This weekend was full of performances and a bit of Timon rehearsal. The exciting thing about this weekend is we had our rock star Symmonie go in for John since he was out of town for a wedding. She went on as Touchstone and Pantalone. This meant that on Friday, we devoted rehearsal for put-ins. She had the lines down, even stepped in to sing an interlude song that John sings right before we start the second half of As You Like It. It's always fascinating to play with an understudy. Things are just inherently different. In fact, I discovered some new things in my various interactions with Touchstone as a result.
We also had to do some music shuffling. John is a stalwart in the music parts of our troupe. He's mostly covering on the brand-new upright bass. I'm not sure how well it carries into the playhouse, but that instrument is critical for the ensemble in holding down the roots of all the chords. I most missed it during the interlude music during As You Like It. We did end up cutting two songs in each pre-show, which just meant that we delayed when the musicians came out to play for the audience.
All in all, it was a good weekend. It wasn't without some glitches. I'm starting to understand the true excitement of Ren Season. I'm quite used to repertory now, but rehearsing Timon for three 8-hour days and then revisiting Servant after not touching it for a week is a little nerve-wracking (and I'm hardly even in that show). I can imagine it will only get more frantic as we add the other two shows....
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| Though this picture doesn't seem like things are that frantic: William and Silvius crush some candies... |
On Sunday, we rehearsed for a couple hours in the evening (this is our Friday night, need I remind you...). We finished blocking the play (the epitaph scenes). Since I wasn't in those scenes, I worked on figuring out the notes to an opening "party" song that will start off the show. If all goes well, Greg and I will trade off noodling on our respective horns to help set off the festivities of Timon's great banquet. After that, we plugged everyone into the Masque. There's dancing, a leap/backbend off a table, music, and lots of revelry. I'm doing my best to play the bongos. It's about as Baz Luhrmann as you can get on the Blackfriars.
I'll provide a link to some rehearsal photos. But I will say there are some possible spoiler alerts if you'd like to keep some parts of the show a surprise, you may not want to see some of them. But here it is...
Okay, I'll leave at that. I want to see Inside Llewyn Davis today, but I only deserve that if I make uber-progress on my Epicene lines (and review all of my Timon lines).
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From an actor friend of mine in Austin:
Some People
By Laurie Coker
Some people, sad people
(take for instance my waitress
Here who can’t stop feeling sorry for herself
Having to be at work in the rain at 4:00
To make my coffee)
Cannot separate their sadness
From the rest of the world.
They carry it with them everywhere.
That’s why I love actors.
Actors get up in the morning
To run their lines while brushing their teeth –
And they have a terrible toothache.
The landlady bangs on the door for their rent
And the actor shouts believably, I’ll have it for you tomorrow, Mrs. Grigsby!
There is no coffee or eggs or milk
So the actor digs in the trash for some old coffee grounds
And makes a cup of second-hand java,
Grabs half a day-old doughnut
And runs to catch the subway.
The actor has a terrible headache, the temperature is 109 in the city
and yet it is raining.
The actor’s hair melts in the humidity,
But the actor manages to devise an attractive look by the time of the audition.
The actor feels nauseous, hungry, worried, and a little weak,
But when the casting director says, Good morning, how are you? the actor smiles
And answers, Great! And you?
And when the audition begins the actor thinks of nothing but the character.
There is no sadness, no worry, no hunger, no nausea, no ego.
There is only happiness and glee and sparkling eyes and lively nuances.
Actors have a bad rep. People say they are egoists; I heartily disagree.
Actors have a natural capacity to put themselves outside of themselves
Just for the rest of us to have a good laugh or a good cry
or to forget ourselves for a moment.
Give me an actor to a sad, intriguing girl in a coffee shop any old day.
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