Kevin Spacey Mentors Aspiring Actors in Sharjah
Kevin Spacey mentors aspiring actors in Sharjah
The Oscar-winning actor Kevin Spacey has been flying under the radar for the past two weeks, slipping into the UAE to coach 34 lucky students at theSharjah Institute of Theatrical Arts culminating in a play that will be staged to a packed house Sunday night. The performance of Hassan Abdulrazzak’sDhow Under the Sun marked the end of the workshop in which the Kevin Spacey Foundation and META, the Middle East Theatre Academy, had collaborated. Over the weekend, before the curtain rose, the 55-year-old theatre veteran sat down for a rare interview, exclusive to The National, where he shared his passion for mentoring young actors – and explained why he isn’t a fan of the softly-softly approach.
How did your friendship with Emirati entrepreneur Badr Jafar, the founder of META, come about?
We met many years ago and have had some incredible conversations, experiences and travels together. I think he’s an incredibly dedicated, generous person and great fun. I’ve always had a particular interest in this region – all the changes happening here – and I’ve done workshops and trips to Abu Dhabi, Dubai Qatar, Beirut and beyond. So Badr and I decided a number of years back to develop a way of ‘bringing work here’ and ‘inspiring work here’. This is the first big project we’ve done between META and the Kevin Spacey Foundation.
What have you made of the talent pool from your workshops?
Pretty impressive, the group is unique, exciting and diverse. With a lot of the workshops I’ve done – like in Doha – as the time for me to do the workshops drew closer I kept hearing from the organisers, “don’t expect any women”. And I kept asking “why?” When I walked into the workshop room, 13 out of 28 were women and I was like “hmmm”. So, when I was asked to do a workshop in Abu Dhabi, I said yes but the entire workshop had to be women or I wouldn’t come. It happened and it was a remarkable, extraordinary day with groups of women from two universities who presented Shakespeare in Arabic and English. We touched upon taboos and resistance to some degree, and one of the exciting things is that you can often say and do things artistically that you can’t politically.
You set up your foundation in 2010 with the mission statement of ‘sending the elevator back down’. How much further has it got to go and how will you keep ‘giving back’?
Well the great thing is that we’re beginning to encourage other people to set up their own elevators, because ours is very crowded. I’m a product of this kind of thing and when I began as an actor I was involved in lots of workshops. I got to work with professional actors and at 13 years of age – very much like the students here – I got to do a workshop with Jack Lemmon, my idol. He had this wonderful philosophy -which I only learned about when we later became colleagues and he became a mentor and father figure – he believed you should ‘always send the elevator back down’. I think to some degree because Jack Lemmon was also born in an elevator. It’s an extraordinary feeling to be able to look into the eyes of some kids I work with and see the nickel drop – see the moment when they make a recognition either about the piece they are working on or about themselves. Suddenly you see their self-esteem rise, they have a better sense of themselves and I think all that goes into making for a better society, whether the kids go into the arts or not.
Elizabeth Smith, your teacher at the Juilliard drama school once said to you: “I’m hard on you because I think you’re talented.” Do you have a similar tough-love approach with your students?
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