REP SEASON 2012 – Rehearsal Day 39 – ANDREW CHEVALIER (Antonio/Talbot/Reveller)
I’ve just tweeted how sad I am to have come to the end of the rehearsal process. Our third play, Miss Julie, previewed last night and today we go into one last rehearsal before press night tonight.
The truth is, I love the rehearsal process more than performing. It’s in the rehearsal room where discoveries from the text are made and interpretations committed to. They are the most important moments of any play and are decided days or weeks before the actors are on stage. Those moments can be incredibly exciting! They are the moments you agonise over, the daring choices that you make to give a character, an interaction or a design the specificity that defines them. You close doors on a myriad of possibilities to explore the depth of one.
In our rehearsals there have been many such moments. How to stage the shipwreck in Twelfth Night? How to use projections in Mary Stuart? How to bring to life the sensuality of the deeply evokative stage directions in Emily Juniper’s adaptation of Miss Julie? to name a few. I remember fondly the discussions where each idea was first given air, first took hold and ultimately brought definition to a production.
It is credit to the ethos of Faction Theatre that every voice has equal weight. I can’t remember a time when a suggested idea wasn’t given time and trial. But every team needs someone who’s job it is to give the last word. Not always a popular position to be in but our director has done it time and again with vision and clarity.
Each production is different. Each has its own theatrical language, its own feel and esthetic. Our ensemble effort to bring three new worlds to life has been achieved in a creative process that began for me back in December – when press night for Miss Julie felt an age away – and I am happy to say, I’m very sorry it’s come to an end.
