Beautiful Judgement

I remember a time

When I was midway through my 3 years of training at drama school

My best friend called me

He was expressing his excitement at continuing his craft progression

“I want to try all the drama schools!

All the teachers!

All the classes!

All the techniques!”

I remember thinking on the other end of the line…

Huh?

Why the hell would I finish 3 years at drama school and want to go learn more?

If I’ve finished drama school,

Surely I’ve learnt all I need to

Duh…

Cut to a few years later

It was my first year out of drama school

I had been fortunate with getting a few guest roles on some Aussie soaps

As well as playing Romeo for Bell Shakespeare

And I thought

Mmm

Things are working out pretty good

Except for the amount of free time I had

That was a big learning curve

So I thought I’de start my own mini research lab in my study (garage)

I thought I would go through all the Inside The Actor’s Studio interviews

See what I could steal from great artists

The OG’s of the biz

DeNiro, Newman, Streep, etc etc

Then one day

To my absolute horror

An interview was released with Bradley Cooper

I was mortified

How dare they

Why would they interview an actor from some blockbuster

Who hasn’t spent decades in the industry yet

And ruin the shows reputation?

I deliberately ignored the interview

Weeks went by

And it became a Princess and the Pea kind of thing

A niggling deep down

Every time I scrolled passed it

Ugh

GO AWAY

Until finally

I told myself I would click on it

Give it 5 minutes

Just to reassure myself what a mistake it was to interview some soap actor on such a prestigious platform

Judgement judgment judgement

I clicked

I watched

And when it was finished

I sat in silence staring at the wall

I felt like something had cracked inside me

I didn’t feel angry

Or strained

Or anxious

I felt like my breath was full

My feet were on the ground

My eyes felt easy, clear

Why?

Because…

I saw someone who was insanely caring of their craft

And deeply connected to the idea of contributing great work

To become the most generous actor he could be

But the line that stuck with me the most

Was in discussing the classes with a teacher named Elizabeth Kemp

“It was the first time in my life I learned to relax”

I was shook

Because I knew that despite my training

And my experience

I still had not learned how to be at home on a professional set yet.

To see an actor who was in their first decade out of drama school

Who was so intent on working with great coaches

To try and improve his craft

So he could give more generous work on set…

I don’t know

It pulled a thread in a judgment jumper

And things unravelled for me

The fixed response I had to my friends’ phone call years before

Shrunk away

What was left?

An openness

A curiosity

A little voice inside that said

Go

Learn

Grow

Scare myself

That moment led to me eventually working with Elizabeth Kemp in her Dreamwork Workshops

Which broke my paradigm around what I thought acting was

Which led to my appetite for further craft exploration becoming insatiable

Which led to me getting more work

Which led to more exploration

Which led to more work

Until finally

I sent Elizabeth the email I had always wanted to send

“Dearest Elizabeth

I just got a great role on a film I really believe in

I would love to work together on this one if you have the availability?”

I still treasure my memories of working with Elizabeth Kemp on The Nightingale

Especially because a month after we finished filming

Elizabeth passed away

The whole time we had been working together on the film…

She was dying from cancer.

I had no idea that leaning into my judgement

Would expand my curiosity

Which would lead to meeting and working with someone who would change my life

What’s more

Is that this cycle

Has been repeated so. many. times.

I use to scoff at athletes having mindset coaches

Then I started reading about the Captain of the All Blacks rugby team

Which led to me working with Angela Ford

Which changed my life.

I use to bag out Shakespeare

Then I stepped into a class with Damien Rain who became my teacher and mentor for 4 years

Which led to me eventually being directed by him in Henry V at the Sydney Opera House a decade later

Which changed my life.

Judgements judgments judgments

Beautiful judgements

These little gems

Protecting me from something wonderful just on the other side

My point?

Get curious around your judgment

Lean into it

Who the hell knows where you’ll end up

Hope this helps

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