Meet Gehan A Cooray

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Gehan A Cooray a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Gehan , so great to have you with us and we want to jump right into a really important question. In recent years, it’s become so clear that we’re living through a time where so many folks are lacking self-confidence and self-esteem. So, we’d love to hear about your journey and how you developed your self-confidence and self-esteem.
I had to learn to cope with a lot more family drama growing up than most children and adolescents back in my native Sri Lanka did – multiple divorces (starting when I was 3 years old), more than one set of new partners that my parents brought into the fold etc, all of which was very anomalous in what was a particularly traditional South Asian society. I am also an only child, which means I didn’t have any siblings to cling to for comfort amidst the constant upheaval, and yet this very fact turned out to be one of my greatest strengths – I learned at a very tender age not to look to any “peers” for emotional validation; rather, I learned to look inward and nurture myself from within.

I was raised in a female-headed and female-driven household, and since the people I interacted with the most were my mother (who worked full time) and the maids at home, I developed a more feminine way of thinking and being, which led to constant bullying and snide remarks no matter where I went for being perceived as effeminate. However, I instinctively took great pride in NOT being the typical boy, because I seem to have recognized intuitively even as a child that the strong feminine influence I had at home was something special and remarkable in a country that still suffers from toxic masculinity.

My mother would read fairy tales to me, and introduced me to strong female characters who overcame all the odds, like the Classic Disney Princesses, Maria from ‘The Sound of Music’ and Eliza Doolittle from ‘My Fair Lady’. These were not traditional heroes by any means, and so I realized very early on that one did not have to be a conventionally tough, macho person to be strong and to prevail over adversities. I learned that sensitivity could be harnessed as a great strength, and that I did not need to fit any mold to be confident – my mother herself did not fit any mold, for she was at the helm of one of the biggest companies in Sri Lanka, with even my father working beneath her there (they remained work colleagues and friends).
I feel like a boy who has a very robust, self-driven mother who does not need a man to prop her up will automatically end up with greater confidence and self-esteem than a boy whose father is the dominant force in his life. It all starts with having role models who go against the grain, and who do not acquiesce to societal expectations and gender norms etc.

By the time I was a teenager, I became absolutely and utterly fascinated by St. Joan of Arc after seeing a movie about her and reading everything I could about her – she is of course the greatest historical embodiment of some of the things I just described, and what she reinforced for me is that confidence and self-esteem are ultimately perpetuated the most in individuals who are driven by their INNER CONVICTIONS, their MORALS, and their VALUES, rather than external, ephemeral constructs. She identified herself as “La Pucelle” (which means “The Young Virgin/The Maiden” in French) and made her chastity and purity the cornerstone of her entire identity, while insisting that all the French Soldiers in the Royal Army live a very clean lifestyle if they were to be victorious – which is how they ultimately defeated the invading British Soldiers.

I am of course a far cry from St. Joan of Arc, but I do still sometimes refer to myself as “Saint Gehan” (with my tongue placed firmly in my cheek) because of the lifestyle I’ve always lived, despite spending most of my adult life in Central Hollywood, California – I never drink alcohol, never smoke anything, never watch pornography, never do drugs, never undress people in my mind, never fantasize about sexual acts, don’t “party”, don’t go clubbing, and don’t eat any of the animals that are prohibited in the Most Holy Bible.

I’m not saying any of this to sound sanctimonious, but I can walk into any room – be it in Los Angeles or New York or Sri Lanka – and no matter who else may be there (could be a well-known Hollywood director, theatre casting personnel, or a family member who is against me), my confidence and my self-esteem are always *ROCK-SOLID* because they are foregrounded by WHO I AM INSIDE and HOW I LIVE MY DAY-TO-DAY LIFE, rather than temporal things like fame or bank balances.

