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 Though I had worked hard on my character, I didn’t expect to find that playing a character with an accent, or this particular accent was, in some mysterious way, terrifically liberating. Perhaps the distance it created from my own personal reality gave me a mask, behind which I could leave my particular self behind, and be free. Though not a Scot by blood, I felt as if some atavistic tribal chord of Scotland was throbbing inside of me—unless it was the terror I felt in front of such an audience of heavyweights—that put an extra zing into my performance. Suffice it to say, if there ''had'' been any scenery to chew I would have had a feast. A spirit of heroic proportions flew into my chest like a madman on wings and lodged there with steel talons. I couldn’t have shaken it even if I had wanted to—it was bigger than I was. And when it was over, with people milling around the way they do after a main-event bout, I knew in my bones, that it was one of those times in my life where it had, indeed, been my night. Now it was fortunate that I felt this because I happened to catch sight of a large flock of white hair next to me. It was Norman inviting another cast member to play Arthur Miller in a play of his about Marilyn. Since that actor, though capable enough, was a soap opera actor, an occupation held in rather low esteem by some young stage actors, I naturally felt that I might also be worthy of such an invitation. The adrenalin pumping through me that night, had given me a little more bravado than I might otherwise have had.
+So I planted myself in Norman’s path and, be damned, sure enough he turned and as if it was all in the plan, said “And you. There’s a role for you. Not the lead, but a role I think ''you'' might find interesting. He’s a stuntman, and one thing he does is take Marilyn for a ride.”You’ve already heard what that scene was like, and that was just the beginning, but what’s really significant here is that he offered me a role in his play only because of the merit he saw in the work—he didn’t know me from Adam. A gesture of that kind of fairness is almost unheard of in the Byzantine casting channels of theater and film. To give a young actor a break, without asking for credentials, or who he knew, or was connected to, with the only consideration being the work ''itself'', seems like it is almost looked upon as heretical by the powers that be. So that was my first sense of Norman, that he was a stand-up guy—a ''fair man''. Rare indeed.
+One of the most satisfying things for an actor is to have a director who receives and fully absorbs what the actor is doing in his performance. The director is the actor’s objective eye and his mirror reflection. At the same time, a gifted director is one who creates a safe space, say, a sandbox of the mind, where the actor can cavort, search, get naked—psychologically or otherwise—and yes, fall on his ass, if it comes to that, without fear of retribution. In short, where he can be free to take risks and, if his instincts are ripe, land on his feet. Norman didn’t miss a trick and, it was understood, if the actor felt the urge to try something that might embellish a scene, he could, and if it worked Norman was likely to keep it in. Not to be misconstrued as license to rewrite the author’s lines, no, this was more in the vein of breathing life into the lines by extending their physical life. The first time this happened for me was a rather small moment, but one that opened up a door that ushered in an abundance of future opportunity. My character, Rod, had picked up Marilyn in a bar where one of her first lines was a challenge. “Gee, Rod, why are all those boys staring at you?” The line called for a simple answer of “I don’t know.” Instead something sparked and, taking my cue from her, I looked off in the direction she had suggested and then sashayed over a few steps to where this imaginary bevy of queenly young men might be, and with a gesture of defiance, a Sicilian “fungoo,” grabbed my crotch at them, so to speak. The gesture spoke volumes, and opened up the scene—the audience guffawed as if they could see this imaginary little group. This happened during a performance and none of it had been planned. Now it should be noted that, in addition to Norman’s openness, this was, after all, The Actors Studio and there, when you were ''on'', you went all the way with what you were doing—if an impulse hit you, you were free to dive after it. I didn’t know from what cesspool of the subconscious this impulse sprang from, but it felt right and Norman loved it. Afterwards he told me to keep it in—it was right for the character. To me this was the real thing, theater on the edge: genuine collaboration between author and actor.
