In my universe of true acting talent, Ron Campbell, above, is his own galaxy.

I’ve seen him in several wonderful plays, most especially the extraordinary one-man show “R. Buckminster Fuller: The History (and Mystery) of the Universe” (which received a nice feature here). I’ve been an appreciator of Fuller since late adolescence. Despite my familiarity with Bucky and his thinking, I remember after seeing this show some years ago in Chicago walking out of the theatre and feeling that I had a better perception of (and gratitude for) the world and its potential. Whether or not everything is fixable, it is certainly improvable. And we ought to get on that.

Yes, the underlying work was brilliant. But on top of that, Campbell was utterly captivating. Unless you’ve ever stood alone on a stage, you can’t fully understand how difficult it is to be that mesmerizing. (I’m not a performer — not since my rock ‘n’ roll days, anyway — but I am a speech-giver, and I’m well aware of what mesmerizing is. Because it isn’t me.) Charles Nelson Reilly was mesmerizing in an inexplicable way. The first production I saw of “Waiting for Godot” was mesmerizing (because, as with being spellbound, I lost track of where I was and felt entirely consumed by that universe). The Berliner Ensemble production of “The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui,” seen in 1999 at UCLA Live! was completely mesmerizing in a somewhat unfortunate way, so much so that I remember the awful moment when my friend Jack and I turned to each other at the end of the performance and realized that we had just, in effect, enlisted as eager compatriots of Hitler’s Germany. That was powerful theatre, but it also had the advantage of full spectacle. Campbell had just himself and some slides. And a desk.

I say all this because if you haven’t seen Ron Campbell, you should, and if you’re in southern California and environs you’re going to have a chance very soon. This and next month, Campbell will be performing “The Thousandth Night” at the Colony Theatre in Burbank. The synopsis:

Paris. 1943. A French actor has one chance at freedom before his derailed train to a concentration camp gets moving again. Like Scheherazade before him, this storyteller spins the tales of 1001 Arabian Nights as though his life depends on it — and it does. Solo performer virtuoso Ron Campbell plays 38 roles in this remarkable play written especially for him.

Few deserve the sobriquet “virtuouso.” Ron Campbell does. I’ll be there opening night.

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 7th, 2007 at 9:26 am and is filed under On being, On seeing, Thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.