The play's the thing

After the theatrical one-upmanship and costume selection, the day came for the performance of our rehearsed reading.

Arriving as instructed at 11am for further run throughs, I was a little perturbed to find only myself and the writer/director there. A few minutes later, Shakespearean Actor arrived, and we went through into the studio, where props and costumes were being gathered. When I looked at some of the items, I knew I was right about my costume.

Eventually the others turned up, apart from Opera Man, who couldn’t be contacted, so the first play had to be run through with the writer playing his part.

By the end of a pretty slow run through, it was nearly 1pm, and we had to perform at 2.30pm. I knew the play that needed the most work was the second piece, and yet we hadn’t touched it. Just as we were working out how we could cast around our absent player, Opera Man walked in, unapologetic.

After quickly dashing across the stage of the main house to get changed in the green room, we started a run of the second play. The writer had supposedly worked through the entrance and exit problems from last week, but it still wasn’t very clear, so we sorted things out for ourselves.

Despite all the issues, with costume, lights, and a professional theatre space, I was loving it. We didn’t manage a full run, though, before we had to stop to let the audience in.

As we waited, we stood on the stage of the main theatre, looking out into that auditorium. It holds such memories for me, as I did my first real performances there. It feels as though you can reach the whole of the space from the stage. Shakespearean Actor felt the need to give us a bit of his Leontes, but I was happy just to drink in the atmosphere, smiling at K about shared memories.

Back to reality, they performed the first piece, but I didn’t go and watch, as I’d just seen it. After the interval, I was on.

It seemed to go pretty well, apparently better than the first one, but you couldn’t really appreciate the humour unless you really knew your Chekov. I felt I played my part as well as I could in the circumstances, and actually managed to cry when needed*.

Afterwards, as with all good theatre, a few of us adjourned to the pub, to talk about acting. After all my concerns the previous week, it was actually really enjoyable.

I think I’ve got my taste for acting back.

*Really, she was a bit of a drip!