Corporate America: Off Book

I never thought this day would come, but it finally has. Today marks the first off book rehearsal for my cast. I could see the difference in the way the actors spoke their lines, the way they moved in the space, and they way they focused on the audience. Getting the scripts out of their faces freed them up to do so much more than before. No longer focused on their scripts, the actors were able to move more freely through the space. The only downside to taking their scripts away was they were much less confident when speaking the words. I had told them not to worry if they did not know the lines exactly and just to power through the dialogue. However they dropped whatever they were doing whenever they missed a line. I eventually told them that on the nights of the show, they won't know 100% of their lines and they can't stop the show when they mess up. It's up to them to keep the show going, even if they don't know exactly what they're doing. It's important for them to continue the scene, when they need to say line. That way the ball is never dropped, I can feed them their line, and they can continue the scene as if nothing had happened.

To further cater to the thrust staging of the one acts, I made some small changes that made a huge impact. First, the focal point of the show is a wooden box that Conrad uses as his "cubicle/work station". Before, this box would face the front part of the audience, leaving Conrad fully exposed to them, while only giving the side audience his profile. To add in some sorely needed diagonals, I turned the box a little bit to create a diamond. Now, Conrad can still use the sides of the box, but this way he's always at a diagonal, which exposes him to more of the audience. Conrad will still need to practice using the box this way, because I noticed in rehearsal that he still liked to face the front audience. I'm thinking wooden spikes on the corners of the boxes.

I also gave the direction to always move with a point A and a point B. For example, when Sheighla enters as Cecil, she should move in one straight direction across the stage. That way, movement is less random and the actors can give themselves a reason why they're moving a certain way. Along with this, I told the actors to always think in diagonals. Their point A & B should always be a diagonal across the stage. After focussing on diagonals, I'm noticing that the actors are really starting to think 3 dimensional, which is going to be extremely beneficial leading up to tech.

Next rehearsal I would like to start taking these staging ideas and codify them in a way that the actors can repeat. Hopefully by the end of this week, we'll be able to run through with out stopping and starting.