N is for Nativity Plays - drama in a nutshell

N

I don't know how it works elsewhere in the world, but for virtually every British child, the nativity play is the standard introduction to live performance.  Every nativity play contains a microcosm of every play ever produced.   All illustrations by Giotto.

Mary
There will have been ferocious competition for the female lead.  Reactions to the ultimate choice will vary from shoulder-shrugging "meh, it's not a very good part anyway" to "I know it should have been me, but I was just too good to play opposite Joseph".  These opinions will be expressed in audible whispers at every rehearsal.  If Mary is ever absent, there will be a flurry of eager readers-in, eyeing the director and hoping that the miracle will happen and someone will say "we've made a terrible mistake, you are clearly much, much better and shall replace her right now".

Joseph
It will have been very easy to cast Joseph as only two boys will have been eligble to play the role at all and one of them will have been absent on audition day.  The performer will take one of two forms.  He will either be sublimely confident or a gibbering inaudible wreck.  In either case, he will be mollified by being allowed to wear a beard.  Joseph and Mary will behave as though they are plague-ridden and refuse to hold hands.  Both will repeatedly say "we'll do it on the night".

The Magi
These three will be clowns.  They will probably be the most experienced performers and know that the best parts do not necessarily have the most lines.  They will make the whole cast laugh and everyone will adore them.  The director will not adore them.  At least one of them will have already played the role before and will know how to do it better.  They will not learn their lines as they will assume that the other two will.  During the performances, they will suffer collective memory loss and go through their scene three times in different iterations.  On leaving the stage they will have a massive and highly audible argument about whose fault it was.

Gabriel
Gabriel will either be a reject Mary (see above), or taking their first important part.  In either case the role will be taken extremely seriously and the performer will shoot resentful glances at unruly cast members.  The director will learn to dread those faintly pursed lips and the whispered "can I just ask you something?" 

Angels
Angels are obsessed with their costumes.  Furtive arguments will break out over length of dress and amount of tinsel.  They will always have a solo spot of some kind which will be impossible to rehearse as the whole team will only be available at the dress rehearsal.

Shepherds
This is the ultimate home for the too young, too shy and too grumpy.  They will want to be part of the play, but will feel that the whole project is an excuse to chat to their mates.  Some will find relative anonimity a relief, but there will always be a contingent hunting for ways to make themselves noticeable.  In a year's time, such performers will be playing Magi (see above).  Shepherds become obsessed with props.  "Can I have a stuffed sheep?"  If there is a Head Shepherd, he will be the other potential Joseph (see above).  He will need a special prop and woe betide anyone who tries to move or use it.  "That's my crook!" followed by a solid thump and tears is standard at this point.

If you think the above is cynical, all I can say is visit your local Operatic or Dramatic Society and look for yourself.  The person waving their arms, looking despairing and trying not to have a breakdown is the director.

Source of much inspiration

Bolton Castle in Castle Bolton

Ah, Yorkshire Dales, how do I love thee.

We've lived here nearly ten years now, and I'm still stunned everytime I drive up into the Dales.  Yesterday, Castle Bolton was my destination.  I narrowly avoided being late for lunch with the Swaledale Festival team due to taking the wrong road out of Richmond and ending up going to Castle Bolton via Marske and Marrick rather than over the Bellerby tank road.

As it happened, that turned out to be a good wrong choice.  Coming down off the tops, there was just enough mist left over for the whole of Swaledale to be semi-hidden behind a kind of ethereal cloud.  This sounds (and is) fanciful, but it reminded me of exactly where the notion of Mikelmerck as a border country came from. 

Purpose of visit - to scout the place out as a possible venue for some kind of awesome community drama project for 2013.  Said project is the combined brainchild of me, old mate Chris and the artistic director of the Swaledale Festival. 

Bolton Castle (confusingly situated in the hamlet of Castle Bolton, which mostly consists of one small church and the castle), has a ton of potential.  Most conveniently, a lot of it is still intact.  Even more conveniently, the intact bits include some large rooms linked by corridors.  There is potential here for a wonderful promenade performance of something.

Swaledale's event organiser and I hopped from room to room squeaking with delight as we discovered plentiful power sockets and handy niches suitable for suspending lights, hiding cast members and generally setting up some blissfully immersive scenes.

Before long, we'd conjured the mental image of the audience walking through a ship wreck as drowned sailors and ship rigging whirled around them to the accompaniment of a sung lament.  To be followed by arrival on a sandy beach where they would be greeted by rambuctious fisherfolk salvaging the wreck.  To be followed by them being met by the king of the island and welcomed to a feast and a tourney.

We must looked have a right pair of idiots.

Now to get to work on some serious plans.

I want it to happen.

Where the worlds meet

The more I write about the mechanics of drama, rehearsals and gaming, the more I become aware of how close they are.  I am sure this should be obvious, but like many things, the realisation has come to me quite slowly.  Piecemeal, at least.

GMing and directing have an enormous amount in common.  In both cases, when it works well, you are facilitating creativity.   When it doesn't work, you are basically a tedious nagbag.

Naturally enough, I prefer the first option, but accept that part of the job will consist of doing the second.  My aim is to try to do as much facilitation and as little nagging as possible.

The only problem with this revelation is that I'm now quite likely to start demanding the players know their lines and telling casts to roll a save v daze.

This could go badly.