+Recently I read about a young, raging, female playwright that had lit up the London stage with a play that included a character getting anally assaulted with a broomstick, another character shooting junk through his eyeball. She was touted as terrifically brave, and her writing groundbreaking.What’s peculiar to me about this is that when Norman put things up, at least as dark as this, fully a decade before in our production of ''Strawhead: A Portrait of Marilyn'', the audiences almost yawned, barely raising an eyebrow, defiantly unimpressed. And nothing he wrote was ever gratuitous—it never felt as if anything we did was exploitive or pornographic. He simply had a curiosity for those who walked on the wild side, and was committed to pushing out to the edges of what was considered acceptable behavior on stage. Which leads me to a scene that takes place between Marilyn and Rod, right after their motorcycle ride. Norman was not yet through running with the demons of the night. After she and I dismounted, I was supposed to pull her down to her knees by the hair; apparently, how I did this was a little too gentle for Norman’s taste. He wanted something, frankly, more brutal.
+He: “Well, look. This is not Stephan, Boy Scout. This is Rod, Stuntman and stud ''extraordinaire''. Can I show you?” Feeling a little foolish, I nodded. Grabbing a fistful of air he brought his arm down twisting it with a vicious grunt. Did I mention that the actress playing Marilyn was his daughter? Well, so she was, but before we go off speculating about various and delicious Oedipal delights, suffice it to say, after I was given the license I needed— indeed, a father’s permission—WHAM, down she went.
+The scene didn’t stop there. In the next instant, I found myself within a zipper-jerk away from being the first actor in the history of The Actors Studio to be fellated during a performance. At that moment, Marilyn flings off her platinum wig and the ''actress'', Kate, refuses to go on with this “tabloid bullshit.” Of course, the whole thing was a set-up, and this is, in fact, the moment when the play stops mid-stream, with the heckler, previously mentioned, standing up and haranguing the playwright.
+One night, shortly before a performance, Norman approached me in some consternation. “Look, about that cassette with the Doberman sounds. It turned out badly. I don’t want to use it, unless I have to. I want to try and keep it more in the vein of live theater.” He peered at me closely, his sharp blue eyes driving in on me. “I have this idea. What about if you tried it? Could you do something?”My mouth opened and closed as I caught myself from saying “Like what?” I was blank—it took a long moment for what he was suggesting to sink in. Then, “Sure.Where uhh ... do you want me to do it?” I was trying to be a sport about the thing, but I could only imagine myself out there in the center of the stage, maybe even off a little to one side, writhing and growling, for all I was worth, like some rabid psychotic, less like Rod and more like Renfield’s soul brother. A whole performance going down the toilet in one unfortunate flush. I must have been transparent in my despair. So he said, “Well, I mean for you to do it in the wings upstage. You go offstage and make the sounds from there.”
+Small comfort. This was the story. To wit: Rod, who was determined to get back a diamond necklace from his ex-girlfriend would have to retrieve it from the neck of her Doberman, and thereby kill it in the process. So I was going to be making the sounds of Rod grunting in his efforts, simultaneously with those of the dog snarling with rage, then whining in pain and finally gurgling in his death throes. Never mind that I had never taken a sound effects lesson in my life, as if there were such a thing. Or that I could only vaguely conceive of what a Doberman might sound like in such circumstances, alive or dead. Well, sometimes you can’t plan and you have to just jump and pray. And sometimes, just because of this, when there’s nothing preconceived, instinct takes over—there’s no thought involved—and though there may be very little recollection of what exactly happens, something extraordinary may occur. Maybe Norman didn’t realize how much of the dog I had in me—or maybe he did and knew better than I. But I doubt that he was expecting the ''symphony''; nay, hurricane might be more accurate, of sounds that issued forth from that little corner in the wings. I have only a hazy recollection, like some werewolf, of that first time we did the scene. I am convinced, though, that if there had been any fur it would have been flying. The audience must have thought so because, as I recall, there was a spontaneous ovation for it.
