URGE. VIBRATION. EXCITATION.
The Aztecs and the Orgasmic Revival of Acting Training
Kimon Fioretos | 5 min read
There are moments in this work, this strange, trembling thing we call actor training, where theory and practice, East and West, neurobiology and shamanism, all briefly align into one searing, undeniable yes. One of those moments hit me recently. Right in the gut. Or the groin. Hard to say. The hurt was real…
Let me explain.
You see, in S.A.M. (our ensemble, for those reading the article), we’ve been working on a very particular acting path: excitation.
Not just emotional, not just sensory, but full-body, bioenergetic, vibrational excitation. Not acting as control, as strategy, as objectives. No, we’re talking about permission. Freedom. The magic words we use with our actors:
“For the next 3 minutes,
Do as you feel like doing.
Feel as you feel like feeling.
Think as you feel like thinking.”
Not as you should. Not as you MUST (“Must”urbation). As you feel.
The key word here is urge.
The excitatory path.
Some pioneers in acting knew it. Their entire theory (even when they accidentally reached that conclusion) rested on the principle of disinhibition.
Let it out. Say it. Move it. Express it. Not because it’s clever. Because it’s alive.
So imagine my reaction — nay, my ecstatic confirmation — when I came across a GITIS publication (yes, GITIS itself, the sacred academic mother of Russian theatrical training) and read the following, as the very first exercise in the book. I quote, verbatim:
Exercise: Sex on Stage
The exercise is based on an ancient Aztec custom:
Young people would come to the home of a severely ill person and engage in energetically powerful sexual movements, simulating intercourse with parts of space.
It was as if they were fertilizing the dead environment.
Bringing it back to life. Energizing it.
A powerful field was created, in which the patient recovered much faster.
…By having sex with the space, they were preparing the stage for the play.
It made a strong impression on me. After about twenty minutes, the stage was like an oven, and even I felt young again.
“One problem,” a beautiful Mexican woman said to me with a smile, “actors in Europe are mostly atheists.”
And I agreed with her.
…
Let that sink in.
You will not find this in The “New” 12 Steps to Acting or any other moronic title like that, where it’s usually a diagonal rehashing of Stanislavskian principles. You will not find it in the beige classrooms of your average LA technique sweatshop, where everything is laminated and neutered. Hell, even in New York, they might let you scream “I want my hat back!” thirty times, or “You are wearing a blue shirt” forty times — but try humping the space and see what happens. Instant lawsuit.
This isn’t provocation for its own sake. It’s not a throwback to the coked-up, sweaty 1980s workshop scene, where “freeing your impulses” quickly devolved into just fucking your scene partner on the stage floor. (Which, let’s be honest, might be expressive, but it ain’t acting.)
No. This is about energy. The field. The urge that precedes form.
What we call excitation. What we call spontaneity. What Reich might have called orgone. What Grotowski danced around.
It’s the same language. The same hunger. The same pulse.
We are here to tremble. To vibrate. To fertilize the space.
With breath. With body. With sound.
Not for the audience. For the space itself. For the act of revival.
If you don’t get it, it’s fine. Go back to your action verbs and beat changes. But if you’ve ever felt that raw lightning in your stomach before a line escapes your lips,
if your body’s ever known the truth before your brain caught up —
then you know what I’m talking about.
And if the non-spiritual laminated people can’t get it up for this kind of sacred madness,
they should probably stay with their well-branded 12 steps.
