20080429

The Main Line

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Hi-diddle-dee (An Actor's Life For Me)
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“I know that the dissolutions of personal friendship are among the most painful occurrences in human life.” — Thomas Jefferson
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The actor who played the child in Kramer versus Kramer’s name is Justin Henry. While filming the movie there came a scene when Billy Kramer was to cry. Dustin Hoffman used an actors horse sense (And some would say a dirty trick) to enable him to do so. He took Justin aside and pointed out various members of the crew whom through shooting Justin had come to love. He told the child a simple truth of the acting world, that when all of this was over he would not see his friends on a daily basis and many of them he would not see at all. Justin began bawling and they shot the scene.
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I have told that story to a lot of folks who think what Hoffman did was cruel but I think that although he was an opportunist he was simply teaching Justin the facts of acting life. The actors we know and love in Jericho will probably not see much of each other once the show is no longer in production and I wonder if many of us in the fandom are not destined to undergo a similar fate. Already people whom I fought side by side with back in June have become less and less a part of my life. Some left because they were fed up and others had real life scenarios to contend with. Some became friends so fast they felt like they always were and others I had to struggle with before befriending. Still others I started out close with but grew apart as priorities led us in different directions. I feel it important to face this as real life has recently had me moving away from the fandom. I feel it necessary to acknowledge that moments have a shelf life and that is why we are required to live them to the fullest. I feel we have done that together and I feel that there are many among us who still are doing so. They call for us to return to the boards and fight on not realizing, I think, that we all move on at different rates and that our moving on does not reflect upon the Jericho movement so much as it simply says that our time has been served. I cannot be in the thick of things daily anymore but I refuse to feel like a failure for it. Another Ranger reminded me tonight that there is no reason to do so.
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We have all moved “out of the gray twilight”.
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3 comments:

Margie and Edna said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Sweet Tea said...

Superb post, Terocious. Jericho has been an amazing experience and I don't regret a moment of it. I have made friends who will last a lifetime and friends who didn't last a month. I have seen people change from kind to paranoid, from helpful to hurtful, and I have several knives in my back. I take comfort in the fact that I gave my best and it's time to move along. But, the greatest comfort is to be found in the relationships that are fulfilling and helpful and kind. I count you among those.

Anonymous said...

Such is the nature of volunteer groups. People give what they can when they can.

No one should be made to feel guilty if they need to cut back or leave.

I've had people apologize to me, if they just can't get the weekend off to go to an historical recreation event. My answer is alwyas the same, go do what you need to do and the group will still be here when you come back.

Gwen
http://www.jericho-kansas.com