Good theatre is better than the greatest movie you’ve ever seen.

Most live theatre is mediocre, I get it, I walk out all the time at intermission.

But real theatre, non-musical bullshit…when it’s good, it transforms you. You are left a smiling or a blubbering mass in the audience, you live with it for days after.

I’ve been a theatrical artist my whole life, so I’m very comfortable with how much effort it takes to envision, create, embody and then let go and forget all the work it took to create artistic beauty. The whole point of live theatre is that it only changes lives when it’s live.

And so many countless unknowable moments of life-changing theatre have come and gone in history. Literally 1000’s of years.

Theatre is more life-changing and ephemeral than the secondary arts by far, yet forgotten because ‘you had to be there’.

Go see live theatre. Yes, it’s expensive. Yes, most of it is meh. We actually live in the nadir of live theatre…nothing that isn’t a famous musical, a former film or just click-bait pablum is being produced. Which is sad, because there is a tsunami of creativity in playwriting that has happened over the past 20 years that few know about or are experiencing.

When you see that one performance that eclipses everything you’ve ever experienced in a live performance. When you leave the theatre unable to shake-off what you’ve just sat through, when you want to discuss what you just experienced that evening again and again with the person you were with.

When that happens, you’re hooked. You need that again and again. “Movies” will be broken for you.

Also, tl;dr: most people who call themselves Artists don’t actually understand the fundamental need for Artists to be forgotten. ‘Ancient’ artists never signed their works. Today, all artists want to become a brand before they actually become art-worthy. The archetype of the Artist should always seek to be forgotten.

That’s a discussion for another time, I suppose.