+They say that the hardest thing in art is to know when to stop. Sure enough, small moment of triumph that I had snatched, perhaps from the dark jaws of disaster. Still, the way the Doberman scene opened, left me unsatisfied.Why would any dog, especially a trained attack animal, just wait to be slaughtered? Didn’t make sense. Clearly something was missing for the scene to have some street credibility. Then I got the ''idea''. And yet, because it was a fragile one, or perhaps because I didn’t have the strength of my convictions, I found myself eagerly waiting for the night I had found out there was a good chance Norman would arrive very late or not at all. I would try it. It would either work or it wouldn’t, and if it didn’t nobody would be the wiser except me, and maybe the more astute souls in the audience. I had a strong feeling that this idea was valid, yet I wouldn’t know for sure until it was up in front of an audience. And if I brought it up casually to Norman, and I happened to chance it at the wrong moment, say, in the dressing room when he might be having an irritating moment with another actor or, worse yet, with his lovely though provocative wife, Norris (who was also in the cast). Or if I just presented it clumsily, it might easily get shot down, and we would never know if it could have worked or not, which, in my heart of hearts, I believed would have been very unfortunate. So that night, as I slithered across the stage, giving a low whistle for the dog, Bowie knife slipping quietly up out of my engineer boot—I slowly drew out the large, soft, bloody steak Rod had especially brought for the occasion. The mushy, red flesh swaying back and forth from my black-gloved hand, spread something nauseating into the air as if bloody vapors were slowly drifting out into the house. It wasn’t so much that you could hear a pin drop—you couldn’t, because there was a storm of little gasps rolling around out there. Maybe because it was not imaginary, but a small dose of something real, palpable, in this minimalist production—it stood out and it resonated, that pulpy piece of meat, so that I knew in my bones I had made a small but stunning contribution to the piece. I was thrilled, to say the least, and then I did a double take. There was a flock of familiar-looking white hair in the last row. Impossible. Norman was presiding at the PEN meeting at the UN and not here tonight, or at least not until much later. After the show, sure enough, there was Norman in a formal three-piece, pin-striped blue suit looking for all the world like a banker. He caught my eye and, solemn-faced, stormed straight up to me. As he approached I heard a strange hymn-like phrase thunder past me. “Here comes the Judge. Halleluhah.” Ho. Ho. Joke’s on me. When he reached my elbow he immediately broached the subject of the steak. “What kind of meat was that?” ~I was a vegetarian at the time, and wouldn’t have known a sirloin from a shoe sole.! I shrugged. “Steak?” Then he moved in on me. “Do you know what Dobermans love to eat?” he demanded. I saw a large black hole opening at my feet into which my cherished spirit of collaboration was diving headfirst. Busted. I hadn’t even done my homework. Who knew what Doberman’s ate? Meat. Red. What other mysterious substance could they possibly crave? Who knew? Maybe someone, but not me. Suddenly his face lit up with a look as if he had suddenly remembered something. A smile creased his mouth and, as his eyes started to twinkle ferociously, he was whisked away by an old crony, arm around his shoulder, who more direly needed his attention. So he had been yanking my chain. I had paid the price for my boldness. Later he gave his formal approval and for the rest of the run he even paid for the steak.
+The run was not without some moments of tension and ruffled feathers. We had a few interns helping us out backstage and one of them got into a dispute with the young stalwart running the lights. It seems that the lighting kid had a pretty full plate up in the booth and had asked the intern to help him out and sweep the stage. The intern, not too diplomatically, had answered the request with “I’m not here to be a friggin’ janitor.” Things had escalated and gotten out of hand with the two young bucks squaring off and in the end the intern had stalked off. The Actors Studio tends to be somewhat on the egalitarian side, so if anyone had been just pulling rank, that would have been given short shrift, but it was not hard to see that there was a lot to be done up in the booth. Moreover, as it happened, the lighting booth techie had been somewhat generous in his praise about what I was managing to pull off in the play and, since it’s true that generosity is not especially abundant in the theater, he was in a position to see every night’s efforts and his comments were especially valued. But more than the flattery, I really appreciated the warmth of spirit he brought to the production. He was one of those buoyant personalities that can bring some levity to an otherwise grim moment. To further complicate things, it turns out I had also developed an acquaintance with the intern and, prideful though he might be, he was a good sort in the end. And since there are never enough volunteers for a show, even at the Actors Studio, I thought it would be worthwhile to approach him and said so to Norman. “Lemme talk to him, I think I can get him back.” Norman answered “No.We don’t want him if he’s not interested.” I persisted. “Look, we had a small crew before, now we have almost no one backstage. I’m telling you. I know him a little. I think I can bring him back.” Norman repeated himself even more sharply the second time.“It’s only good if he’s interested.”
 ===Works Cited===
 {{Refbegin}}
 * {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |date=1983 |title=Ancient Evenings |location=Boston|publisher=Little Brown |ref=harv }}