We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Mbayo Jonathan Gotz Bona a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Mbayo Jonathan Gotz thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

As Ray Virta, one of my favorite teachers in acting school once said to me: “Be a roast”.

“A roast?” I asked, thinking this was another one of those cultural or language barriers I’ve had a tendency of running into here and here “Like the food?”

“Yes.” the answer shot out of him “In order to make a good roast, you need to perfect the craft of marinating, preparing, cooking and properly observing the roast. But one of the most important steps after you’ve done all that is to let it sit. Let it sit and absorb all the creative juices, all the hard work you’ve put in to properly marinate, prepare, cook and observe your roast. Only then can the dish fully come together. Only then can the meat revel in the determined honesty that classifies our work.”

He was right. It was a Thursday afternoon during our exam phase. He knew very well that any other note would’ve sent me down a spiral of overadjusting that probably would’ve only hurt my performance in our upcoming scene demo the following week. What Ray told me basically translates to: “Relax, man, you got this.” I wish I could’ve found this lesson by myself a bit earlier.

As an immigrant, the world constantly lets you know that you’re expected to do better than anyone around you. Otherwise, what are you doing here? Same goes for actors. So, when I, a natural perfectionist to begin with, came to this country as an immigrant to study acting, you know the pressure was on. And I’m not even going to lie: pressure is part of my process. Had I not worked hard, expected results, failed at attaining them, been extremely disappointed, frustrated, depressed, angry, then driven, focused, and back to working hard, I never would’ve made it to where I am now. Now, I’m a professional actor, and I have my mom, my teachers, my friends, my love, my passion, and honestly also the pressure I felt to thank for it.

But I will admit that maybe the amounts of pressure I used to put myself under were excessive. I would work myself day and night, not socialize, isolate and bury myself within the work. I would want to grind away at every scene, character and assignment until I’d gotten it to absolute perfection. I’d be up working the day before the exam to squeeze out the final tiny drops of creativity in hopes to make my work better somehow, by any margin.

But acting isn’t a one-man-show. Cooperative work, in my experience, has the tendency of being twice as valuable as work done alone. Additionally, being healthy, eating healthy, sleeping, loving life and socializing are just things that should have priority over anything else, at least in the long run. I won’t act like I don’t still experience phases where the work and craft are everything to me, but I’m learning, steadily learning to find that delicate balance. Additionally, Ray was absolutely right. The work itself can profit so much from a bit of distance, a bit of breathing room and play.

If I could go back to tell my past self one thing, it’d be: “Relax, dude, you got this. Have fun, play around, be a roast.”

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I think the major thing I have to offer to the world as both a performer and as a human being is authenticity. It sounds so simple when we talk about it: Just say what you think. Just do what you love. Just stand up for yourself and be honest. But the more we attempt to work toward genuine authenticity, the more we realize how incredibly hard it is to reach and to maintain.

After lots and lots of work on myself and my craft, I’ve reached a level of honesty and authenticity that I am genuinely proud of. Of course, like everything in life, it fluctuates, and on my bad days I wonder if I’ve made any progress at all. But really, most of the time, I’m super comfortable with who I am and what I stand for, and I think people gravitate towards that. At least the kinds of people I love having in my life.

The same goes for acting. We all talk about authentic performances and how they move us, but it’s very, very tricky to actually go out there with a heart that’s open enough to give and receive, and with a mind that’s ready and committed enough to really live in a different world for a while. Even throughout a single scene, many performers will tell you that their level of commitment to the material can go through a wild roller coaster ride.

But I think there’s a certain kind of performer who strives to live authentically on stage and off. Those performers who allow themselves to be vulnerable, to admit, accept, and work on their own flaws, the ones who are a pleasure to work with because they’ve learned to practice kindness with themselves, and thus are able to be kind to others. I do (humbly) count myself as one of them. I think it’s important to bring your own full self to every performance and every personal relationship you truly care about. My true self is one that strives for authenticity, love, and kindness in all things. And I try to bring it everywhere I go.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

That’s an easy one: it’s the work itself. I truly, genuinely love what I do. Some nights after a day filled with acting, I go to bed excited to be able to do more as soon as I wake up. Often in life, we do things to some specific end, to gain resources or approval. Acting is one of those rare activities where these very human instincts don’t dictate my behavior. I like to compare it to loving another person. Ideally, we don’t act selfishly or with any ulterior motives. The point of the act lies in the act itself. Be it talking to them on the phone until late at night, enjoying nature or a piece of art together, or just coexisting in silence. When we truly love something or someone, we don’t need a lot more to be happy.

That’s how I feel about acting. It’s a source of endless energy and endless joy for me. It challenges me, sure, frustrates me at times, even makes me wonder whether I’m cut out to be an actor. But ultimately, I always move past any of these doubts because I feel like I was meant to do this. It feels like that’s what I’m here for. When I’m on stage or in front of the camera, the puzzle piece named “Mbayo” fits into that chaotic, weird puzzle called “the universe”. And having moved through such a period of doubts and frustration, my conviction only grows stronger and stronger.

The most rewarding aspect about being an artist or creative is being an artist or creative. Plain and simple.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

It’s not so much a lesson I had to unlearn, more a way of thinking. I’m naturally a very analytical guy. I like chess and video games and analyzing story structures and character arcs, morphing even the arts into a science. And honestly, this has brought me far. I was a good student in school and a very good one at university. Society rewards brains like mine for thinking the way they do. It’s seen as the proper way to be. Languages, natural sciences, philosophy – the thinker’s subjects are regarded as markers of an intelligent and well-adjusted member of society.

But it’s also, I’ve come to realize, the comfort of seeking singular, quantifiably correct answers that drives this desire for analytical thinking. I noticed it within myself first. In acting school, I was following my habit of trying to solve every issue by mentally sinking my teeth into it. But I noticed pretty quickly that in art there never is a “right” solution. There’s my answer, your answer, his, her, and their answer. There are as many answers as there are human beings on this planet, maybe even infinitely more. And all of them are correct. If I strive to find my own most honest answer, then that’s the correct one for me. And in the past, my outward search for safe, simple, feasible solutions had been hindering my exploration of those internal, very personal solutions.

So, I had to start broadening my horizons. I had to break open all that concentrated energy from inside my brain and allow it to flow through my whole entire body. Not an easy journey for sure. Not a complete one yet either. And the fact that I even think about an artistic journey like that as incomplete, as if it would ever yield a concrete, feasible end result, only shows me that I have a long way to go. But I’m working on tapping into my body’s intelligence. Yoga helps me, and so does dancing. Stage combat, running, climbing, and meditation are pretty good as well. Ultimately, we’re three-dimensional beings that always strive for some sort of balance. I’ve been tapping into my own potential in a rather imbalanced way in the past, and so unlearning to solely rely on my analytical ways of thinking is one of the biggest endeavors on my journey. My body has so much to tell me, and I’m finally deciding to listen to it.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.mbayobona.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/deutschmaninnewyork/

Image Credits
Michael Gusev – https://www.instagram.com/flyinggoose76/