by Stephen Sachs
The outside world goes away whenever I work on a play. More so, when I’m out-of-town. And when the town happens to be a soothing and idyllic seaside village like this, the dream work of play-making dissolves into the dream world around me and the outside world recedes from consciousness like a toxic cloud and evaporates.
I haven’t turned on the TV or read a newspaper since I arrived. The peril of Obama, the Dow dropping 600, the savage dysfunction of Congress, seems to exist in an alternate universe very far away. I know this will not last. I will have to return to civilization. Just, not yet. Not now …
I have never lived next to the sea before. The ocean is teaching me something. There are matters of Man, and there are forces of Nature. One is momentary, the other Eternal. In Bakersfield Mist, art expert Lionel describes a Jackson Pollock painting as “Movement made infinite. No beginning or end. Each painting just is.” The same is true of the sea. The ocean just is. Movement made infinite. No beginning or end. Enormous. Unknowable. Mysterious. Alive. The matters of Man, so small and temporary, like the discarded shards of oyster shell littered along the ocean side, broken and dropped by gulls.
I live in the world of theatre. The world of dreams. Where dreams can appear real, and reveal truth. I know dreams are not real, are not reality. Even so … Shhh … don’t wake the dreamer yet. Let him sleep. Let him dream. One more hour.
Fountain Co-Artistic Director and writer/director Stephen Sachs is in Cape Cod for the opening of his new play, Bakersfield Mist, at Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theatre.
how fortunate we are to have you in the world
I am the fortunate one. So many blessings.
Sigh. Thank you…
I can only ditto Susan’s response…
Deb
All of us at the Fountain are so blessed to have you, Deb.