From the Vault

If you've ever been in a show I've directed, you'll be familiar with this essay. I'm putting it up here because it still speaks to the way I approach my work in the theater. Mind you, I'm not advocating, along with Mamet, a strict Stanislavskian approach to theater production. My training/aesthetic veers wildly off from that work.

First Principles
by David Mamet

The proclamation and repetition of first principles is a constant feature in life in our democracy. Active adherence to these principles, however, has always been considered un-American.

We recipients of the boon of liberty have always been ready, when faced with discomfort, to discard any and all first principles of liberty; and, further, to indict those who do not freely join with us in happily abrogating those principles.

Freedom of speech, religion, and sexual preference are tolerated only until their exercise is found offensive, at which point those freedoms are haughtily revoked--and we hear, “Yes, but the Framers of the Constitution (or Christ or Lincoln, or whatever Saint we are choosing to invoke in our support) surely didn’t envision an instance as extreme as this!”

We tolerate and repeat the teachings of Christ, but explain that the injunction against murder surely cannot be construed to apply to war; and that against theft does not apply to commerce. We sanctify the Constitution of the United States, but explain that freedom of choice is meant to apply to all except women, racial minorities, homosexuals, the poor, opponents of the government, and those with whose ideals we disagree.

The theatre also has its first principles--principles which make our presentations honest, moral and (coincidentally) moving, funny and worth the time and money of the audience.

Most of us are acquainted with these rules, which relegate everything in a production to the idea of the play, and cause all elements to adhere to and express that idea forcefully, fully, without desire for praise or fear of censure. But, at first sign of discomfort we assure ourselves that principles of unity, simplicity and honesty are well and good under normal circumstances, but we surely cannot be meant to apply them under the extraordinary pressure of actually working on a play.

We discard our first principles the moment they cause us unpleasantness--where they might send the author back for another draft, or the piece back for another week or month of rehearsal, or cause the director to work on a scene until it is finished, or cause a producer to say, “You know, on reflection this piece is garbage. I think it would be better for all concerned if we didn’t put it on.”.....yes, but we have seats to fill, we have to get on to the next act, we have a deadline to meet.

If we act as if the Aristotelian unities, the philosophy of Stanislavski or Brecht or Shaw, were effete musings and intended for some ideal theatre and not applicable to our own work, we are declining the responsibility for creating that ideal theatre.

Every time an actor deviates from the through-line of a piece (that is, the first principle of the piece) for whatever reason...to gain praise, or out of laziness, or because he hasn’t taken the time to discover how that one difficult moment actually expresses the through-line...he creates in himself the habit of moral turpitude. And the play, which is a strict lesson in ethics, is given the lie.

Every time the author leaves in a piece of non-essential prose (beautiful though it may be) he weakens the structure of the play, and again, the audience learns this lesson: no one is taking responsibility---theatre people are prepared to espouse a moral act, but not to commit it. What is communicated to the audience when we deviate from first principles is a lesson in cowardice.

This lesson is of as great a magnitude as our subversion of the constitution by involvement in Vietnam, in Ford’s pardon of Nixon, in the persecution of Larry Flynt, in the re-instatement of the death penalty. They are all lessons in cowardice, and each begets cowardice.

Alternatively, the theatre affords an opportunity uniquely suited for communicating and inspiring ethical behavior: the audience is given the possibility of seeing live people on stage carrying out an action based on first principles (objectives) to its full conclusion.

The audience participates in a celebration of the idea that Intention A begets Result B. The audience imbibes that lesson as regards the given circumstances of the play, and they also receive the lesson as regards the standards of production, writing, acting, design and direction.

If theatrical workers are seen not to have the courage of their convictions (which is to say the courage to relegate every aspect of the production to the laws of theatrical action, economy, and specifically the requirements of the super-objective of the play) the audience once again learns a lesson in moral cowardice, and we add to the burden of their lives. We add to their loneliness.

Each time we (in all respects of production) relegate all we do to the necessity of bringing to life simply and completely the intention of the play, we give the audience an experience which enlightens and frees them: the experience of witnessing their fellow human beings saying, “Nothing will sway me, nothing will divert me, nothing will dilute my intention of achieving what I have sworn to achieve.” (In technical terms, “My Objective;” in general terms, my “goal,” my “desire,” my “responsibility.”)

The theatrical repetition of this lesson can and will, in time, help teach that it is possible and pleasant to substitute action for inaction, courage for cowardice, humanity for selfishness.

If we hold to those first principles of action and beauty and economy which we know to be true, and hold to them in all things--choice of plays, actor training, writing, advertising, promotion--we can uniquely speak to our fellow citizens.

In a morally bankrupt time we can help to change the habits of coercive and frightened action and substitute for it the habits of trust, self-reliance, and cooperation.

If we are true to our ideals, we can help to form an ideal society--a society based on and adhering to ethical first principles--not preaching about it, but by creating it each night, in front of the audience--by showing how it works. In action.