How One Man Changed My Life Through the Art of Listening

The summer after my first year of drama school I mustered up the courage to dial one of the most prominent regional theaters in the country. I remember the nervous tension I felt as I rehearsed my inquiry moments before a woman on the other end picked up.

“Hi,” I said. “Uh, I’m calling about the Guthrie Theater’s training program. I think it’s called A Summer Experience for Actors in Training?”

“You’re calling wayyyyyyyyy to early,” she told me. “The program isn’t until next year.”

“Oh,” was all I could think to say. She wished me good luck and hung up the phone in one swift motion.

For the next 10 months I practiced monologues in a drab black box theater in the basement of a dormitory.

I later discovered no matter how prestigious the drama program, wealthy the school, or famous the alumni when you’re in the performing arts you somehow always end up in some newly excavated opening far below the departments of science, engineering, and law.

Thankfully I was far too young to appreciate the irony of playing a starving artist quite literally below where those very students lay their heads at night dreaming of steady paychecks.

I’d arrive at 5:30 am and usually tiptoe past a sleeping guard to avoid an argument of why I needed to be anywhere, let alone the theater at such an ungodly hour.

I’d then make my way down the stairs as if walking a tight rope before flipping on the lights to a makeshift theater waiting patiently for someone’s words to bring it to life.

Nearly 3 hours would pass and I’d still be stumbling through words put to paper by men named Shakespeare, Brecht, and Beckett.

These monologues need to be perfect, I convinced myself.

The auditions finally arrived one spring afternoon as a seemingly endless winter began to surrender to summer’s all too brief warm-up act. As the trees began to bloom so did my confidence as an actor.

As the elevator doors slowly scraped open on the 16th floor of that old Riverside Church I saw a few classmates rehearsing in the corridor. I smiled, or at least tried to, before making my way to the bathroom in an effort to not overhear the audition just beyond the heavy metal doors.

When it was finally my turn to perform I stepped into the room where I’d end up spending nearly 3 years of my young life learning about the breath, the voice, but mostly how vulnerability was a sign of courage. Not weakness.

The room overlooked the Hudson River and the cold hardwood floors succeeded each morning in waking me from the daze 5-hours of sleep invariably leaves in its wake.

I’d often stare out the window looking towards New Jersey as a cool breeze washed over me. Like my dreams, the shores beyond the river seemed so far and yet somehow within reach.

Sitting behind a folding table was a man who looked to be in his early 60s with soft features and a warm smile. He had the temperament of someone who’d undoubtedly give up his seat on the train to someone who needed it more.

His movements were slow, or maybe just calculated. It was hard to tell. But his gaze was steady, his presence undeniable, and when he finally spoke it was with a pitch far higher than I’d imagined.

For the next 20 minutes I rummaged through my bag of tricks, pulling out monologues I’d spent nearly a year preparing. After each piece he’d look to his notes before peering up and casually asking, “What else do you have?”

By the time I left that afternoon I’d performed 7 monologues. I was exhausted.

He thanked me for my time before I made my way home unsure if I’d ever see him again, or find a reason to visit Minnesota on my own.

A few weeks later I received a call informing me I’d been accepted to the program. The same one that selected just 12 actors from across the country offering a chance to spend 9 weeks eating, sleeping, and discussing theater in one of the most progressive little pockets of the midwest.

At the time it all seemed as integral a part of life as breath itself. I didn’t want the opportunity as much as I needed it.

Within minutes of arriving at the Minneapolis Airport I was whisked away to the Guthrie Theater, a tabernacle I’d only seen in pictures and my imagination. To finally see it up close was something else completely.

It was one of the most beautiful things I’d ever laid eyes on.

To a young man who wanted nothing more than to tell stories for the rest of his life it was no different than ambling through the Sistine Chapel or gazing up at the Mausoleum in Petra.

It was as religious an experience as any I’d ever known.

I met up with the 11 other actors on the top floor of the theater, which proudly overlooked the Mississippi River. There were actors from places like Rutgers, Yale, NYU, Cal Arts, and Brown all equally anxious to show the world what they could do on a stage.

As I made my way to the bar I ran into the same man who’d tested my stamina, my desire, and who ultimately granted my wish. He greeted me with his trademark smile. I asked how he was which was about the extent of our interaction that evening.

A few days later 12 actors sat in a circle as if huddled around a campfire waiting for the embers of enlightenment to illuminate us all. That same man sat quietly without judgement, listening to a dozen 20-somethings ramble on about what they knew, or thought they did about the theater and what little life they’d lived.

This went on for weeks as we steadily became more comfortable sharing our frailties, our failures, and how we hoped one or the other would make us better actors, but more importantly better people.

I finally mustered up the courage to speak with that man alone when time allowed. And as he had in those morning circles he opted to listen rather than speak. And not because he didn’t have anything to say but because his curiosity far eclipsed his desire to prove how much he knew.

He listened as if his life depended on it which it may have in some small way. When you sat across from him you felt heard in a way that made you question all the interactions in your life to that point. I thought about how seldom even I listened with a desire to understand rather than add or discount a point.

Never had someone taken in my words in a way that showed a reverence for my presence — that reassured me what I had to say mattered.

That man’s name was Ken Washington and in just one summer he completely changed my life.

Ken’s greatest attributes were his humility, kindness, patience, emotional agility, and capacity to think flexibly in any environment. He also mastered the ability to be generous without sacrificing a sense of rigor.

When you stepped out of line he let you know.

During a project where each actor was asked to perform a speech from a well-known public or political figure I chose President Kennedy’s 1961 speech at Rice University where he first spoke of man’s need to go to the moon. My performance gradually receded into a caricature with Secret Service Agents in tow.

“I thought it started off well,” he said. “But you sacrificed the integrity of the speech and importance of that moment by how you delivered it,” he told me.

I felt ashamed and made sure it never happened again.

Even after the program ended Ken kept in touch with his students. Whenever he was in New York, a city he loved deeply, he’d reach out and ask us to join him for a drink. He loved actors but mostly admired their beautiful struggle.

It’s been nearly 4 years since Ken passed away and though I didn’t know him as well as some I still feel his influence in profound ways.

In those fleeting moments where I doubt stepping on a stage still matters I think about how Ken believed stories were an integral part of being human; how at their best they could inform us of who we are but more importantly who we could still become.

He taught me we tell stories not because of our loneliness, self-doubt, or neurosis but despite them.

But mostly Ken taught me the craft of listening and how all forms of meaningful connection stem from the desire to listen to another human being without allowing the need to be right override the need to find the truth.

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