MAGGIE O’CONNOR MOORE
Personal Statement
An artist must open themselves to the infinite.
I believe that an actor’s work is to channel the universe that lies inside ourselves into our creations. My work touches the part of me without a name and gives it room to be free. It invites me to exist with intense truth.
Therefore, using myself, I am able to become boundless.
This is difficult. This work requires unprecedented courage and an acceptance of our innate empathy.
I did not understand what “the work” was until very recently. I spent the fall semester of 2017 studying at Guildhall on the Preliminary Acting Course. There, the term “the work” was used constantly, yet I was infuriated for not being able to internalize what it meant.
During this time, due to personal reasons, I was experiencing the darkest regions of my mind-space. Simultaneously, I was experiencing a rapid expansion of self due to the work I was doing everyday. Guildhall was guiding me on how to release in a time when I was lost. This resulted in a lot of confusion, but after months of working through the darkness, I realized that in my destruction I had faced my truth.
Afterwards, I went home to Alabama. I had thought that Guildhall would have the answers to being a great actress. I was so angry at myself for months after I got home because I felt I hadn’t been enough to understand the answers that I had been given. I wanted to try again. I started training at the University of Alabama in Birmingham to work on what I'd learned at Guildhall until I could audition again.
I was constantly faced with the question: How could my work ever inspire people to be vulnerable, brave, and empathetic if I couldn’t do it myself?
Then, through the guidance of some wonderful people, I began to realize the tensions that I had built up inside of myself. I had destroyed myself all my life in order to figure out what the work was and how to be the kind of person that could do it. It wasn’t until now, after all of that destruction, that I began to understand that in my pursuit of an answer I was deconstructing exactly what I was looking for.
Acting makes me feel alive because there is no answer. There is no way to be great. My work is the constant continuum of art. It will never be the same, there is no end, it is always.
Unfortunately for me that meant I had to let go of a lot of ideas that I had spent the last twenty years implanting deeply into my consciousness.
I realized that I couldn't remember the last time I let myself express my true emotions to their fullest depth. So I began to let go, and I am still learning to let go.
I began to let go of the desire to be good, to be great. This desire lends itself to definition- which hinders exploration- which hinders my work.
I can am now beginning to work with a fearless, joyful abandon.
My work makes me love deeper than I have ever loved because it is continuous and changing. It is revelation after revelation. I am ready to not be ready. I have been through hell and have come out kinder, stronger, and with a greater ability to be myself which has strengthened my ability to work with truth, generosity, and courage.
My dream is to train long-term at an institution that values theatre in the same way that I do, a place that curates a safe space.
I believe that an actor’s work is to channel the universe that lies inside ourselves into our creations. My work touches the part of me without a name and gives it room to be free. It invites me to exist with intense truth.
Therefore, using myself, I am able to become boundless.
This is difficult. This work requires unprecedented courage and an acceptance of our innate empathy.
I did not understand what “the work” was until very recently. I spent the fall semester of 2017 studying at Guildhall on the Preliminary Acting Course. There, the term “the work” was used constantly, yet I was infuriated for not being able to internalize what it meant.
During this time, due to personal reasons, I was experiencing the darkest regions of my mind-space. Simultaneously, I was experiencing a rapid expansion of self due to the work I was doing everyday. Guildhall was guiding me on how to release in a time when I was lost. This resulted in a lot of confusion, but after months of working through the darkness, I realized that in my destruction I had faced my truth.
Afterwards, I went home to Alabama. I had thought that Guildhall would have the answers to being a great actress. I was so angry at myself for months after I got home because I felt I hadn’t been enough to understand the answers that I had been given. I wanted to try again. I started training at the University of Alabama in Birmingham to work on what I'd learned at Guildhall until I could audition again.
I was constantly faced with the question: How could my work ever inspire people to be vulnerable, brave, and empathetic if I couldn’t do it myself?
Then, through the guidance of some wonderful people, I began to realize the tensions that I had built up inside of myself. I had destroyed myself all my life in order to figure out what the work was and how to be the kind of person that could do it. It wasn’t until now, after all of that destruction, that I began to understand that in my pursuit of an answer I was deconstructing exactly what I was looking for.
Acting makes me feel alive because there is no answer. There is no way to be great. My work is the constant continuum of art. It will never be the same, there is no end, it is always.
Unfortunately for me that meant I had to let go of a lot of ideas that I had spent the last twenty years implanting deeply into my consciousness.
I realized that I couldn't remember the last time I let myself express my true emotions to their fullest depth. So I began to let go, and I am still learning to let go.
I began to let go of the desire to be good, to be great. This desire lends itself to definition- which hinders exploration- which hinders my work.
I can am now beginning to work with a fearless, joyful abandon.
My work makes me love deeper than I have ever loved because it is continuous and changing. It is revelation after revelation. I am ready to not be ready. I have been through hell and have come out kinder, stronger, and with a greater ability to be myself which has strengthened my ability to work with truth, generosity, and courage.
My dream is to train long-term at an institution that values theatre in the same way that I do, a place that curates a safe space.