It's All Coming Together...

We've been hard at work the last week. The actors are getting off book, we're doing a lot of stopping and starting within scenes, and trying to add makeup/costumes/set pieces to run throughs. It's all been very informative. Whenever we add something, new challenges spring up that we have to deal with. All part of the process.

This particular show is unique in that the playwright, Rajiv Joseph, prescribes that all scene/costume/makeup changes be done in full view of the audience. And as you might guess from the title of the play, the makeup is quite a handful. When we did our initial read-through, the play's text took only 53 minutes. Now that has inflated a bit as we're taking our time with the character's thoughts/taking our pauses, so we're somewhere around 65 minutes of text. With all of the changes that take place on stage, we're looking at around another 20 minutes.Grand total: around 85 minutes. I assure you, it won't be simply watching two actors change and add makeup as fast as they can in the scene changes. We're approaching this as part of the show, so we're trying to put our own artistic twist on it. This will be a very interesting part of this specific production.

It's easy to let the artistry of a show get lost within the technical aspects. As the clock ticks down to opening (two weeks away!) things can get choppy and just throwing a product up on stage can be the goal. That's not going to be us. We're trying to carefully add the costumes/makeup/set pieces bit by bit so as not to be overwhelmed come the week of the show. The actors have to feel comfortable with these extra aspects...they're running the ENTIRE show! I don't want their mind's to be focused on the changes, when they should be focused on the action of the play.

We're getting really excited here, folks! Two weeks from tonight the lights will come up...we'll be ready! Can't wait for you to see it!