Long day ahead

Apart from the normal 8 hours of classes, it's also the final night of the One Act Drama Festival tonight.  Our Youth Theatre is entering and this is when they perform.

The play in question is a melodramatic piece about WWI and has been directed (very well) by one of our senior students.  Like the senior who has been directing Antigone, he has had a free hand from start to finish with as much support as we can muster. 

For directors, the performance is a bit like the final exam.  Once the dress rehearsal finishes, it isn't your play any more.  It now belongs to the cast and the stage manager and the audience.  That's how it should be. 

Wishing them all well tonight, and hoping that my services as their loyal prompter will not be needed.

Last classes of 2011

Got my last set of classes today.

I always do a mental tally of what's been achieved over a term - nothing formal, just a kind of balance sheet to help me focus on what needs to be done next.  A priority roadmap, I suppose.

We have dates for all our productions and some of them are coming up very soon indeed.  Antigone needs to be ready in the first week of March - which essentially gives us 6 rehearsals (12 hours) plus a dress/tech to get it right.  Planning is on course for that.

The cast have the bones in the right place, but some are behind on the lines.  Among the principals, nice performances are emerging, but they need to find more variety.  With these heavy roles it's a great temptation to give each line the same weight in an attempt to convey all the ideas.  That leads to shouty, dull performances, so we'll be looking at finding ways to give some light and shade to the scenes.  Most of the story is basically a monster family row played out in public, but I think there needs to be a greater contrast in the rare moments when Chorus and principals are not on stage together.

Malfi is now fully blocked at last.  Spent Thursday working through the small bits we never managed to do before, worked through the fights and sent the cast home with instructions that lines must be learned for progress to be made.  Costuming on that is moving ahead as it's complex and a pain.  We can't do a "proper" period, so we'll be concocting a house-style.  If it is internally consistent with the world we're building, it will both work and look good.  Fabric and colour are the keys here.

Faustus has the longest rehearsal period.  It also has the widest spread of cast experience and the big issue here is to help them blend.  Everyone is talented and some are very promising, but for a lot of this large cast, this will be their first attempt at a major piece of classic storytelling.  I'm lucky enough to have been able to seed it through with some very good, very experienced senior members who are acting as mentors (whether they know it or not).  I am much further behind with costuming ideas on this one, but that isn't the priority here.  Not yet anyway.

As far as Bowes goes ... well now.  The nativity went well (I didn't see it, but my spies are everywhere).  We are now therefore back to Drama Club only.  What normally happens is that we get a lot of new members off the back of the nativity (which is partly the idea, after all).  They start again in January and by the end of the Spring term we should be working on whatever their summer show will be.  I'll write something for them.  The theme pretty much has to be the Olympics (2012, unavoidable).  Some kind of Greek myth I think. 

Cast will range in age from 6-11.  I will probably only have one or two boys at most.  Ability will also be varied.  Suggestions? 

Closing on opening night

... or to put it another way, they have their dress rehearsal tomorrow morning and performance in the evening.  It went much, much better today.  Followers will know that "much, much better" is not a high bar but there was sufficient improvement that the staff and I heaved a collective sigh of relief.

In the hope of energising everyone at 9.20 in snow-bound Bowes, I lead a warmup.  This went extremely well and included some high comedy for the masses.  I backed away from the cast as we went through some breathing and projection work and walked into a set of trestles I didn't know were there.  Collapse.  Also, it must be admitted some pain as them there trestles be sharp.  If it caused the resulting performance, I'll obviously need to find some way to publically cripple myself before every show I direct.

What worries me is that might actually be a good idea.

Up and over

Interesting afternoon.  Less worried about the actual role than I was, although sorry for Andrew Aguecheek who is due to get duffed up by Maria early in Act 1.  It doesn't look as though their relationship will improve either.

What is reducing me to jelly is the set.  It's lovely.  Well, it's full of stuff that I'd do, so of course I'd like it.  We'll be using both Juliet boxes and a lot of levels.  Except - be still my floundering nervous system - I  am one of the people supposed to ascend into a Juliet box.  I am completely terrified of heights.  Changing lightbulbs is a big deal for me.  Climbing up a vertical ladder in a full length costume will be a mortal nightmare. 

Staying on the stage may be a mortal nightmare as well.  It's covered in back and white checks.  This is going to be a "learn early" job.  It was always going to be - I like getting rid of the script asap, but in this case it's really essential.  I swear I could feel myself tilting with the squares.  The director just looked benign and said "Oh yes, some people can take a while to adjust.  That's why it's down early." 

I think I'm going to need travel sickness pills.

On directing (courtesy of Jonathan Miller)

Since I must use my brutalised right hand as little as possible, I've been reading.  And in doing so came across this:

"Directing is like medicine.  What I liked about medicine and what I like about directing, is this very delicate relationship you have between a group of people working towards some end on the basis of analysing and reproducting human behaviour.  Since you spend a lot of time while training as a doctor watching what human beings do, and trying to diagnose them as a result, that sort of skill pays enormous dividends when you try to reproduce what people naturally do."

I like this quote.  Jonathan Miller can be an inspired director and crosses many boundaries of expectation.  On the whole we don't really expect people to be genuine polymaths.  What I get from this particular quotation is a glorious holistic approach, where everything he does feeds into everything else he does - with the result that it all gets enhanced.

It is a very cybernetic approach - of which my father approved greatly (he being a Professor of Cybernetics).

Rehearsal routine

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.