Onebody:
A Conversation with Neale Donald Walsch
Dennis Weaver, actor, humanitarian, and pioneer environmentalist, succumbed to complications from cancer February 24 at his home in Ridgway, Colorado. He would have been 82 on June 4th and is survived by his wife of 60 years, Gerry, and their sons and grandchildren. Born in Joplin, Missouri, Dennis starred in 9 television series, including Gunsmoke , for which he won an Emmy in 1959 for his portrayal of “Chester,” as well as Gentle Ben and McCloud . He also played leading roles in 40 motion pictures, including Orson Welles' 1958 Touch of Evil and the 1971 Spielberg TV classic Duel .
But it was as a humanitarian and ultimately an environmentalist that he made what was perhaps his signal contributions. In 1982, Dennis, his wife Gerry and friends founded L.I.F.E (Love Is Feeding Everyone), which fed 180,000 people in Los Angeles each week. In 1986 he received the Presidential End Hunger Award .
Steve Hays: So you're coming to San Diego to do the theater production Onebody , a different kind of appearance for you. You haven't been involved in theater for a while. What was your motivation to get back into it.
Neale Donald Walsch: I don't quite see it as getting back into theater. I see it as moving my message forward with a new vehicle, in a new modality, in a new way. So in my mind it's doesn't feel like a return to theater so much as it feels like extending the message by yet another device. As you know there's a wonderful movie now, Conversations With God - the Movie which people are able to get from Blockbuster and other places and buy it Amazon and so forth. There are other books, of course. There are other talks, workshops and retreats that I do and so now this is yet one more avenue of outreach of the overriding message of Conversations With God . Because of course Onebody is based on the messages and conversations. I'd say heavily based on it. Probably 1/3 of the lines lift right out of the book.
So to me it felt like wow, what an opportunity for me to bring this message forward and make it available to even more and more people using some of the talents and gifts that I have received from the universe, including my gifts for direction and the theatrical arts.
I knew you have a radio background and I knew that you had done a couple of productions in San Diego that were quite successful, but I wasn't aware that you had done so much with the theater and I couldn't help but wonder if this was a joyful venue for you and you were getting back to something you loved being involved in.
I've been doing live theater performances since I was 16 years old. I've probably done over 200 plays in my life and directed many, many shows, including, as you surely must remember I directed Godspell for Terry Cole-Whittaker Ministries [referring to when Steve and Neale worked there together]. That was a pretty sophisticated and complicated production and it would not have been possible to do without 20 years of theater background. I've been involved in live stage presentations and live performance art since I was 16; and as a director and producer since I was 25. In fact I won my first best director award in regional theater when I was 23 in the Baltimore/Washington area. So yeah, I have had a long and extensive background in the theatrical and performing arts including work in nightclubs and so forth. So this is a chance for me to reach back on that background as I've done with my broadcasting background.
As you know I started out in broadcasting as well at 16 and did a lot of work in talk radio and so forth so when it came time to do the Conversations With God books on tape and make other audio programs surrounding that material, again, I reached back from my prior training in the broadcast arts, and radio and television to produce my audio and video products with some degree of professionalism and experience gained from years as a member of the working media.
So really—as a member of the working performing arts community—I'm simply reaching back now and grabbing a previously honed skill and bringing it forward. —This is probably going to be my last foray into live theater because I can't imagine that my work in the world would allow me to take the time that it takes and the energy it takes to do live performance arts anymore. My lecture schedule, my workshop and retreat programs and my satellite television, satellite link programs around the world are taking up, really, all of my time. And the truth is I probably shouldn't have taken this month out to do it but I made a commitment a year ago and of course I'm going to keep that commitment. I was just saying to my wife last night that this is going to be my last hurrah because I can't imagine doing any more live performance. It takes a lot of time—6 weeks or 8 weeks out of your life—and I don't have too many 8-week swatches.
I can imagine. Tell me more about the production. How did you come up with the name Onebody ?
I have very little to do with the actual creation of the vehicle. Jim Coventry wrote the music and the book and lyrics for it. He based it on the messages of Conversations With God . His dream has always been to one day collaborate with me or bring me in on it in some way or another. He wanted to show it to me, see what he had and see if it made sense for me to get involved in some way. Well he did not know at that time that I had years of theater experience. He had no idea about that. Funny, he probably just wanted my endorsement and to expose his vehicle to my audience. But when he and I connected, which is just a little bit less that a year ago now, and when I listened to the score it was magnificent; just as exciting as anything I've ever heard in this genre.
