There is an old saying in theatre: A bad dress rehearsal means a great opening night and a good run. It's thought that the adrenalin produced on opening night after a disasterous dress rehearsal will solve all problems and even allow the show to transcend artistic expectations and really fly. Some people secretly hope for a bad dress rehearsal. After all, it makes for a great theatre story, right?
Not me. No way.
I want a dress rehearsal that is almost boring, we know what we're doing so well. I want a dress rehearsal in which the cast can start to move well through the space, listen to each other one last time, and make a few more discoveries before having to integrate the audience into what they are doing. I want a dress rehearsal during which it becomes painfully clear that we need an audience. And, I also want a black and white pony.
What I mean is that we can't always get that fantastic dress rehearsal. We sometimes (as we did with Wrong For Each Other produced by Encore Productions here in Toronto) get a little behind in our scheduling goals. This time we had a vacation half way through the rehearsal process, preceeded by a night of sickness (losing one rehearsal), and followed by Easter (losing two more rehearsals). All in all, we lost about two and a half weeks from about a seven week rehearsal process. This period (in the way I approach rehearsing), unfortunately, is the chunk of time normally allotted work the heck out of the scenes, doing them over and over and over again and practically learning the lines on our feet. But we lost all that time. Ooooookay.
What happened to us? Well, fear not, gentle reader. Enter my fabulous, glorious, hard-working cast. Mario D'Alimonte and Kelly Ann Woods spent the rest of what was left of our rehearsal period hammering out their lines, working very hard, solving problems, and gracefully adjusting as we understood how scenes transitions needed to flow (because we hadn't even had a chance to rehearse them either). We all had our eye fixed clearly on our goals and we worked hard.
And the process became about the lines. Remembering the lines. Not getting lost in the lines. See, they didn't get that awesome chance to learn those lines as they moved through the space over, and over, and over again. They literally had to learn them by rote. Ptui. As we moved into the theatre, there was very little forward momentum in terms of progress in performing the piece. After we moved in, we leapt ahead every night but, still, I had no idea what the dress rehearsal would bring.
It was a magical night. It's so amazing to see two actors relax into their roles and really listen. Turn off the part of the brain that worries about lines and turn on the part of the brain that understands timing and delivery. Turn off the part of the brain that tells them where to move and turn on the part of the brain that just allows you to be present. It's a kind of flowering of performance that usually happens a few runs in for most shows, sometimes later, and, sadly, sometimes never. And such a gift for a director. Notes were swift that night -- just remarking on this or that little problem and clearing up one interpretive issue. They did a fabulous job.
And are still doing it, by the way. We are getting excellent audience response. I am not necessarily saying that a bad dress rehearsal means a bad opening. Far from it. I am just saying that one can, even in the extreme circumstances as we had here, have an excellent dress rehearsal and an excellent run.
Jacqui Burke is
a freelance director, writer, and theatrical teacher living in Toronto,
Ontario, Canada. She is currently directing Wrong for Each Other
for Encore Productions opening
in April, Kidsplay 2012: The Mayan Prediction
opening in June, and The Last Five Years
for TOKL Productions opening in July. She is, also,
serializing The
Pretender, her first novel,
online at http://thepretender-amarcienoelnovel.blogspot.ca/.
She is preparing for two Shakespeare is Boffo! summer camp
sessions for 2012.
Want to contact me?
Jacqui
Burke
Artistic
Director
Jaybird
Productions
talk/text: 647-292-0210
twitter: @jaybird01
skype: Jacquiburkecell, jacqui.burke
www.wordsnimages.com
www.jaybirdproductions.ca
www.shakespeareisboffo.ca
http://jacquiburke.blogspot.ca
http://thepretender-amarcienoelnovel.blogspot.ca/
http://jaybirdproductions.blogspot.ca/
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