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Karma and acting

anadi

on the way
Hello dear friends!

A few days ago, while watching David Lynch's movie Inland Empire, an interesting thought apperead in my awareness. This film is very interesting and confusing until you start to understand and put the pieces together. The story involves a movie star getting a role in what is rumored to be a cursed script. Soon she get's so identified with her role in the film, that she loses touch with reality.

So here comes in my question: do actors get karmicly involved while acting out their role's? My mind says that probably no, *** long as there is some distance between the actor and act, but my mind also says that really good actors probably get very much ''into'' their role, so maybe it's another level and one could get karmically entangled by acting?

The funny thing is, life itself is a bit like what I've described here. Aren't we all just very good actors, so good that we've forgotten it's all a play and thus got entangled in the realm of misery and pain?
 

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
I personally don't think actors take on karma for their roles, per se, but there is karma due to the selection of roles, as there is with the entire movie industry. Portrayal of violence, for example, would earn everyone involved some karma, as would being part of a very uplifting movie.
 

तत्त्वप्रह्व

स्वभावस्थं निरावेशम्
So here comes in my question: do actors get karmicly involved while acting out their role's? My mind says that probably no, *** long as there is some distance between the actor and act, but my mind also says that really good actors probably get very much ''into'' their role, so maybe it's another level and one could get karmically entangled by acting?

The funny thing is, life itself is a bit like what I've described here. Aren't we all just very good actors, so good that we've forgotten it's all a play and thus got entangled in the realm of misery and pain?
I think it is possible to see it both ways - some kind of entanglement or sheer coincidence. For instance, a horror movie was made in two parts (in kannada), just before the release of first part the lead actress died in a helicopter accident, and just before the release of the second the lead actor died unexpectedly!

There is a doctrine of - yad bhāvam tad bhavati - whatever is incessantly held in the consciousness, eventually manifests in reality. Our scriptures use this to suggest the path to mokṣa: a) just as we incessantly identify with the body and there results full assumption of the identity, incessant identification with the Supreme results in the assumption of that identity, b) only just as the assumption of identity with body doesn't subsume in entirety the distinct existence of the individual (ātman), so too the assumption of identity with brahman does not result in the subsumption in entirety. Between a) and b) most schools of thought digress.

नारायणायेतिसमर्पयामि ।
 

Rick O'Shez

Irishman bouncing off walls
So here comes in my question: do actors get karmicly involved while acting out their role's? My mind says that probably no, *** long as there is some distance between the actor and act, but my mind also says that really good actors probably get very much ''into'' their role, so maybe it's another level and one could get karmically entangled by acting?

I'm not sure about the karmic point, but I used to do amateur acting and found that you can get very wrapped up in some roles, taking on a different persona. In a way it's quite liberating being somebody else for a while, exploring different ways of being, loosening up existing assumptions about one's character.
 
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