Choose to Make It an Adventure

“In truth, the work itself is the adventure. And no artist could go about this work, or would want to, with less than extraordinary energy and concentration. The extraordinary is what art is about.” –Mary Oliver

I came across this quote today as I was working on an audition—yet another self-tape, only this time for a theater role. Right now, I’m in a place where I haven’t done a play or musical in over two years. It’s the longest I’ve gone in my career without being part of a creative process. 

This isn’t an insight about how much I miss that process (I do, of course), or my lack of bookings (the episode of Chicago PD I shot in December aired this week). It’s about the process of creating a fully fleshed-out character to show a creative team—if only for a self-tape that might not lead to anything else. 

It’s the work itself that’s the adventure. 

Is that something I’m telling myself as I turn in yet another self-tape that may or may not end in me getting a callback, or god forbid, a job? I don’t think so. It feels different. I’m engaged in a way I haven’t been for an audition in some time. 

This self-tape is for a new musical. I started the process the way I would if I was already cast in the role: On Sunday morning, I sat down with a cup of coffee and read through the script, making notes of what others say about my character, shaping him from the inside out. I scheduled a voice lesson to learn the song. (I told Roberta Duchak, my amazing voice teacher, that I long for the day when I schedule a lesson just to sing, not to work on an audition. But it felt good to work on a new song anyway). 

As I worked on memorizing the lyrics today—singing along to my recorded voice lesson—the words and moments seeped into my body like they would if I was in rehearsals. This is the adventure, right? This process. And while that next booking or that 12-week run of a show might not be in my immediate future, I’m going to enjoy this. 

In fact, I’m shifting my mindset in 2026—these aren’t auditions. They will be adventures. 

While pausing to write this today, I caught an interview with Andrew Scott—maybe one of the most exciting actors on the planet right now—who said: “It’s not about creating a perfect painting of, say, London Bridge, but rather your view, your impression of the character.”

That’s exactly what this world of self-tapes allows us to do as actors. So let’s embrace it. Embrace that adventure. Remember that it's authorship over accuracy. Give casting your best impression of the character. Take them on an adventure rather than just trying to get the self-tape finished and done “right.”

So stay tuned! We’ll see how this self-tape turns out and if I get a callback out of it. But it will be an adventure … and I’ll share it at my next Self-Tape “Open Gym” on February 9th!