John Cariani: State of Maine

John Cariani is wearing a new hat, and we don't mean a fur-lined topper. The actor is learning what it is to be a playwright as his first play, Almost, Maine, hits off-Broadway. Cariani enjoyed the spoils of stardom when he received an Outer Critics Circle Award and a Tony nomination for his performance as Motel in the recent revival of Fiddler on the Roof. His other stage credits include The Two Gentleman of Verona in New York. Film and TV appearances include Scotland, PA, Showtime, Kissing Jessica Stein and Law & Order. Though he's on a roll with his written work his new play Cul de Sac will go up within the year, Almost, Maine has been quite an initiation into the life of a playwright. Here, Cariani dishes on the differences between acting and writing, and why Almost, Maine has been a rocky--but worth it--sled ride.

A couple weeks ago, I was asked by Broadway.com to share some thoughts on what it's been like going from actor to playwright with my first play, Almost, Maine. The overriding thought I have is…that it's been a trip. The two experiences--putting up a play as an actor vs. putting up a play as a writer--couldn't be more different. It's kind of like a tale of two trajectories.

As an actor, you try to start rehearsal with a clean slate--a slate that that quickly gets cluttered because there's so much work to be done. You've got to learn your words; you have to learn how to work with your fellow actors, your director, the playwright. And--hardest of all--you have to figure out what story you're telling. There's confusion and there's pain and self-doubt because you're pretty much an open, fragile vessel.

As a writer, though, I came into rehearsal as a totally cluttered slate: one that was very full of my vision of what I wanted Almost, Maine to be. But, as rehearsals began, all the clutter started to fall away. It was literally blown away by the experience of watching stuff that had been living exclusively inside my head take on a life of its own outside my head. It was a thrill beyond compare--one that allowed me to let go of what I thought my play had to be.

Fast forward to the middle weeks of rehearsal. Everything changed. The actors were growing--they were getting a handle on their lines; they were starting to play; they were having fun. I, as the writer, on the other hand, stopped having fun because I finally stopped watching the play through the filter of what I wanted it to become, and I started watching it for what it was. And it was bad for a while, there--the writing, I mean. It needed work. Why it's so much work to make a play, I'll never understand. So began the work of rewriting and editing; tedious work that took time and thought. And that's when the play kind of took over my life. And I kind of lost track of myself. I stopped eating well, I slept less and less, I wore the same clothes for…more than a few days in a row. And, see--back to my trajectory thing--while I was sliding down, down, down into the abyss, the actors were rising. Because they had to. You can't be dirty and tired and poorly fed when you're an actor, especially during tech, because YOU--your body and your voice--are what THEY the creative team need. You have to sleep and eat right and stay strong physically and emotionally, so you can handle the dumb things playwrights and directors say!. You have rise as you move into tech, and take flight and soar and hopefully come in for a beautiful landing by the time opening night arrives. Those of us on the other side--the creative team--we kind of deteriorated during tech and previews and I almost felt like I was going to burn out. Until, of course, that magic moment of everything coming together happened, and then we all rose kind of like a bunch of phoenixes from the ashes and rejoined the actors. I guess, ultimately, we all ended up in the same place. We all just got beat up at different times along the way. The actors started out low and gradually rose to the occasion. The writer started out on a high, dipped way, way down, and then found his way back. It'd be neat to graph it--the two trajectories, right?

Wait, though. It's funny--I just realized as I wrote that last bit that the actors and the creative team don't really end up in the same place at all at the end of the process. I mean--they're not far from one another--just a few steps. But the actors are on stage now. And the creative team is a part of the audience. Two completely different places in the theater. Two completely different perspectives. I get to watch Almost, Maine night in and night out and see and hear what we've all made--with an audience. Stage actors never get to see what they've made. Ever. I never thought about that before. It's so generous, what they do. What a gift they give. And what a thing they make. The stuff of dreams, right? Because what they do will be remembered. It will live in people's minds, in their memories. That's cool. It makes me very proud of what Almost, Maine's cast and creative team have made. It's no longer my creation--some little play on paper. It's a most spectacular collaborative creation, one that will be remembered by someone, somewhere for at least a while. And that's a trip.