It's kind of a rock musical like Godspell , like Hair and all those wonderful rock musicals of several years ago. Only more modern than that in terms of its musical approach—there's even some taste of heavy metal in this but there are also some beautiful ballads so it really sweeps across the pantheon of musical styles including even a little bit of a taste of Gilbert and Sullivan. So there's a lot going on musically and when I heard the score I said “Oh my gosh, James, this is a marvelous, marvelous score. Give me the libretto. Let me read the libretto.” So he give me the libretto and I read that and of course I saw that every third line in the libretto came out of Conversations With God verbatim, not paraphrased, but right out of the book verbatim. So I said ‘Wow, you've taken a lot of liberties here.” He said, “I wasn't going to actually produce it until I got your okay, but yeah I wanted to take your ideas and add a few broader strokes to it and put it on stage.” So I agreed that I would and I got so excited about it I said “Not only do I give you my permission to use my material in this way, but I'd love to direct it.” And he was stunned. He said “Direct it? You know how to direct? You're a director?” I said “Actually I've directed over 50 stages production in my life and he was floored. He didn't know that. He said “Oh my God, what serendipity this is.” So then he discovered that he had a director and then he said to me “Would you be in it as well?” I hadn't thought about that but I gave it some thought and I realized that it might be fun to actually appear in it as my last—probably my last stage—appearance in this lifetime unless something quite unusual happens. So I said “Yeah, I'd love to.” I don't have a huge role. It's a relatively small part. He keeps on saying it's the title role, but I don't think it's the starring role. The starring role is played by somebody else.
How large is cast of actors?
I think there like 12 – 12 or 13, something like that. Just over a dozen.
And what's going on now is strictly on the West Coast. He hopes to carry it further.
But not with you?
I can't imagine. If someone's going to carry if further, they're certainly not going to star me in it they're going to bring a Broadway star in. Or bring in a highly professional actor and have them do it. So I think what we're doing here is a showcase production to see how well it does, how well it plays in front of an audience, what adjustments have to be made like in any show and get it ready so for even larger venues. So I don't want people to think they're going see a slapdash production because we're putting this together with all the energies we have. We suspect it's going be a very exciting, very exciting show. But it is a showcase production, to see what we've got and to see whether or not the message gets across and people cotton to it. We'll probably take a little audience survey afterward and find out, you know, how did it go. Like the producers of the movie What Dreams May Come did a few years ago before they did their final edit, they screened it around the country and got comments from audiences, and I think that that was a very wise thing to do.
Describe the message of Onebody .
The message of Conversations With God is that we are all one. The essential core message of Conversations With God are those 4 words “we are all one.” This musical is called Onebody because it sends exactly the same message and the title character of the show is the character called Onebody , which is interpreted by many who see the production as God or a deity or the one thing there is. And that character speaks with the voice of Onebody , of one with everything and speaks to the other characters in the show that imagine their selves to be separate both from each other and from God. So it's a very clever conceit. The conceit of the show, to use theatrical terms, is that people fall into several categories; in this show the characters include Somebody, Nobody, Everybody, and characters like that. They're in a sense almost like an old Greek chorus or early Greek theater, that is, they speak for everybody, or they speak for all the nobodies in the world, or the people who have been called the nobodies of the world or they speak for the somebody's. It's a very clever piece, it's a very clever stage piece that makes a social, spiritual, and philosophical commentary about the human condition and how we live out our lives.
And there's also a character named The Fear.
That is correct. The Fear is just that. He's a major character in the show and he represents, of course, the archetype of fear and he speaks to and, in fact, manipulates and controls the actors in the show until he doesn't anymore, until the characters let go of the fear that drives their experience and step into a direct expression of Onebody. So it's a very timely social commentary including a look at the questions of war and peace, consumerism, and other aspects of post-modern life in the world.
