Performers really write with their bodies. If you give them a piece of writing, it becomes a completely different thing once it’s spoken and acted by a performer. The strange alchemy that they’re able to do has everything to do with energy and the force of their imagination…
What I love about actors, really, is that they only have their history and their observation of the world to call on. It’s actually sort of like learning how to play poker really well: you have to make that decision so quickly… They’re in touch with the cosmic reality of life and also the memory of life. In the way that writers excavate, actors embody. — Hilton Als, PARIS LA 16
LAXART and the Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens present LIVES OF THE PERFORMERS, a work-in-progress by Hilton Als.
The piece is directed by Peter Born and will be performed by Helga Davis and Victoire Charles—the Los Angeles stand-in for Okwui Okpokwasili, who was in a previous iteration.
Sunday and Monday, November 17 and 18, at 7:30 pm.
LAXART
7000 Santa Monica Boulevard, Los Angeles.
Hilton Als, Lives of the Performers, from top: Helga Davis in performance at Triple Canopy; Davis; Victoire Charles; Hilton Als at the Soho Playhouse, New York City, January 19, 2018, photograph by Ali Smith; Davis and Okwui Okpokwasili at Triple Canopy. Images courtesy and © the author, the performers, and the photographers.
