Long week, long beard, late blog.
I’m going to a rehearsal in a matter of hours, so I thought I would drop by for a quick update. We had two big old rehearsals this week, for different reasons. The first was an enormous bloody great big rehearsal of some missing scenes from the first act which we had yet to work on. We basically ran the from Kate’s re-entry and subsequent nibbling to the end of act one in one fell swoop. And this time with Kate, Rice AND Queeny, which I think might be a full-blown first!
There was a huge mass of humanity in that tiny little nursery, a not just because the enormous zombie battle. It was an open rehearsal for prospective members of the Southside Players, so there were onlookers as well! Not a lot of room to manoeuvre when there’s that many toes to step on, but it went well.
They were good scenes to work on with onlookers, actually. Scenes with comedy, action and tension. I hope it looked good. We got a good reaction from the audience. A few giggles anyway…
We also worked on the very last sequence. Without spoiling it, it’s an emotional and heart rending farewell in many respects. I always kind of assumed it would be a quiet, mournful, maybe even despairing moment. But then… the zombies entered.
Firstly, remember when I mentioned just how terrifying I find zombies, particularly when they are behind me. Well, this time, they aren’t just standing behind me and standing under my command… this time they are surrounding me… and they are coming to get me.
We practised it three times. The first one, I froze in abject horror. the second and third run through I could not help but close my eyes and grimace. There were plenty of giggles there!
And that brought its own set of complications. Twenty zombies make a hell of a noise. And a quiet farewell was off the cards. But that set a difficult problem for me. How does Shakespeare say goodbye in a manner loud enough for all to hear over twenty groans and moans? How do we convey the emotion of that moment.
Steve and I have chatted about it briefly a couple of times, and he has some blocking/action ideas to convey Shakespeare’s intentions… but I’ve has some thoughts about how to convey the feelings. I think he just has to get emotional sooner. As it is, I have been playing parts of Act 3 with a degree of aggression or with the idea that shakespeare has nothing left to lose. I decided that Shakespeare’s ultimate super-objective was his legacy, and so his confidence comes from having no legacy to worry about any longer, even if he does have a slither of hope.
By the end of Act 3, all that hope is gone. It’s the end of the world. But maybe as more and more is taken from him, he sees it coming. He finds his fear again. And then he truly loses everything. And by the time he’s surrounded, he’s resigned to that fact. Then it becomes an almost defiant surrender. Curtains.
We’ll see how it works. It should be fun figuring it out, but I feel nervous about not quite having made that decision yet. And we don’t really have time or place to work on nuance in those big rehearsals as there are so many moving parts that need attention.
Wednesday, however, was much more focused and particular. We found ourselves in a new venue, due to a scheduling mix up, and this time it was just Burbage, Kemp, Dee, Bacon (with Soldier 2) and I. And its all the great two person scenes from Act 3. We hadn’t done them in so long that we had actually managed to get rusty with the lines (though we were, at least, off-book).
It was a great little condensed rehearsal, all about the details. All about the relationships. And I found myself enjoying my scenes with Doctor Dee a great deal. It was the first time we did it completely off book and I really enjoyed finally getting to dig in to that scene a bit. Derek is great. There’s a kind of mutual respect in Dee and Shakespeare, even though I think Shakespeare probably thinks Dee a bit of a hack.
And Rory and my scene is getting more and more fun. I think now that Rory and I are getting to know each other a little better, he’s really enjoying winding me up. And he’s very good. Flipping from comedy and pathos beautifully.
And likewise, Leigh is really embracing the comedic part of that scene. His Bacon is so exhausted by that point, you can’t help but laugh at him getting fed up with us all. He plays up to it so well. And Leigh himself is very funny so it’s great fun to see him play up to it there.
It’s been really fun getting to work on the emotional character moments as much as anything else. By the end of all this, we might just have a belter.
I’m really looking forward to today’s rehearsal. We’re running all of the second half. BRING IT!
I Am Zombie Shakespeare 