And while I remain eternally grateful to God for all my academic achievements, artistic accomplishments, and professional awards and accolades, my confidence and self-esteem are ultimately not the least bit contingent on whatever I might achieve or accomplish NEXT – nor are they determined by a family name or by association with specific corporations or other people (who are used by some to buoy their identities) – but rather, I rely solely on the personal qualities, attributes, and way of life that God has enabled me to stand by almost from the time I was a teenager.

Confidence and self-esteem can only be sustained by who one is and what one does as a PERSON/INDIVIDUAL, entirely apart from one’s profession or family ties or other, external associations. I hope that our intrepid readers take this to heart.

Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
I’m an Actor, Classical Baritone Singer, and Independent Filmmaker. From a very young age, my mother sent me for Elocution lessons back in Sri Lanka, where the quality of Diction and Speech were emphasized as per the Classical Acting Techniques of Great Britain and Europe, while also exploring the imaginative possibilities of Improvisation. I started working with private vocal teachers as a teenager, and by the time I completed my secondary education, I had performed everything from Shakespeare to Gilbert & Sullivan. I graduated from the University of Southern California here in Los Angeles with a B.A in Theatre and Minor in Psychology, with Renaissance Scholar & Discovery Scholar Honors, and ever since then, everything I’ve done in the fields of Drama, Music and Cinema has been infused with that scholarly spirit of the Renaissance Man within me.

Meeting director Jon Favreau a year after moving to Hollywood is what inspired me to start making my own films in addition to acting and singing. I had already directed Operas like Mozart’s ‘The Marriage of Figaro’ and Rossini’s ‘The Barber of Seville’ onstage, while playing the lead baritone roles in those masterworks, and after a series of short films I made got into a number of film festivals in Los Angeles and Palm Springs, I decided to make my first feature film – THE BILLIONAIRE. I adapted the script from a George Bernard Shaw play, and sought to represent South Asians in an empowered light by portraying the title character, while the rest of the cast was North American. The film won the Best Comedy Feature Award at the Burbank International Film Festival in 2020, and was officially eligible for both Oscar and Golden Globe Nominations in 2021. One of the Golden Globe Jurors, Ms. Patricia Danaher, gave me one of the most positive and glowing reviews I ever received for the film, which I specifically styled in the fashion of the Classic Hollywood Films I grew up watching, such as “My Fair Lady” and “All About Eve”.

My personal philosophy is that I shouldn’t merely mirror reality back to my audiences as an Actor and a Singer, but rather, take them to a heightened realm where one can “think more nobly and feel more deeply” as Bernard Shaw put it. When I made my Carnegie Hall Solo Concert Debut in October 2019, I told one of my pianists that even the Broadway musical numbers in my programme should be interpreted with the same finesse, elegance and refinement as the Operatic pieces I sang. Although I’ve been equally successful performing in American Musicals as I have been in French and Italian Operas, and British Operettas, I don’t believe in treating one art form as more profound than the others.

So for instance, I’ve approached the role of Gaston in Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” stage musical with the same artistic heft that I would bring to a role like Escamillo the Toreador in Bizet’s French Opera ‘Carmen’ (which I did at the Miami Classical Music Festival last year) – although I will say that being a classical crossover type of artist, any Broadway musical performance I do is bound to have a certain operatic quality to it, while any Operatic performance I do will invariably be a bit more accessible even to people who don’t normally go to the opera.

You can currently watch my feature film THE BILLIONAIRE on the streaming platform ‘Revry’ for free with advertisements – it’s a streamer that features LGBTQIA+ films, and Asexuality is one of the major themes in my film, since I identify as Asexual in real life.
You can also listen to my vocal album, CLASSICAL AND COOL, on Apple Music, Spotify and Amazon Music etc. This album was officially eligible for Grammy Award Nominations in 2021 upon release, and features a wide range of music from the 1700s all the way to the 20th century. I sing in English, French, Italian and Latin, and I guarantee that there is something on the album for everyone, whether you want to listen to a brand new arrangement of Schubert’s “Ave Maria” with Harp, or the original 1920s version of “Who’s Sorry Now?” replete with a dramatic monologue in the middle of the song!

