The Prophet of West 43rd Street

I never shared my acting teacher's evangelical Christian beliefs, but taking her class was transformative.

Louis Abel-Truchet’s Le Cafe-Concert via Wikimedia Commons.

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This newsletter is, in part, my reckoning with the self-help culture that I promoted during my time writing for consumer and business magazines. But during this frenetic news cycle, I've wanted to look back at the times when a personal development tool or technique did help. The following is part of an occasional series looking at that. — Sara

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Your acting teacher’s notebook sits open on her bag, a handwritten page reads “Dear God.” You notice it after sitting beside her on the top riser in this midtown Manhattan rehearsal studio, a short block from Port Authority.

The teacher, Patricia, is a fortyish woman in a polo shirt and mom jeans. You didn’t know she was an evangelical Christian when you first signed up for the class, which is a good thing because you’d never have come if you did.

A snapshot of your first day:

Patricia instructs the class to start warming up. Your classmates, many of them barefoot or in stocking feet, begin walking in intersecting circles making guttural, animal sounds. They screech and moan and yell, “haaaaaa!” They karate-chop the air and sway like windsocks. They shake and holler and laugh manically as they pace the black floor, skirting around each other like ice skaters on a crowded rink.

You sit holding your messenger bag in your lap. It’s an acting class, so of course they’d be doing stuff like this. But still, it’s freaky. A few minutes ago, they were New Yorkers you might have seen waiting for the subway or ordering a sandwich at the deli. Now they’re a raw mass of humanity vomiting up their darkest emotions.

You signed up for this class because you got a call from a producer of the local Fox station, who wanted you to talk on their morning show about a women’s magazine article you’d recently published on how often people have sex. The producers ended up canceling the segment, a crashing relief because the idea of talking about sex on television gives you hives. The near-miss convinces you that you need to work on your presentation skills, and a writer you’d recently met recommended this class.

Your fellow students are aspiring actors, who take turns each week practicing the monologues they’ll use for auditions. On your first night, a petite woman with strawberry-blonde hair begins. She’s barefoot, in faded jeans and a brown button-down shirt. She tells Patricia she hasn't slept in four days, and her young face is pale and lined with worry.

She recites Lady Macbeth’s “out damned spot” speech. Then Patricia asks why she isn’t sleeping. She talks about losing her job, her brother’s suicide, her stress about money. She starts sobbing and then looks up into the risers, taking turns staring into people’s eyes. The other students meet her gaze, fully present, tears streaming.

She turns to you. You meet her bloodshot eyes and pleading gaze. You hold your breath, willing the moment to be over.

“Who is this?” says Patricia.

“A new person in my life,” the woman says.

You do your best to stay with her, but maybe you flinch, or something. She starts sobbing.

“Make a sound about that,” says Patricia.

She howls like a dying animal.

“OK. Now do the scene,” says Patricia.

This time she is Lady Macbeth, powerful and electric.

This is, of course, the purpose of the class—to tap into raw emotions so that aspiring actors can deliver killer monologues at their auditions.

Still, this is not your scene. You are a Gen Xer fully enmeshed in the 1990s culture of ironic detachment—Seinfeld, David Letterman, SPY magazine. You’re already composing a story in your head about this weird night, a story to tell your writer friends over too many Pinot Grigios.

But you also know you’re going to stay. You’re 31 years old. You have just quit your job, broken up with your boyfriend and moved into a 200-square-foot studio apartment. You need somewhere to go.

Patricia never brings up her religious beliefs in class—you learn that she is born-again via another student much later. But she uses the fuzzy spiritual language of acting teachers everywhere, and she seems genuinely touched. Each Monday night, she transforms this group of beaten-down office temps and birthday-party clowns into queens and assassins. At the same time, she somehow helps you and your classmates become more yourselves.

Your monologues are pieces you’ve written, very often that day. You’ve challenged yourself to present the most embarrassing version of yourself possible, because this is the easiest room ever. One summer night, you rush to class and realize you forgot to shave under your arms. When you stand up to do your monologue, you raise your hands over your head and announce this to the group. Everyone cheers.

In your monologues, you talk about men who’ve broken your heart and friends whose careers you envy. You have a writer’s skill of seeming vulnerable without giving away too much. But Patricia makes you go there, pushing you to explore what’s happening underneath all those carefully honed wisecracks.

What’s happening is rage. You’re 31, and your life isn’t what it’s supposed to be—not even close. You scream, you roar, you cry. Afterward, classmates cheer for you and tell you you’re brave. You look up at Patricia, sitting on that top riser in her sensible haircut. She looks deep into your eyes and says your voice is powerful and important.

In other words, you allow yourself to be thoroughly manipulated. It’s great.

The evenings are long and emotionally draining, even if you’re not presenting work. Each time a classmate does a monologue, you watch with fierce intensity, never flinching when they lock eyes with you. You hear about their no-good landlords, their asshole restaurant bosses, their Law & Order callbacks that went nowhere. Monday nights are full of laughter and tears, and thoroughly exhausting.

During the years that you take Patricia’s class, you do not find your true love or the career success you crave. None of your classmates become famous actors (though one of your favorites will pop up on your screen sometimes, in an episode of Sex and the City or CSI).

What happens instead is that you shed something—the hard veneer you mistook for sophistication, and the ironic detachment you mistook for a personality. With each cringe-inducing rant, you knock down the wall that kept you distanced from yourself and the world.

You never found Patricia’s faith in God or anything metaphysical. Instead, you experienced the divinity of a very gifted and giving woman. You got to witness the way she breathed life into a group of people struggling mightily to transcend their circumstances—crap jobs, shitty childhoods, near-constant rejection—and become something remarkable.

In Patricia’s studio, it all felt possible.

Please tell me about teachers, techniques or tools that have improved your life.