ENTRY ONE: ON IDENTIFYING WITH THE SPEAR CARRIER
My parents took me to one production at Stratford every year, so far as I can remember. And in my memory, it was a significant event, so it may as well have been every year, or every month. Images of those productions are burned into my brain, indelibly, even as whole years of my life have been deleted.
But to the best of my memory, we rarely-if-ever sat in 'the good seats.' When we attended the Stratford, Ontario, theatre--the site of many of my first experiences of performance—our seats of choice were way around on what's called 'stage left,' near the front. The Stratford stage at that time had much more of a thrust than it does now, and the seats wrapped around so far that some of them--some less expensive seats--were essentially facing the stage from the back. Or so it seemed to me.
This was where I met and bonded with 'The Spear Carrier.'
Where I was sitting, when actors entered the stage they more or less rushed past me and planted themselves up front and centre, facing the good seats, and with their faces away from me. I was very near the stage left entrance, where, after all the main characters had passed by me and found their marks, other actors entered and stood their ground.
Invariably, once everyone had taken their places, there was someone standing just near the entrance nearest to me, an unnamed character there to provide more colour and shape and context to the action, and perhaps to come forward at some point to receive an order, often immediately leaving the stage, or, on rare occasions, taking action, to serve a drink or make an arrest.
But mostly, they watched.
I was so far around to the edge of the stage, and so far forward--I can close my eyes now and be in that seat--that the closest actor to me, and the one whose face and every nuanced and accidental gesture I could see, was this person with me at the edge of the stage. I'll say a 'he,' because it usually was a 'he,' and yes, quite often, 'he' was in some kind of ahistorical-historical costuming, Greek or Roman, or Elizabethan, or something less specific, and often bearing arms. In opera this performer was a 'supernumerary'--not listed in the program.
I watched Lear lose his kingdom, Hamlet dither, the Duke break the ice of his bowl of water in Arden, and Milady DeWinter bare her tattoo, all in the company of this Spear Carrier, and so far as I was concerned, always through his eyes. Since I knew nothing about theatre, and most of the time was only half aware of what I was watching, I had to look to someone for support, for comfort, for clues, quite honestly, as to what the hell was going on. And he was there to help me. He and I watched the world unfold, neither of us quite in that world, but neither of us quite not in that world. He was observing intently, waiting for his cue, to come forward or walk around, or to turn and walk back off the stage.
And because I so identified with this actor...so was I....