Lee's First Blog
With only a few days before the start of Rehearsals, now feels like a good time to start blogging! I have spent a good bit of this week working with my good friend (The Puppet) trying to gain a bit of confidence with my puppetry skills which prior to this week were pretty non existent, but we will get there! We also spent a day at The Mining Museum in which we had a great deal of fun with the publicity shots at various locations within the museum, which apart from the unusually hot weather was exciting stuff! Need to go through the novel one more time before Monday which i will be doing with Puppet in hand, as I have found this the best way to practice thus far! We also had a costume fit the week before last which was the first real cast meeting. This was a first for me….wearing tights is surprisingly comfortable….but removing them was a challenge in itself! Cast and crew seem to all get along splendidly and i'm looking forward to the adventures ahead…
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Oct 21
First Rehearsal – Andrew Warnock (George Bailey)
For some time now I have been looking forward to this project with equal measures of excitement and trepidation.
Lets take the latter first. How could anyone approach such an iconic and well loved character as George Bailey and not feel a little overwhelmed? The story of Its A Wonderful Life and the characters therein tend to mean more to people than those of other Movies. So many people (me included) have grown up with the story and have attached a great deal of sentimental value to it over the years. For anyone taking on such a story, the fear of being compared and coming up short proves a gigantic psychological barrier and in weaker moments you just can't help but imagine a sea of dissappointed faces, shedding tears and wondering how you could do such a thing to them.
That's the trepidation part. And the Excitement? All of the above reasons. The challenge of taking something that people think they know inside out and presenting it as something new and fresh and relevant. The prospect of illuminating areas of the story that maybe people didn't see before, or at least hadn't thought of.
Anyway, it was with all these thoughts swimming round my head that I arrived for the first rehearsal. The day got off to a shaky start, as the rehearsal space at Roslyn Glen Hotel was unexpectedly shut. This proved a brief and minor set back and actually allowed us the opportunity to walk along to the nearby Chapel (one of our performance venues) and have a good look round. That done, we returned to the Hotel and got down to the business of analysing the text and breaking it down into small workable chunks. This is a vital part of any rehearsal process as it helps the cast towards a greater understanding of the story and the part they will play in it. The cast assembled here have thrown a lot of interesting thoughts and ideas into the mix and I am already starting to feel excited about the direction that the story might in go and the way its characters will develope.
All in all, its been a fruitful first day.
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Tonight’s the night….
Jul 30
Well, the first night is upon us. The fact that I haven’t updated you for over a week gives you an idea of how busy we have been. This show has presented more of a challenge than any that we have done before.
I must take this opportunity to praise the actors who have worked tirelessly to create rounded, believable and enjoyable characters. This years show has been a challenge from the outset and they continue to meet each new obstacle with determination and no shortage of creative solutions. They really have worked wonders.
We are now at the stage of being ‘ready for an audience’ obviously during all of the rehearsals you are aiming to achieve something for an audience but it’s not until one actually arrives that you truly understand what it is that you are creating.
Peter Brooke describes in his book ‘The Empty Space’ ‘A man walks across this empty space whilst someone else is watching him, and this is all that is needed for an act of theatre to be engaged.’ In one way of course he is absolutely right. However, for me true theatre takes place when you have the space, the audience, the players and most importantly something to say. In our case this is the magnificent story of Romeo and Juliet. Tomorrow will be our first opportunity to really see whether our story affects an audience in the way we hoped. If you would like to contribute your thoughts after watching the show please feel free to keep us updated with anything you liked or disliked.
As with our production of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream we have some outside sections in the gardens of the chapel. However the weather forecast is not too favourable for tonight but we’ll just have to keep our fingers crossed that the rain holds off. It really adds something unique to the evening to be in the open air listening to Shakespeare – just as it was 400 years ago.
Finally I would like to say a big thank you to everyone who has worked tirelessly in the supporting roles in the creation of this year’s show. In no particular order, Brenda Murphy who has assisted me brilliantly and offered excellent insights and asked thoughtful questions and made well thought out suggestions throughout and been a great support. Cathie Owen our Voice Coach who has given the cast such tremendous support and help and been a great supporter of us all. Bill Scott whose costumes seem to get better and better. They are stunning creations and all made from scratch. Michael Osborne who has whipped us into shape in terms of his stage management and found and made some excellent props. Fiona Rutherford whose Clarsach is so wonderful to listen to. All original creations (bar one) that fit and build the mood and atmosphere beautifully. Thank you all.
I will update you over the weekend as to how we go…
The only way is up……
Jul 15
In March 1923, in an interview with The New York Times, the British mountaineer George Leigh Mallory was asked why he wanted to climb Mount Everest, and replied, 'Because it's there'.
Without wishing to give too much away about this years show we have set ourselves a couple of very difficult tasks which at this, the mid-point of rehearsals, you start to question. The quote above I think goes some way to answering it.
I should stress that creating a play is nowhere near as strenuous as climbing a mountain and I am thoroughly enjoying the process but the challenge is valid as a comparison. The sense of setting a difficult task and then trying to achieve it is applicable to the mountains and the rehearsal room.
I am pleased to report that, to continue the mountain metaphor, we have established base camp and are well on the way to summiting on July 31st – The team is in good shape and extremely well supported by a very capable crew.
This (the mid-point of the rehearsal process) is always an interesting point in any show because you find yourself with a lot of work achieved and an awful lot more still to do – it genuinely is like being half way up a mountain – the thing that drags you to the top is the determination to get there winning over the desire to give up and go back down. Especially when you know that it potentially is going to get harder before it gets easier.
Anyway, back at sea level we are really making great strides with the show. We have some lovely moments already created as well as some very interesting characters. The scenes outside are going to be really effective I think. I will try to give you another update as we go.
We have been concentrating on developing each of the scenes to really allow us to tell the story of this particular version of Romeo and Juliet. As always with Shakespeare the trouble is that the more you work on it the more you find and so many options present themselves to you because of the genius of the language. Finding the right decision for the character, the actor and the story takes a lot of careful thought, and, really 8 weeks of rehearsal (like the Royal Shakespeare Company). We have only the 3, but I think we are making excellent progress. Onward and upwards…..