aren’t who you are, but someone completely different.

I have many theories on how one becomes a good actor, but I also believe that it is always within you. I believe that homosexual men tend to be good actors because they are used to showing off a different person to the outside world then who they truly are. I also believe that many actors go through odd stages in their life where they might act “different” and pretend to be an emo, a nerd, etc.

But I believe that the best actors have the hardest challenge ever.

Find out who they truly are.

Now I am not saying that all of the good actors need to go on a trip to the hills of Tuscany and go soul searching until they have found who they truly were made to be, but the best actors go through lives where they naturally act as if they are someone else, hiding their true selves to fit in. The best actors are so good at what they do because they truly live the life day in and day out. They have to pretend to be someone else, to enjoy different things, to act a different way just to fit in. Just to be that person.

After a while they don’t know who they are. They have lost the real person. They have locked up their true self for so long that they can’t even find who it is. It is just one out of many faces that doesn’t match what they are wearing now.

You lose yourself.

2. A person who puts on a false manner to deceive others.

Sometimes that false manner is there for so long that you don’t know where the true one is. It is a viscous circle of games that never come to an end: looking forever to find your true self when it is already gone.