I'm settling back into the term-time pattern now. As I work all day Saturday, Monday is my new Sunday. Today it's Antigone where I'm not responsible for the direction of the show, but the support of the director.
They had a look at some short bits last week and will go from the start setting each scene now. Usually this is an elating period for the performers as they're at last getting an idea of what these roles will be like. For an outsider, it will look a lot less interesting. Mumbling, trying stuff again, wondering how to place the line, working out what the line means and so on are fascinating to the director and the actor. To anyone else it looks entirely pointless.
For this young cast, part of their job now is to recognise that a lot of their job is to do nothing but wait. This is a tough thing for anyone, but for a bunch of 11-13 year olds, it's particularly difficult. My main role here is to make sure that they spend that time profitably. Rehearsal time is an oddity. The show is either unimaginably far away or so close you could scream with terror. We're at the unimaginably far away part now, and it will feel like an eternity as they wait for their scene to come up and watch as someone else goes over the same line ten times.
A lot of the way cast synergy develops comes from that watching and waiting and however it feels, the time is not wasted.
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