Alejandro Jodorowsky (1929) is a Chilean-French novelist, poet, screenwriter, playwright, and film director, who wrote the play titled El juego que todos jugamos (1970) [The game that we all play]. The experimental play relates the state of humanity paired with the ideal state in which it should develop according to the author. It prompts the audience to reflect on its attitudes and behaviors.

Te voy a decir cómo eres, Pequeño Hombre, porque creo en ti y tu gran futuro. No hay duda el futuro te pertenece. Por eso debes verte a ti mismo, sin compadecerte, como realmente eres.

I am going to tell you how you are, Little Man, because I believe in you and your important future. There is no doubt that the future is yours. That is why you should see yourself, without feeling pity, for who you truly are.

— Alejandro Jodorowsky, El juego que todos jugamos 

The five players were well settled into the second act of El juego que todos jugamos [The game that we all play]. It was Friday night entertainment, an experimental play about humanity. They hurriedly aligned themselves on the stage before the audience, the lights dimmed, and then an overhead lamp illuminated one in singular attention. The others remained with their heads bowed down and arms folded behind their backs. He raised his hand and pointed into the audience,

“You.”

I looked on at the character. It seemed as if he was staring right at me. He repeated,

“You.”

I slowly turned my head from side to side to see in darkness if he signaled to someone else. It did not seem so. I immediately felt awkward like I did not know what to do. I had never seen anything like this before in a theater. After all, it was a play and the characters never engaged the audience in this way. Until now, the show was frankly bizarre and unexpected like one minute disturbing and the next hysterical. 

I discreetly gestured at myself by pointing,  and I mouthed, “Me?” The character responded immediately,

“Yes, you!”

I could not believe it! It felt like a mistake! The character was actually talking to me! A tinge of adrenaline set me on edge and blood coursed through my veins. I thought, “What if he does not mean me?” I did not want to do anything that would call attention to myself in the middle of a play. And so, I looked around again. The lights cast down and eighty eyes were on me too. He asked, 

“What is your name, Little Man?”

At this time, I realized that the character spoke to me. His gaze did not search out anyone else but rather fixated on me. I blushed in embarrassment, and I nervously pronounced my name. A soft laughter rippled across the audience. He continued, 

“Little Man, do you even know any of the strangers sitting beside you?”

Suddenly, I felt strangely complicit to his actions with a need to respond whether I wanted to or not. I thought to myself, “Well, at least he must think that I speak well enough to call on me. I better play along.” I replied, 

“No, unfortunately I do not.”

He paced back and forth and responded sharply,

“You see, Little Man, that is the problem with our society. You do not even know the people sitting beside you.”

The audience laughed. He was right. I did not. I remembered how this very observation was a behavior that always troubled me about society, like when you wave your hand or say, “hello,” to someone and they do not greet you back. He said,

“Turn and greet your neighbor. Ask him his name too.”

Locked, I did not know how to act except with my own instincts. It was a performance that compelled me to action. The audience was waiting in expectation for me to do something. To act or not to act. And so, I turned to a man seated behind me, and I pronounced, 

“Good evening, sir. What is your name?”

He smiled and we shook hands. And then, he responded, 

“Good evening. My name is Eduardo.”

The audience tickled with delight. And, the character continued, 

“You see, Little Man, that was not so hard. We can always be good neighbors.”

And, the show went on without a misstep to reveal a vision of ideals for our collective humanity. Such a small, seemingly trivial detail to point out this exchange, but in truth, the “entertainment” of the play rattled the humanity of all with its questioning. Breaking down the fourth wall disrupted my role as “Little Man,” a passive audience bystander, any one of the many guises that I may wear in my day-to-day life. For a brief instant, our exchange transformed me and the other onlookers into agents of reflection  — Reflection that may prompt thinking and create a potential for action. Pausing to meditate on my small everyday acts, the game that we all play, to realize how to see myself for who I truly am. Taking away the masks, it brought reality into the realm of the imaginary, the possibility of creating a new agency. Whether the character or the person, I was a member of society in which I performed the “Little Man” day in and day out. I had to choose to be greater than the “Little Man” or settle into my defaults. The lesson, abrupt yet profound, loomed clear in everlasting transparency:

I must live, awakened, to my own humanity.