Tech Week on Anything Goes

Teching Anything Goes this week. It's been an excellent week so far...

We've had our Lighting sessions. We've had our sound session. We've had our mic checks and last night we finished our spacing rehearsals. I decided to use one of our Q to Q sessions to continue spacing work because...

Our set has four levels on it and a lot of stairs, so we've used two tech sessions (7.5 hours) to move from the flat rehearsal room floor to our cast of 43 dashing up and down and dancing on all the levels. We're also changing many of the entrances and exits, now that we have the depth and width of the Main stage. It's a joy to get on stage! And the height means that I can create some super images and see the students- I can also do some fun 'ambient work', creating the world of the boat-

Our set is looking super. It still has echoes of my original idea and also is a good set for a comedy that often verges on farce. My original idea I'll save for another time- it was a more conceptual approach... and the Directorial Decision to take a Conceptual Approach to a Classic American Musical Theatre piece is probably a whole other conversation!

Today is our Q to Q. We start at one p.m. and will finish at 11:30 p.m. Normally, in this type of tech, it would be three sessions, but as I said, I devoted a session to spacing, above and beyond our 3.5 hours for spacing...I'm going to get into work early to pick up other tasks to make the Q to Q go as smoothly as possible- and to connect with other projects that I'm working on later this season.

This technical process is the biggest that I've directed in Canada and it's always interesting to notice the differences as I move from one country to another...

Technical rehearsals vary depending on the country and genre of theatre that's being produced. In the UK I'm used to getting the actors in costumes from the beginning of the technical rehearsals so that all elements are dealt with at once. I look at the actors in their costumes, under the lights that have been plotted and we go through all technical elements together. In Canada it's often a more layered process: for the Q to Q today, the actors are in their own clothes, wearing mics and show shoes and we have show lighting conditions. I see the actors in costume, under lights on Sat. at the dress rehearsal. And then our invited dress rehearsal is on Sunday. One of the impacts of this difference is that the actors have less time to get used to their costumes on stage...For 'period work' and for unusual costumes, this can be a challenge. In the US, they often structure technical rehearsals in a different way... What I notice everywhere is that people tend to be used to what they know- and that's fascinating to observe as I go from place to place. What I've learned is that as a director, I need to be flexible and knowledgeable about the various approaches because quite often, it's the genre and the company that choose the way the technical rehearsals progress, not the director. The scheduling is done months in advance and the director generally joins the process later.

There are a many factors that go into creating the Tech Schedule. For example, there are several unions that converge in a large performance space and this has an impact on scheduling. Creating a Tech Schedule that meets everyone's needs can be formidable challenge, so I've learned that I just need to be organized, manage my time well, communicate with all the teams and Technical Director/Production Manager all the time, exercise my imagination when looking at the emerging production, keep looking at what's coming up next and always stay solution-oriented.

I'm really looking forward to our Q to Q. I'm not very good at saying that "I'm excited!" I tend to get excited when I've got through the work and it's all worked out! But I'm really looking forward to it working through all of the elements and getting our production in front of an audience. It's fantastic to see all of the work of so many creative and technical people coming together on stage. And the student actors are doing extremely well- (growing in confidence and skill every day!) and the lighting and set are looking lovely, so I'm sure that I will get excited- after the Q to Q and the tech. dress and the two dress rehearsals!

more soon...

Cross-over days

We had a full day with the full company of The Sad and Cautionary Tale of Smackheaded Peter yesterday. I was looking forward to the day with extreme excitement.

We did worked on some transitions, did a run-through, had a production meeting, changed the beginning of the play, worked more transitions and then had a sound design meeting. That's the order of what happened...

One of our old frenemies, time, tried to sabotage the atmosphere in the rehearsal room at the start of the day. People were a little nervous/tense about running through the play, getting off book, some uncertainty about some physical sections of the play, thinking about transitions- there are still sections of the play that we've not been able to rehearse with everyone present, it's been a tricky process...and the challenges of working several nights in a row at restaurants/shows etc were also affecting energy levels in the room. However a little company TLC began to change the atmosphere and we had an excellent first run-through!

It's not pretty yet- but we're definitely get there and frankly, if it was too pretty at this point in the process I'd be worried about us 'peaking too soon'!

So, now, in our unique rehearsal process, I move on to Anything Goes for a week and the acting company on Smackheaded Peter brew/mull/digest the work/embed lines today in a rehearsal lead by our wonderful Stage Manager, Lauren Williams and our very capable Assistant Director, Andrew McNaughton.

I'm torn about today. If I could split myself in half, (and not frighten people), I'd do it. Half of me would love to be at The Grand, meeting stage management, the props department, the costume designer, our vocal coach, (Rick Kish), seeing Susan Ferley (my boss) and production manager in preparation for Anything Goes and the other half would be incredibly happy to be with the Smackheaded Peter company to build on the work we did yesterday. I'm frustrated to say the least- and also, what a wonderful problem to have- I can't be two places at once.

If my brain were hair (which thankfully it's not!) it would look a little like the drawings of Shockheaded Peter, the German character Struwwelpeter, or Shockheaded Peter. I hope though, that that is where any similarities would end... Struwwelpeter was a boy who had poor personal hygiene. According to the Wikepdias (the source of all extensive research!), "Literally translated, Struwwel-Peter means Shaggy-Peter. According to Ellen Handler Spitz, the book was intended as a highly exaggerated send-up of the pietistic children's books of the day in which good little children came to good ends, and the badly behaved did not."

