 |
 |
|
|
|
|||
|
School
& Youth Theatre
|
|||
|
|
Rehearsals 3The performance rehearsal is the one everyone thinks about when the word rehearsal is mentioned: going through the lines and moves until they are perfect. I have problems with this. I'm not sure that a performance is ever perfect, particularly in rehearsal, and particularly particularly (deliberate repetition!) with kids. For a start, each rehearsal should bring new insights: it might be something small, like finding a new gesture which is just right, or it may be a major revelation which suddenly illuminates the whole play. I find that I'm tinkering with moves and tones of voice and so on right up till the last minute, and so are my cast. I'll say to one of them, when a doubt attacks me, "Are you happy with that (move/tone/line/whatever)?" or they may see to me that they're not happy with the move...etc. Perhaps tinkering is the wrong word: what I really mean is fine-tuning. Character insights can lead to changes in moves, which might even give rise to a total change in the on-stage picture. The move to the stage from the rehearsal room floor can have a major impact. No matter how carefully you may mark out your floor, it looks different when you're on-stage, especially when you have actual scenery rather than chalk marks on the floor. Even the acoustics of the theatre as opposed to the rehearsal room can lead you to make changes. What I'm saying is that it is entirely wrong to think of the moves devised at the blocking or the intonation etc. created in the early rehearsals as being the law and the prophets. Each actor, whether the most seasoned professional or a young kid in his/her first part, brings something of him(her)self to the part, and it is a function of the rehearsal process to fan that spark into flame (what a metaphor!). Thus the function - I firmly believe - of the rehearsal period is not to set the performance in stone, but rather to develop and refine it, to make it live rather than embalm it. I have, I am afraid, worked with too many directors (in school, amateur and even professional theatre) who seemed to me to be undertakers presiding over a play's funeral! The key to a successful production is understanding: the better the actors understand the play, the characters, the world and themselves, the better the performance will be. A poor performance will never improve by repetition: repetition merely allows a bad performance to set like superglue. Of course you need to rehearse technical things repeatedly until they are perfect. I remember spending a full hour when I did Little Shop of Horrors, making Ronette, Chiffon and Crystal push two scenery trucks around until they could it it smoothly and efficiently in pitch darkness, and in my last production of Joseph we had no scenery or set, just a few tables and chairs, and the cast became furniture. That needed a lot of rehearsal: pure repetition until it was slick and smooth. There's a beautiful example of this in the London production of Miss Saigon. At one point the stage is lit very dimly and, for a line or two, the face of each girl (and they are scattered all over the stage) is lit by a pin spot, not from a lime but from a static lantern. Obviously exact positioning is of vital importance here, so I imagine it took a fair amount of rehearsal to get it right. But apart from occasions such as this, where precision is of the utmost importance, don't shackle your actors to a rigid framework, not until the last minute - for there's always a time when you have to call a halt to further development - when you are almost about to face the public. Then,and only then, set it in stone. What you have to realise, too, is that kids play on their nerves. You will never get a near-perfect performance from them until they are faced with an audience, and then adrenalin makes them pull out those extra stops and you'll see the performance you wanted to see in rehearsal, but never did. Or at least you will if you've trained them properly throughout the rehearsal period. Teach them to be quick-thinking and flexible. I was very proud of my kids just last week. We were doing a show in a church and one of the minor characters had a solo song. She'd had a terrible sore throat for a week, but had managed to get through most of the show until her solo, when her voice just gave up. Another cast member saw she was struggling and joined in, and by the end of the line, the entire company was singing - and the audience never noticed a thing! You'll never get that sort of reaction - which not only saved the show, but also saved the poor girl from terrible embarrassment - if you use your rehearsals to set the piece like a fly in amber! That's it! Well, almost. One last piece of advice: try to set a rehearsal schedule which avoids having people sitting around for a long time. It's better to have two short rehearsals with different actors (more mainly different actors), than one long one in which half of them have to sit around for half the time waiting for their turn! That way not only does their concentration go, but they get restless and disturb those who are rehearsing.. Yes, I know that puts more of a burden on you, but you love it! Don't you?
|
||
|
|