AYLI, rehearsal 24: MUSIC, PROBLEMS

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When I labeled last night’s rehearsal PROBLEMS, I meant it to be a description, not a prediction.

Oy, what a night:

  • Embree was still sick.

  • Chas got rear-ended on I-285.

  • Garrick was not there because he hasn’t gotten an email since Feb. 14 because somehow I deleted him from my contacts, I guess? Oy.

First, Craig Humphrey gave us the quickest of all drumming lessons; everyone joined in, even though most of us will not be on stage during the scene. It was fun and I hope productive.

The plan for the evening was to loop back and work on the scenes with songs, but since 2.5 (GREENWOOD TREE) and 4.2 (DEAD DEER) are mostly Jaques talking (!), all we could do is work on the music.

5.1 (WILLIAM) went out to the lobby to polish those bits while I worked on 2.1 (OLD DUKE). Mike is beautifully resonant and on point in the Duke’s speeches; Gary is still ramping up as Amiens/First Lord. One thing that he’s working on is introducing us to the as-yet-unseen Jaques by telling the story of Jaques and the deer, through mime and mimickry, both to the audience and to his compeers.

We attempted LOVER & HIS LASS, but the song just wasn’t ready. I sent them to the lobby to work on it. Then, because I had attached Meranda (as LeBeau) and Chuck (Oliver) to LOVER & HIS LASS, I couldn’t work either WILLIAM or GOOD OLIVER.

Oy.

So while we waited, Amanda got to try out the wireless mic — thanks, Chaz! — for Touchstone’s standup bits. It is an egregious assault on the fabric of the text, but it is actually very funny. (I need to find all the sound effects for Touchstone’s shtick.)

“It’ll be fine” is my running gag for Placement for the burn. You’re going to be seeing a lot of these memes.

“It’ll be fine” is my running gag for Placement for the burn. You’re going to be seeing a lot of these memes.

I snagged Meranda and we ran through WILLIAM; still some clean-up to do on the slapstick, but it’s working.

Finally I sent everyone home but Mariel and Chuck home and we ran through Oliver’s section of 4.3 (GOOD OLIVER). This is not a scene I am particularly worried about.

So, in sum, the evening was a shambles, not at all the tightly organized work session I had envisioned. But the cast did not slack, and we got some real work done. Thank you, cast.