Brock dramatic arts faculty member Danielle Wilson wrote a piece recently published in Intermission magazine about conquering stage fright.

Wilson writes:

The audience goes quiet. It’s time.

I walk out onto the small stage and feel all eyes on me. My legs are trembling. I begin to speak, and almost immediately my tongue goes cold, like it’s covered in ice. And then, suddenly, my mouth goes dry. Like, completely dry. My tongue feels heavy, like it’s an Orca whale I’m attempting to manoeuvre. It’s a monumental effort to pronounce my consonants. Just keep moving your mouth, I say to myself. Don’t stop. My lips are sticking to my teeth.

Time has slowed down. I feel like it’s being marked by a giant sand clock. Each second is a grain of sand dropping painfully slowly into a great heap. My fingers are numb and I’m having a hard time moving them. Only when my character drinks some water and my mouth stops being so dry do I feel my body begin to relax. My tongue shrinks to normal from its whale size.

The show ends, and I’ve survived. But I’m disappointed in myself.

This was last September, on opening night of a new play I had co-created, almost eight years since my last stage performance. When I used to act, nerves were common before a show, but I always felt fine once I stepped on the stage. A former teacher of mine had said, “Nerves are 90 percent creative energy and 10 percent fear of making an ass of yourself. Focus on the 90 percent.” I used to be able to follow that guideline, but, on that opening night last fall, my focus was on the 10 percent.

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