I recently attended an amateur theatrical production with my mother and several of her friends. My mom likes to keep a tight schedule so her evenings are rarely open for heading to the theatre with me, or anyone else for that matter, so I try and make it a point to catch shows with her when she shows a specific interest in them. To be honest, she's still kind of learning theatre etiquette despite my fifteen years of doing this art thing.
Anyway, this one didn't exactly stand out to me more than most community/educational productions I attend. To be honest, several parts of the show were a little weak and while we were able to enjoy ourselves, both myself and my mother maintained a sort of "It was cute" mentality. (We've all been in those shows, myself included. Heck, I've DIRECTED those shows.)
Anyway, on the way out, as my mom and I kept most of our criticisms to ourselves, one of her friends couldn't stop talking about how much she loved it. Her monologue went something like this...
"That went by so quickly. It took me away for two hours! It's like nothing else was happening for a while."
Mother was rather quick on the response with,
"Well, that's the point."
And I was once again reminded that this silly art/thing still works. No matter how big or small the budget, strong or weak the talent... this theatre thing works. My entire perspective of the performance shifted a little when I got to see the GIFT this woman had just received by sitting in that audience. A little bit of magic...
A frequent visitor to my Starbucks, an older gentleman, is going through chemotherapy and as a certain silly shift walked by singing
"Everything is awesome."
He quickly interjected with
"I just watched The Lego Movie this weekend! I just love that movie. Makes me forget for a little bit."
What a gift. What a little, precious glimpse of magic.
I'm all about a pursuit of excellence, but its nice to be reminded that this art thing, this God breathed desire to create, is bigger than us. And, it works.
No comments:
Post a Comment