I’m upset right now. Not because my favorite actor or director didn’t get a nod from the Academy. I have lost excitement with the Oscars every year for the past few. The deeper I dive into the creative experience of trying to craft words to page or set up shots to capture moments I see less and less the need to make this artistic venture some sort of competition.
And after two years in a row with the nominations being what they are (meaning they all share one glaring similarity) I just don’t see any reason to give this machine my viewership.
I’m not on a soapbox about it.
I don’t worry myself with whether or not you want to watch. Go for it. In my drinking days we’d make a game out of it and take a drink every time a superlative was thrown out. Genius. Brilliant. Inspiring.
All that said, I’m going to write today for one who apparently would not be eligible for an Oscar based upon trends.
My #thisiscrazylove2016 today is to the creator of this hashtag mutiny himself, Tyler Merritt.
This is part of Tyler's face. He has more face than this.
Tyler is an artist. He views most everything in the world through a lens of creation and sharing. Whether onstage commanding a crowd with his voice and stage presence or on shoots with acting roles, he finds a way to share in the process of creating.
"The Greatest!" Oh, not Tyler. That's Muhammad Ali on his shirt. Although Tyler is pretty great.
Tyler is also a critic. However, his criticisms are never negative. He always, Always, ALWAYS looks to the good of a performance or presentation and finds the things about the artistic endeavor that were good.
I’ve been on stage with Tyler as director. His sensibility and understanding of how to make a subtle motion or nuanced emphasis in a scene win an audience over is near genius. (Go ahead, take a drink) He is able to find in the actor what is available which the actor may not even be aware of.
So many things could be said about this photo.
Tyler gravitates to creative people in a room. I've watched him do this countless times. What Tyler does when in their presence is something many artists have trouble with doing. He spends his time talking to them about THEM.
It is actually quite difficult to get him to talk about what he is working on.
I think his attitude is more of a “I’ll show you what I’m doing. Right now I’d like to know more about you.”
I had planned to write about Tyler later on in this one year journey of writing about someone and sharing my love for them each day but I figured today would be as good a day as any to give my friend Tyler the nod.