Shockheaded Peter is definitely an influence on our play, The Sad and Cautionary Tale of Smackheaded Peter... but it's not about the hair or the hygiene! Promise...

Booking a Tantie- End of Week Two

Time and Money...Time and money- we'll just have to make it work with the Time that we have...

This is what was going through my head a lot yesterday- while we were doing our first stagger-through of the play. The actors were doing really well in the scenes that we've rehearsed, it's just that we need more time together as a full company- especially for the Choral sections...and yesterday our stagger-through had the full company for about 20 mins of the piece.

We did have a very productive afternoon- including an excellent conversation about the Qualities Shared by Innovative thinkers. I shared a BBC new article on the subject with the company. Here's the link:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-10653786

We also did as much on the ensemble sections of the play as we could- and we made good progress... And please, let me clear that there were lots of very good things going on in the stagger-through and I'm sure we'll have a wonderful production in the end... it's just that I'm a wee bit frustrated by this process.

There's part of me that would like to have a tantrum, throw my toys out of the pram (is the UK expression) and I knooooow (as a grown-up) that there's really no point and and I know that to "get the play done" that I need to stay solution-oriented and I knowwwwww that "it's only a play" and that I need to trust the rehearsal process and it will all come together... But oooohhhh, couldn't I just have oooooonne little tantrum, sometime, please?

There's a theatre expression in the UK called "Booking a Tantie". A Tantie is the cute form of tantrum. As some of us may know, frustration may sometimes appear during the rehearsal process and when it does arrive it can be for lots of different reasons. It may be that there's a difference between what the actor/director feels is needed for the scene, compared to how it's currently working in rehearsal. So, often, humor diffuses this tension. I've often heard/seen the humor come from other actors in the room... "oooo, she's going to need to book a Tantie!" or "Have you booked your Tantie this afternoon?"(both expressed with generosity, rather than dripping sarcastic mockery) Or someone may ask, "would you like to book your Tantie now?" It's a UK way of acknowledging, allowing and diffusing the frustration- and it can work- as long as there's generally been acknowledging, allowing, compassion and humor in the rehearsal process.

Yesterday I didn't have a Tantie... I did share my desire to have one, but only after rehearsals were done. I just wanted to get on with the work in the time that we had together- and we did have a very good afternoon- to which I say, "Hurrah!"

And this weekend, I'm going to think about how I can rehearse differently- and maintain my ensemble approach to the play.

And although at the moment our potential Full Company time feels like this-



and I'd like to do this...



I'm going to turn that wee perspective around- keep positive and keep going.

And I may just give myself a bit of Time off today...

planning a go-go

Friday was an excellent day!

We had a four-hour session of meeting and greeting actors, chatting, measuring actors for costumes, catching up on design conversations, updating production schedules- all very exciting.

In terms of set design, it looks as though we're going to pursue 'the cardboard way'- which I think is great. Also, some super ideas emerged, in conversation with the actors, about costume possibilities... one intriguing offer was the idea of having one character in a wheel-chair. I love it- the collective creative brain at work!

At the moment I'm making sure that we have as much technical information together as we can: the SummerWorks Festival need our technical requirements by June 28th at 5:00. Just combing through all the information so far to give the festival as full a picture as possible of how the play will look/feel etc, so that they get a sense of it before the technical rehearsals. I'm very slow at admin. and planning in this area- so I'm glad to have a couple of quiet days to sift through it all- and I'm getting the information from the design teams, it's just that I'm putting it all into the form- (yum!).

SummerWorks has a similar technical process to a number of festivals- you have a four hour slot to get your play into the space, do all of your lighting and sound cues, run the play (if you decide to do that) and get out. It's a great exercise in having an organized team. And there's little time for indecision, which I like... Also, as a director it's challenging because up until that point you've only been able to imagine the play in the performance space- and you really never know of you're ideas are really going to work until you see it all coming together in the theatre space. For the actors the challenge is understanding how the space works, how it affects the play- it's a swift learning curve for all the production/cast peeps.

However, I do like the impact that this condensed technical time can have on the design and organization of the play. For example, projection. The play we're doing is set in London, UK and we're performing in Toronto- so I'd like to be able to bring the 'character of London' into the production. This can be done through costume, set design, the actor's bodies, the physical/spatial relationships- and through (perhaps) including projection of some kind. However, projection takes a lot of work, it's another design element that needs careful attention and it can get fantastically complicated in a technical rehearsal... So, we may or may not go down this route... The designer and I are still in discussion about it...

A few weeks ago I was in London so I took a lot of photos on slide film- and one option that we're talking about it using an old carousel slide projector... I think that the production is going to have a 'poor theatre' approach overall- so it might make sense to incorporate a 'retro technical approach'... and if we go that route then we can use it in rehearsal and the transition into the technical rehearsals will be 'easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy', as they say. It might also be a fun, slightly subversive expression of projection, (it's old, it's clunky, there's an ugly-beauty to it), which makes sense for the world of the play. A lot of the play is set on the Thamesmead Estate- (which is all 1970's Brutalist architecture).

Okay- I'd better get back to thinking about music and sound cues...

I will write more about the play very soon- promise!



And I did say that it's set on the Thamesmead Estate in the UK...

Here are a couple of photos that you may recognize of the Thamesmead Estate... from the film A Clockwork Orange