The Greater Purpose Of A Play

Each one of us has seen a small child watching a cartoon for the hundredth time, open-mouthed from great excitement. Why does he watch something he previously saw yesterday and the day before with such enthusiasm?

An adult watch a film that he has seen before, while a child watches the same thing as if bewitched. The idea is that a child is changing, he is new every day! And the adult is already determined.

The child is renewed from day to day so that a film that he sees ten times is new for him every time. The child is growing all the time, and his intellect and emotion are developing such that what he saw yesterday is different from what he sees today. After all, he is seeing the same film with different eyes.

And an adult does not become renewed like a child. Until the age of 17-18 he is growing, but later reaches saturation and absorbs new impressions with difficulty. He becomes renewed less and less until his life is over.

But when we watch a show that leaves a strong impression in us, we absorb impressions like children. A good film, a play, or an opera carry us away, stimulates all of our senses and penetrates into us. If it is truly a good show, that is how it influences a person.

Question: Can this help me in life?

Answer: It depends upon the message lies within the play, what it impresses us with, and its subject matter. Therefore, the theater can be a very powerful means of education, but we aren’t using it properly.

Question: Let’s say that for two hours I am impressed by a show with an educational message. After that I go out to the street and return to the routine of life. So what is left in me?

Answer: You no longer go back as the same person. If the show was constructed correctly, you are changed. You are not just watching a play by Shakespeare about something that happened hundreds of years ago.

The play touches your hear, and you relate to it as a part of your current life. So it remains inside you permanently and directs your life. Everything is constructed intentionally to direct your life. It is not a story about a prince and princess; rather, it is truly about life that is close to a person. So you can identify with the hero and see yourself in his place.

You aren’t just watching someone’s life from the side and thinking about what you would do in his place; rather, you are living this role. So you enter a theater as one particular person and leave as another person. You acquire wisdom about life and begin to look at life differently. We need plays like this.

Question: Is it possible to acquire wisdom about life that is not from actual life?

Answer: In many cases and even in real life, we learn not from our personal experience but from that of others. Why should we suffer and learn everything from our mistakes if it is possible to learn from the example of others and not make those mistakes?

I don’t need a theatrical drama to take place in my own life. I want to learn from the examples of others. This is what we are missing in kindergartens, schools, and in thefamily. They should teach us to differentiate between good and evil according to good and bad examples so that we will play our role in the theater of this life.

Question: What is the greatest thing about the theater? What is it prepared to give to a person in his life?

Answer: Theater must educate a person!
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 5/22/14