Tech Begins!

After a one-on-one rehearsal with Wes on Friday I felt very good about the small pacing fixes that needed to be made to the Machinal scene.  We also worked in breath where it was not already present, such as the movements in and out of the statue moments.  (Penny was the victim of a mugging and subsequent problems that stemmed from that event last week--she is OK and has since joined us at rehearsals.)

Today we had a cue-to-cue with our amazing lighting designer and I could not be happier with how everything looks! Turns out that I am using an awful lot of light and sound cues--more than I had anticipated.  At first I was nervous about relying so much on technical aspects to keep the piece moving, but I am more at peace with that reliance after today.  The technical elements are fairly subtle and really support the action on stage, so I feel every light cue and every sound cue is completely justified.

Since tech has taken over my focus recently I made sure to review my lines on my own time and reminded my fellow actors to do the same.  I was debating whether or not to hold rehearsals during our regular rehearsal times this coming week since we will be running the piece on Tuesday and Thursday nights.  After realizing how long it has been since we did a run I decided that we would benefit from our time on Monday before doing the whole shebang with tech on Tuesday.  It's been long enough since we ran through everything together (especially our lines!) so I am looking forward to getting back into the swing of the show with Wes and Penny.

My focus during tomorrow's rehearsal will be to concentrate solely on my own performance.  I have spent so much of this rehearsal process being a director as well as an actor and I have finally reached the point where I must trust my fellow actors and stop being both things.  It is not as though I did not trust Wes and Penny earlier, I just couldn't let go of the observational habits I developed in the first few weeks.

Letting go: a lesson well learned.  From now on I'm turning into a diva.  This whole this is going to be about ME!

This is my inner diva.