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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 December 2021
The eight-week run of Georg Büchner's Woyzeck at the New York Shakespeare Festival Public Theatre in March and April saw his first major acting since his days with The Living Theatre.
In the ten years (1963-1973) that Chaikin served as director in The Open Theatre, the company he founded, he rarely acted. He had very little interest in performing, and yet “I still defined myself not as a director, but much more as an actor. I still do.”
Chaikin is still uncertain as to why he was drawn to acting, except perhaps as an escape, a way to “get out of this crummy Brooklyn context that was my life, whereas the theatre and the radio and the movies seemed like they were these other orbits of existence.” Determinism also played a role, since Chaikin did—and still does to a certain extent—view acting as a chosen lifestyle, a way to “pick the kind of life you'd want to work in.” Acting provided a tremendous sense of freedom.