How Theater Taught Me Empathy
The theater gave me a lot. It was a place where my strange mannerisms and silly voices became unique instruments. Doing also made me break out of my shell and stop being afraid of what others thought of me, which in turn helped me learn to accept and be myself. But most of all, the theater taught me to better empathize with others.
Many people think that playing is just a matter of memorizing lines and looking good while you say them. This may be true to some extent in Hollywood productions, but for most performers, the process is much broader. There is a transformation. Acting is primarily about telling a story through actions and words, but the craft itself is to portray another person, and sometimes even become one . You have to talk how they talk, move how they move, think how they think, and feel how they feel .
Empathy is a skill that anyone can develop well, and theater, an art that aims to explore what it means to be human, is a great teacher. What starts out as a fun game turns into a way to understand people and what motivates them. Over time, studying characters like Romeo or Hamlet can allow you to see people in the real world through a different lens. You have no choice but to empathize with your characters, and this ability can be carried over into your daily life. Think about it: there are characters all over your world. What is it like to be your neighbor, your colleague, your boss? How does it feel to be the downtrodden person they see on the news? Can you imagine what it would be like to be the person you despise when alone at home, stressed and afraid of tomorrow?
The care I have gained from playing fictional characters over the years has been truly a gift, and I often tell myself that theater saved my life – or at least helped open my eyes. Before I started acting as a teenager, I absolutely did not understand people and their actions. I didn’t understand why people felt the need to humiliate others; I didn’t understand why the poor simply didn’t work anymore; I didn’t understand why rich people were reluctant to share; I didn’t understand why people want to hurt each other; and I could not understand why people seek refuge in poisonous intoxication or why they deliberately break the rules. To be honest, I didn’t like people back then, and I didn’t like what they were doing. But the theater gave me insight, understanding and showed that I am no better than people who once confused me.
Self-reflection is a powerful tool on the path to empathy, and play can be a mirror of your own actions. When you play a role, you often notice what sticks to you. You see the character’s flaws, and sometimes in yourself. You understand that you are also a character. And once you’ve played a few different roles, you’ll understand the power of perspective. The point of view of one character will not be identical to that of another, as in real life. Playing out contrasting scenarios is a clear reminder that people in the real world have different opinions and beliefs and are willing to fight for them. You begin to better understand personal circumstances and how they can affect someone’s choices and thought processes. Forces of destiny can be pitted against a character in the same way they often stack up against people in the real world. When I played Don John in Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing , I saw what the world looked like through the eyes of a villain. But when I got to know him, I realized that he is much more than a “bad guy”. He is an illegitimate son, rejected by society since his birth, but nevertheless he was forced to do everything that his more privileged family members did. In many ways, his anger was justified, and this made me take another look at the “villains” in my life. Maybe they weren’t evil; perhaps they were simply the product of an inhospitable environment.
At its core, theater reveals the complexity of human emotion and explains why people do what they do – two of the main building blocks of empathy. Aside from some magic like Freaky Friday , this is one of the best options to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes. You can be rich, you can be poor; you can be oppressor or oppressed; you can be a murderer, a victim, or both; you may be in love or you may never taste a kiss. In theater, you will learn how to be everyone, how to be any person , and this is a skill that I think everyone should have. The world is a stage and we all play our roles, but perhaps we should spend more time thinking about what it would be like to get a different role.