Acting as the Gateway Drug, or How I Became a Writer

Taco Sex is not what it sounds like. My friends and I would “have Taco Sex” when we drenched our Mexican food, in the form of tacos purchased from a very particular Taco Bus, in horribly spicy salsa and then ate said tacos. The term “sex” was used to describe the spiritual cleansing that came from the extraordinary sensation of feeling like your esophagus and stomach had caught on fire. After Taco Sex you panted, lay on the ground, maybe even smoked a cigarette: because by God, you had lived through something. Why did I participate in this strange and sometimes excruciating ritual? Not for masochistic reasons, but because it was something my friends and I did. More specifically, my theatre friends. There was something wonderful in watching Bryson’s face as he contemplated eating his second taco, though the first one’s potency had already brought him to tears. Watching Von, the king of Taco Sex, jump around with his shirt flapping around him, writhe on the floor and holler for his mother was a unique pleasure. The dramatics were priceless because, after all, we were students of drama. We rehearsed together, we partied together, and we had Taco Sex together. It wasn’t until later that’d I’d make the distinction between my love for them and my love of acting. I remember Taco Sex so vividly because it was such a collective experience. You would never have Taco Sex by yourself, it couldn’t be the same. Theatre was much the same way. I’d look forward so much to the hours spent rehearsing after school, that I developed a great love for acting. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, “The Nerd,” “Once Upon a Mattress,” “Kiss Me, Kate,” every show was so fun that I thought, “Wow, acting is incredible! I want to do this forever!” We would make up new song lyrics while our fellow castmembers were performing.

A blurry picture of me (right) in Midsummer. During our run of “Little Shop of

Horrors,” the song “Suddenly Seymour” became “Sudden Erection.” We’d try to crack each other up on stage. One good friend, Derek, was repulsed by Whoopie Goldberg. For whatever reason, he thought she was the least attractive person on earth, so of course we put a postcard of the famous image featuring Whoopie submerged in a bathtub of milk on one of his props. We had so many inside jokes, so many goofy moments that I never wanted rehearsal to be over. And the best part about it was that these people, who were so funny and so outgoing, thought that I was good. Which made me think I was good. Which is a great feeling.

So I made my plans. The first step was to go to a great theatre school and learn from the professionals. Next I would start the audition circuit, and then would come the Oscar. Of course I was aware that it was a difficult field to succeed in, but I literally could not think of anything else I wanted to pursue, not when I thought about how wonderful it felt to be in a play. When the time came, I learned my monologues, auditioned for colleges, and set off on my way to the University of Southern California.

Something changed that first year. I liked the people in my acting classes, but they weren’t my people. They weren’t funny the way Von and Bryson and Derek were funny, not as sharp or witty or elegantly vulgar. They didn’t take pride in their weirdness, but banded together to ridicule other people, and I couldn’t imagine having a long conversation with them about religion or sexuality or any of the other juicy topics I relished talking about with my friends back home.

We didn’t become instant friends. Also, and most importantly, I wasn’t cast in any of the myriad plays produced on campus. All of a sudden, acting didn’t seem so great anymore. I had fun doing scenes in class, but not the kind of fun I had had in high school. Had acting changed, or had I? My parents had always told me that I could be whatever I wanted to be, and I knew that I could probably find success in another field, but I didn’t switch out of the theatre major. Even though that first year was a crisis in which all my adolescent ambitions came shattering down from their pedestals, I didn’t resort to marketing or engineering. I kept taking theatre classes, sure that my acting fervor would return and I would continue on the road I began when I was ten years old.

In 2008, two things happened: I took my first playwriting class and my last acting class. The playwriting was initially at the request, or nagging, of my mother, who always said I was “such a good little writer.” I’m not one to trust my mother’s opinion on issues concerning my competency or physical appearance – she’s not exactly unbiased – but I signed up anyway. I entered the classroom for the first time with no ideas to write about and no experience except for some embarrassing adaptations of Greek myths my high school had been silly enough to produce. It was uncharted territory.

Sitting on a stone bench one day, I started to write. I wrote a whole page. That page turned into a scene. Then I added another scene. By the end of the semester I had a one-act play, a little rough around the edges but finished. Though I was aware that this was no Tony-winning script, I still felt satisfaction that I had completed a work that could be produced. With this sense of completion I had an epiphany: theatre does not spring up from the ground. The works I regarded as classic were once new and untested. Arthur Miller and Christopher Durang were not the names of tree varietals that grew plays on their branches. They were writers, and plays had to be written. Knowing this, that the greatest pieces of theatre had started as a glimmer of an idea in a real person’s head, made the whole process seem much more human and more accessible.

Then there was my last acting class. I was in a class with a superb teacher who told us that she wouldn’t be forcing us to “get on our feet” and act in class. We had to take responsibility for our development, and as someone who loved getting up in front of people and performing, I was sure I’d be up a lot. Imagine my surprise when class after class I found no urge to get up in front of everyone, instead preferring to study the way the words of the script informed the scene or how the specificity of the action could communicate an idea even better than the words. I shared my ideas and honed my sense of perception, but the entire semester passed by with me watching contentedly, never taking the stage. On the last day of class my teacher, who was generally very inspiring, shared some words that really moved me. She said that whenever a person felt alone in their fight against the troubles of the world, they could turn to theatre. In theatre was the evidence that we were not alone, that in fact we were all struggling with the same problems towards the same goals, and to be part of that human struggle was a very wonderful thing. I hugged my teacher with tears in my eyes, thanked her for all she’d taught me, and left the classroom with an intense desire to write the kind of theatre she was talking about.

Thus my acting career ended and my Mary Joan Negro, one of my biggest inspirations. writing career began. I felt like I had been walking down a long, dark road and there had been a break in the clouds. I could see where I was going, but I also felt a sadness for what I had left behind. Hadn’t I, after all, failed at my intention of becoming an actress? This disconcerting notion bothered me, and prompted me to investigate. Why had I liked acting for so long and how could I now be relieved to rid myself of it? When I looked back at my acting days I thought of the backstage games, the teasing and the long conversations, and Taco Sex. These memories were proof that acting had been a great experience for me because of the people I did it with. I had never realized how much I had valued the community that theatre created. Most of my friends were actors. Most of my time was spent acting because that also meant hanging out with my friends. It had really never occurred to me how much I had confused my enjoyment of acting with my enjoyment of my friends. And although I fully intend on continuing to enjoy the theatre community, my place in the community has changed. Acting was my introduction to theatre, but it was also a part of growing up. It was not the epitome of my creativity, but rather just the beginning.

I’m comfortable, now, with the idea of being a writer, and I embrace the hardships and challenges that it involves. I’m filled with the drive to write what my teacher talked about, the connection between all of us, and also to unleash my own humor upon the world. In a way, writing is scarier than acting because, although you’re not climbing onto a stage and talking in front of people, you’re putting your ideas in front of people, as well as the little bit of you that inevitably seeps into your characters. This doesn’t bother me, however. I’m just excited to try my hand at the most fiercely creative part of theatre and see where it takes

me.

So far, writing has taken me...to the

theatre! My first play has been produced, with real actors and a real director who really put effort into my work. This is the realization of the goal I set when I began playwriting: creating theatre. It is not only fulfilling to see my work performed, but inspiring to write better and more exciting pieces for the future.