I play Onebody. The main characters of the show arguably are Onebody, The Fear and The Artist. But the truth is in terms of line, lines and songs, Onebody and The Fear are the main characters of the show; they're the protagonists and the antagonist. Onebody is presented kind of like in Our Town . He's like the narrator, the person standing on the side and coming on every so often to offer some narrative that moves the program, moves the play forward. But in fact the play is juxtaposition between The Fear and The Artist, and between Everybody and Somebody, and between Somebody and Nobody. Everyone is juxtaposed to everyone else as it is in fact in many ways on the earth itself.
It sounds like quite a growth experience as well as .
I think that people are going to find the show intriguing, perhaps inspiring, certainly musically exciting, and entertaining. So I think it'll be like Godspell and Hair and the other social commentary stage pieces of the past 25 years; a real journey into musical and dramatic art forms in order to invite an audience to stop and think “what are we doing, who are we, why are we here anyway, and what is our larger reality? Are we in fact all onebody or is this just a fanciful stage piece?” From the days of the earliest theatrical productions those questions have been asked. Theater stage presentations, acting in any forms, even just acting around a campfire, has been the way in which we tell the story of humanity to humanity and by reenacting the story and by reenacting our story in such a way that we are invited forcefully and excitingly to look at the story itself to see if we agree with it, if we want to change it , if we want to enlarge it and expand it in any way, and if we choose to celebrate it differently than the way we've been celebrating it for all these many years. So life invites life to reinvent life through the process of life itself and drama is one of the richest ways in which we do that, which is why we love the theater. We love the movies. We love television. Because it's just life showing itself to life in such a way that it causes us to take stock occasionally, especially the refined pieces that form the basis of all true art because true art is not merely to be observed and appreciated, but also to stimulate and to cause us to inquire, to ask us about ourselves—to ask ourselves about ourselves. Real art does that. That is the art of art. The art of art is more than simply a presentation, it is an invitation to larger thinking and all good art is exactly that.
Great description. You mentioned the many different venues, media fields that you're involved in with your seminars, writing and television. Do you like being involved with so many different venues or is there something that really holds you that you love doing the most?
I really love it all. I have been blessed with the ability to do many things comfortably and with relative ease. I'm very comfortable in front of a microphone, I'm extremely comfortable in front of a camera. I'm very comfortable in front of an audience. 'I'm extremely comfortable in front of a keyboard with nobody within miles of me or sitting in a room for 3 1/2 weeks buried in a book. I mean I'm just very comfortable in all the communication arts. I'm actually equally comfortable with a camera in my hands, I might add, I'm a portrait photographer and I do it quite well. I don't mean that to sound quite as braggadocios as it probably sounds but I'm a portrait artist with a camera. I've somehow been gifted in this lifetime with a wide spectrum of skills, talents and interest in the communication arts, pictorial communication, verbal communication, and musical communication. I'm a conductor, too, I've conducted symphony orchestras, and I did choirs. I've been a choir director at several churches and I've conducted choirs and performances, as well, outside of a church venue.
So I've had a lot of experience and background and excitement and inspiration in the performance arts and in the fine arts such as photography and graphic arts. I'm a graphic artist and I've produced any number of brochures and book designs and billboard and poster designs for a thousand different ventures. I've also done public relations and marketing work for people right there in San Diego. In fact I was the public relations and advertising director for Ron Packard's campaign for Congress. He was the first write in candidate in the past century to be elected to Congress on a write in vote. He was neither Republican nor a Democrat. It's almost impossible to win a seat in Congress by a write-in but we did it and Ron Packard who was then the mayor of Carlsbad went to Congress as the write-in candidate and I was the advertising and media coordinator for that campaign. So I've just, Steve, I've had such rich background. Pull out one of the fields and say this is best? I love to lecture, I live to do workshops and retreats, I just – golly I just love it all. My life is a wonderful, wonderful game of expressing the self that I imagine myself to be from morning to night I gotta say to God “Thank you God. What a rich a varied experience I've had in this life.”
I've been so grateful because I think communication is the name of the game. We don't communicate very well and it's over, whatever game we're trying to play cannot be played without effective communication.
To find out more about Neale Donald Walsch's schedule, workshops and seminars visit his site at www. nealedonaldwalsch.com/. Call 1-800-837-7130 or visit www. onebodytheatrecompany.com for information about the theater production and tickets. In San Diego Onebody will be at the Unity Center of San Diego,
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