7-17-12 In The Space

One of the strangest things about theatre is that the final few days of rehearsal become less and less about the actor.  The director has to start to focus on everything BUT the acting.  I know, as an actor, it can often feel like I am being abandoned but that is not the case at all.  The director is dealing with lights, costumes, sound, spacing, etc. 

During the last week, the actor's challenge is to maintain a high level of performance while negotiating all of these new stimuli.  Costumes change the performance and the actor needs to figure out how to deal with that.  The same goes with the lights... the sound... and eventually, the audience.

Today we moved into the space.  I love the space but there are a lot of challenges to it.  It isn't a traditional space and it isn't clearly defined.  As an actor, we aren't "framed" by much of a set or by any sort of building.  There is a general playing area and when we are on, we need to make sure we are filling that area.  In a traditional theatre you know exactly when you walk on stage.  Here, you don't always know exactly when the audience is starting to pick you up.  So you have to grab their attention when it is your turn and if you are making a long entrance, you better stay in character the entire time because, odds are, out of the 1000+ people we could have for each performance, at least one person is watching you.

The actor also needs to become his or her own problem solver during the final week.  Example...  today the scabbard to my sword essentially became unusable.  Now is not the time for Cassio's scabbard to be holding up the rehearsal process.  So when I had a stint of time where I was off-stage, I figured out a possible solution, presented it to the director during a break, he said yes, problem solved.  I suspect actors will solve a hundred problems this week.  Many that no one will ever know about.  It could deal with an entrance, or a costume challenge, or a prop issue, or whatever... 

The director's focus becomes the big picture... bringing the technical elements into the production.  The actors, and some of the crew, start to solve the little things.  At this point... the scabbard is a little thing.  Done and done.  Heck, I suspect I dealt with 3 or 4 things like that today.  I assume others were too.  That's how it goes.

So today the new stimuli was the space.

Tomorrow... lights and costumes.

Thursday... sound.

Friday... audience. 

Long runs of shows are nice because you really do relax and settle into a show.  The constant barrage of new stimuli ceases and you can just kind of relax into the part.  That doesn't happen here.  We have a short run and we'll have to be on the top of our game from here on out.

I'm posting a few pics below of the space.  The third picture kind of shows how pretty the sunset is when it is beaming on the river.  I took that at about 9:30pm tonight.  So that will be the lighting as we close Part One of the show.   Finally, I'm posting a picture of my friend's dog.  My friend was a very funny Sir Toby in a production of Twelfth Night and when he got a doge he named the dog Sir Toby... so there is a little bit of a Shakespeare tie there.  haha  I just think the dog was striking a funny pose. 

Finally, the director and I will be on the radio in Indy tomorrow.  We'll be on WICR from around 9:35/9:40 or so until 10:00 with some music and commercials mixed in there.  So if you want to hear that, I suspect you can find a link online.