26 May
I don't think I can adequately describe exactly how horrible my rehearsal was last night.
It was a runthrough for Philip and Kirsten, the artistic director and the associate artistic director, for them to see the show before we open on Friday and give notes.
I don't know if this is a good thing or a bad thing, but at least I was not the only actor up on that stage who neither entirely knew her lines nor quite what she was doing. Everybody was terrible, and the cries of "Line? Line?" echoed through the night.
We didn't even finish the whole thing, we only did the first scene (which is, admittedly, 3/4 of the play)and Philip stopped us, saying "I have no idea what you are doing up there. Bill (the director), if you weren't going into the hospital tomorrow, I would be up on this chair screaming at you! How could you let them do this? Why do they not know their lines? (to us) Do you think you're doing children's theatre? Why are you yelling all the time?"
And Bill, stalwart Bill, tower of Jello, sold us down the river.
"I told them not to do it all on one level", which is a base lie. He did tell me that when we worked the monologue the other day, but what he told us as a group was "Bigger! Bigger!"
The thing is, of course, that Bill is sick and is going into the hospital tomorrow, but he is, I understand, a none too specific director as it is, and his illness has exacerbated his tendency to, well, not direct.
We weren't directed, we weren't blocked, we were left up there to twist in the wind. Not knowing our lines means that we are assholes, but (as I told Philip when I rang him afterwards) it's not as though Bill gave us a whole bunch of wonderful direction that we flat out ignored, we got zip!
All I can say is, I certainly hope that anyone I invited will stay the hell away.
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Last Updated Tues 26 May 09:28:09 1998