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
*. PATIENCE (and of course PERSEVERANCE, which is very closely related) – You must remember that Rome was not built in a day. Patience is one of the Seven Cardinal Virtues that saints like Thomas Aquinas listed, and developing a strong spiritual practice might help those to whom Patience might not come as naturally as it has for me. Perseverance goes hand in hand with Patience, and keeping the Destination in mind at all times is what empowers one to trudge through the journey, even when the journey might be delayed/prolonged by factors that are completely outside one’s control.

*. Possessing a SCHOLARLY SPIRIT (that propelled me to study at a Top University like USC) – An academic degree from a proper, reputed university is going to hold you in good stead throughout the course of your life, even and especially APART from work. Your mind needs to be trained to think, analyze, filter and consider things systematically, which is the ultimate purpose of academia/higher education! Otherwise, you will default to making decisions based on your emotions, which are not always reliable and can sometimes be very misleading. You need to always think about the things your OLDER self will thank your YOUNGER self for, and this is most assuredly one of those things!

*. Always being YOUNG AT HEART – Life sometimes has a way of trying to wear you down, and one of the greatest antidotes to this is never losing touch with your INNER CHILD. As much as people may try to make you disconnect from your imagination and sense of wonder in the adult world, you always need to keep one foot in fairyland (as it were), and PRESERVE THE POLLYANA within, so that your core remains innocent and pure and untouched by the vicissitudes of life as you grow older. Staying young and wholesome at heart will also help you to maintain a youthful external appearance, no matter how old you are, because who we are and how we feel on the inside has a way of manifesting itself in how we look on the outside. This is especially important for men to remember!

Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?
I have been dealing with Tinnitus/nonstop ringing in my left ear since May 2022 after being exposed to loud music on a particular occasion, and although I was able to live with it somehow for over a year, the ear ringing was aggravated and exacerbated to a debilitating degree in August 2023 after being inadvertently exposed to more loud noise. My sleep has suffered dramatically as a result, with the ringing in my ear waking me up after just a few hours of sleep on many occasions – taking Melatonin has only done so much, and a range of holistic treatments such as Acupuncture, Ayurveda, Chiropractic adjustments, Craniosacral work and Frequency Specific Microcurrent etc have yielded mixed results at best (and in some cases, the so-called “treatments” turned out to be “mistreatments” which only made the problem even worse, sometimes making me feel like I fell into the fire from the frying pan, as the adage goes).

However, there have been a few general, overall takeaways from many of the doctors I’ve met (including ENTs) that I plan on abiding by as much as possible as I try to overcome and resolve this ongoing issue. Minimizing stress is something that everyone is advised to do, but it’s especially important when trying to reduce the impact of tinnitus – and unto that end, I’ve decided to become even more selective than I had already become with regard to the people I hang out with, because as an Empath, it’s easy for me to absorb the energies of those I spend any length of time with (even when I meet people with negative, unsteady, chaotic or emotionally unpredictable energies). I am quite excellent at grounding myself when I’m on my own, and so I need to make sure I only spend time with people who possess a similar ability to be grounded and centered.

We live in such an out-of-whack, dangerously frenetic modern world – in most parts of the globe, at least – and since I myself am a very old-fashioned soul who likes to live my life in a much more composed and stately manner, I need to retreat from certain situations, persons and entities that are aggravating, indelicate or unpleasant (e.g: loud modern music, shouting, basically anything that isn’t terribly proper). Any kind of unnecessary sensory stimulation flares up my tinnitus, and while people who operate at lower vibrations/frequencies might crave that type of sensory overload, I have found that the more I avoid various places and people, the infinitely greater my well-being! Discernment and wise judgment are my best friends here.

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Image Credits
Miami Classical Music Festival 2022

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