Last week’s technical rehearsals were lengthy – and no wonder, with so many songs, costumes, quick changes and scenic magic to rehearse in. But they were notable for the immense good nature with which every member of the team approached them. Technicals are always difficult: not least because the theatre has to close for them to take place, so the period allotted always seems too short. To make the most of the time, the team works three or four 13 hour days in a row, and the lack of sleep, together with the tremendous pressure – not to mention the anxiety as first night approaches – can make everyone a little touchy and short-tempered. For The Wizard of Oz we spent six days ‘teching’ and dressing, but it was a surprisingly pleasurable experience. During the whole time I heard only one cross word – addressed not to a person, but to some tangled cabling.
The opening performance took place on Monday afternoon. I’d popped Front of House to buy a bottle of water and immediately wished I hadn’t. A crocodile of excited schoolchildren were marching through the front doors and up the stairs, marshalled by their teachers and our stewards. Seeing them, my first night nerves set in with a vengeance.
I used to have nerves of steel at first performances. But rather than finding opening each show easier and easier, I find I’m more anxious each time – perhaps because, with every production, the list of what could go wrong gets longer! Certainly, The Wizard of Oz is so packed with theatricality that there are manifold opportunities for things to go awry, from Toto’s first entrance, through the appearance of the Emerald City, to the melting of the Wicked Witch.
So I was relieved when the band struck up on Monday and a sudden hush descended on the audience, broken only by a uniform gasp of delight as the miniature farmhouse swung out of sight beneath the stage and Dorothy ran on. The actors were as delighted to meet the audience as the audience were to be seeing the show, and it turned out to be a rewarding afternoon.
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A tough week ahead as we embark on technical rehearsals for The Wizard of Oz. We’re well prepared, but there’s a lot to do and little time to do it in – and our deadline is the first performance at 2.15 on Monday, which can’t be changed whatever happens, so we have to meet our target however difficult it is.
The week began badly for me before I’d even left the house: I woke up with a cold, the central heating hadn’t come on, the car wouldn’t start when I got in to it, and the cat was about to make her final journey to the vet.
Happily, once I’d got to work things began to improve. The band arrived for the first time and worked with the cast and children going through each song in order. Our Musical Director has been doing a sterling job at the piano these last few weeks, but it was a delight to finally hear the timpani and the piccolo and the many other instruments these talented musicians play.
In the auditorium some of the team had worked a long Sunday to get the stage set up and the lighting in. Wardrobe had also been in, moving costumes into dressing rooms and making everything ready for the actors to wear them for the first time. The props department were finishing off a table loaded with magical spells when I arrived and the sound team were setting up speakers and microphones. I’m not the only person with an illness, unfortunately, so we will have to navigate a difficult week in the hope that the actors don’t catch any of the coughs/colds/stomach bugs that are meandering around the building. It feels like it’s quite a mountain to climb – but hearing the band kick into the Overture reminded me what a thrill it’s going to be.
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Last night for Lisa’s Sex Strike – a visiting production from Northern Broadsides. A tremendously contemporary reworking of a two-and-a-half-millennia old play, uniting modern rap with traditional Arisotophanic visual gags. A ballsy night’s theatre.
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A really good final week’s rehearsal for The Wizard of Oz. Sometimes this final week can be difficult, with actors struggling with their lines at a time when I’m itching to get some real polishing done, but this team had everything well under their belts and we hit the week running. We’d had a good run through at the end of the previous week which had given me an agenda to work through, and we went right back to the beginning, revisiting and refining each scene.
I really enjoy this kind of work, scrutinising the detail minutely – asking an actor to move half a step to the left, or questioning an objective, or tightening up a rhythm or an idea – whilst at the same time stepping back to look at the big picture. In this case, we needed to get a grip on the narrative arc of Act Two, which doesn’t have the structural elegance of the first Act and so is that much harder for the actors to wrap their heads around.
We spent Friday going through each scene in the act, clarifying where each character is in terms of achieving their stated ambition (getting home, a heart, a brain, the nerve) and also doing a lot of work on not knowing what comes next! Dealing with such a popular and well-loved story is, I’m finding, a journey well pitted with this particular pot hole.
One of the things I’ve most frequently found myself doing is reminding people that you don’t know what comes next, or how it ends!
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Last night we said goodbye to the cast of Blue/Orange. It has been a terrific show – not an easy play to watch, dense as it is with language and ideas. So it’s been a pleasure to see substantial audiences coming to see it, and especially to note the number of young people in every single audience. This has been a tremendous surprise, and one that’s delighted us all.
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