If there were any vagaries in my mind over the difference between my two main life pursuits at the moment, they were blown out of the water this week. Yesterday I spent a grand total of forty-five minutes conscious in the apartment; half an hour to get ready and leave for work, and fifteen minutes to swap news with Krissa and fall asleep, fourteen hours later.
Three life pursuits then; sleep, then the play and my job. In no order whatsoever.
Monday 5.30pm: Meeting. Calculators out. Sketches left, right and centre. Frowns. Gesturing, working things out, floating ideas, panning ideas. More sketches. Slight feelings of inadequacy, quickly quelled, as it dawns on me that I am a more proficient doodler than technical sketcher. "Can't route that through there. I've got a series of twelve inch beams supporting that deck." "What spacing?" "Every seven and a half feet." "We might be able to branch off here..."
Monday 7pm: Circle of actors, huddled next to stacked tables and jumbled aluminium light rigging backstage. Lyric sheets cast aside. Odd hand gestures of counting and rhythm. Intense frowns of concentration. Gesturing, working things out, getting the hang of the fast-repeated "Take a chance-take a chance-take-a-chick-a-chan-chance, take a chance-take a chance-take-a-chick-a-chan-chance. key change! Take a chance..."
My life seems to be utterly insane at the moment. I'm leaving the house at 8am, returning at 11.45pm or so, and being two - no, four people in between. There's the work me, the evening me, and the two Dukes.
The scenes I mentioned - where I have the last line as one character in one scene and the first line as another character in the next scene? The character changes take place on stage. There's also some wardrobe rearrangement (hopefully not failure) the precise details of which I'll find out tonight. So far in rehearsals I've gone from the good duke (whose character has drifted from Lt. George of Blackadder IV to something closer to Mr. Brittas of The Brittas Empire) to the bad duke with the addition of a Dr. Evil-style jacket, and it makes the transition a lot easier.
The sudden change between the obnoxiously chipper Duke Senior and growly Duke Frederick is easier because of the addition of the jacket, and much easier than simply walking out on stage as one or the other.
I need a jacket for the transition between work and rehearsal, too, but a different one, so I'm not constantly barking at everyone.
I won't lie - I'm really tired, but it's brilliant.
I think it was a memory of this sort of period of rehearsals from last year that made me go for auditions even though Krissa decided not to. I have rehearsals every night this week, rolling right up to the first shows this weekend, and it's now, when we've started to subconsciously mouth the words to other peoples' scenes, and we're honing and tweaking, that things start to shine through.
People are invigorating scenes that were good before but are now suddenly great, and even though we've seen the words said ten or fifteen times before, everyone offstage, everyone sitting reading in the auditorium or pacing back and forth between the rows of seats running their lines in their heads, everyone stops to watch.
Work isn't what I'd call light at the moment, but that's part of the enjoyment - if I was marking time at work waiting for rehearsal, it wouldn't be as much fun. Instead, I walk into the theatre knowing I just gave my all at one thing, and here's another thing to have a crack at. And I get a kick out of that.
Again, here are the show times and locations, cast list and bios and oh yeah! Buy my book. It's printed on bark.*
*Book not actually printed on bark.
It's the Intensity of life that you'll look back on later with joy. Better busy than extended inaction.
I love that time in a rehearsal period where you know it all backwards and forwards but still find yourself inspired and enthralled... it's the best! Break a leg.