"Resistance" from A Director Prepares by Anne Bogart

In this chapter, Anne Bogart discusses the benefits of and variety of methods of achieving healthy resistance and utilizing obstacles to create meaningful and powerful art. Bogart professes that without the existence of obstacles or challenges to a goal, there is no rigor or depth in the work that is created. This makes a lot of sense to me because it speaks to the same way we think about storytelling and acting: if you want the piece to actually be engaging, there has to be conflict and stakes. If you are able to easily just say "I want this," and get it, then there's no real grab for interest or intrigue. For applying this to rehearsal rooms, it looks a lot like picking specific moments when to interrupt a process or moment to delay gratification. That way, when the expression is actually achieved, there is even more compression of the moment to be released. Bogart says, "A good actor gets in the director's way. A good director gets in the actor's way. They set up purposeful resistances between them because

differing perspectives serve to clarify the work at hand." For me this is really useful in thinking about how to form conditions in a room that can create powerful work. There needs to be some friction between perspectives to be able to push against each other towards the goal above. If one or both just meld against the other then there's no traction to push against to boost yourself or the other up.