Bryan Cranston Talks About Jane

A bit too intense, like Ed Harris.

A bit too intense, like Ed Harris.

When he speaks of the sacrifice actors make, this is literally true - at least in good drama.

His comment reminds me of an insightful comment by the poet and scholar Anne Carson, in her preface to Grief Lessons, her translation of Euripedes. The preface is called "Tragedy: A Curious Art Form."

"Why does tragedy exist? Because you are full of rage. Why are you full of rage? Because you are full of grief. Ask a headhunter why he cuts off human heads. He'll say that rage impels him and rage is born of grief. The act of severing and tossing away the victim's head enables him to throw away the anger of all his bereavements. Perhaps you think this does not apply to you. Yet you recall the day your wife, driving you to your mother's funeral, turned left instead of right at the intersection and you had to scream at her so loud other drivers turned to look. When you tore off her head and threw it out the window they nodded, changed gears, drove away.

Grief and rage -- you need to contain that, to put a frame around it, where it can play itself out without you or your kind having to die. There is a theory that watching unbearable stories about other people lost in grief and rage is good for you -- may cleanse you of your darkness. Do you want to go down to the pits of yourself all alone? Not much. What if an actor could do it for you? Isn't that why they are called actors? They act for you. You sacrifice them to action.

And this sacrifice is a mode of deepest intimacy of you with your own life. Within it you watch [yourself] act out the present or possible organization of your nature. You can be aware of your own awareness of this nature as you never are at the moment of experience. The actor, by reiterating you, sacrifices a moment of his own life in order to give you a story of yours."