I read with increasing joy Andreas T Olsson article about the actor’s profession (DN 1/4). ”Finally someone who problematizes the myth”, I thought.
I have long argued to look at and discuss the actor’s profession as ”an occupation”! A profession with in-depth knowledge, rules, workplaces, colleagues. A profession with its own difficulties and merits. Just like many other professions I might add.
in the Swedish newspaper svenska Dagbladet with the usual rhetoric about an unusual occupation with almost mythical blackness and closeness to others. Yes, you sometimes take on each other. Yes, sometimes our profession is not like others. But with such a desire to cross-examine the actor’s special condition, it can be with the same rhetoric even consider other professions. How is it with the closeness and intimacy in care; surgeon, gynecologist, psychologist or massage therapist, professions where practitioners in different ways is intimate with the unknown other. Or even the cleaning lady in the home is – at least in my opinion – too intimitetsöverskridande profession. Don’t want anyone else to see or clean away the remains of my dark interior…
we All have darkness within us, even journalists, but the crux of the matter, as I believe Andreas T Olsson (without knowing him) want is that we never get to handle the actor’s work as standing outside of or at the side of a normality that we require other workplaces. In a conversation about the misbehaviour or violence never get one BUT articulated!
the actor’s profession that justify any harmful darkness. Of course there are special circumstances in the actor’s profession, just as in many other professions. In particular, it is required in many workplaces a management position that defends the workplace, and those who work there, from threats and disturbances. Myth, and ignorance, about the actor’s craft hurts more than realizing.
The magic (in some sense) of the actor’s profession is the moment when all of a sudden – after hard work – suddenly fall into place. It happens not always, but when it happens it is like the perfect the high jump, I think. The moment when everything suddenly coincides, to the perfectly balanced and managed. But it’s not magic really, it’s understand you well, but it is nice if you think…
of the actor’s work and the darkness of the exploited, as long as there is a place for violence and the threat of darkness around our scenes. It’s really complex in the discussion is to require the place and respect for everyone working in a great profession, namely the actor, as unusual as that of many other professions…
Read more: We have no more darkness in us than the other
