Theatre Ventoux

THE CONCEIT
Ever stop to wonder what a play’s characters do when they are not being acted? The obvious response would be “Of course not. They aren’t real. They’re fictions, a writer’s creations that only exist when given life by an actor.” This is a perfectly logical, rational, and, frankly, pedestrian view.

However, this is the Theatre, a world, at its finest, most illogical, most irrational, and most un-pedestrian. So let us suppose for a moment that a playwright’s characters have some semblance of life outside of the acting of them. Let us suppose that they exist in a sort of half-life, drifting as disembodied wisps of possibility. How do you think they would feel? What thoughts would permeate their semi-sentient consciousnesses? What would they want? What would they…hunger for? Why an actor to act them, of course; an actor to birth them, if only briefly, into the world of light and sound and sensation and existence.

And, given this scenario, what do you think they might do if no actor was forthcoming? Would they be content to merely drift about, waiting patiently for some actor to remember them and call upon them? Or might they, just might they, seek out tangible form? Might they search out those whose consciousness slips easily back and forth across the boundaries of so-called reality? And might they do this with a ferocity, an exuberance, a passion that cannot be denied?

Of course not. They’re just words, words on a page. Like these words. Like these words that you are reading right now. My words…slipping seamlessly into your mind…snuggling in all warm and happy…finding a home…a life. Just thoughts…thoughts in my mind…in your mind. How delightfully, how deliciously wonderful!

THE EXPOSITION
Welcome to the dayroom at Parkview Memorial, a treatment facility for the mentally unconcerned, the emotionally uninvolved,and the psychically uncertain. Visitors are most welcome. Most welcome, indeed.

THE ACTION
Dr. Thomas Janecek*– Hamlet’s Ghostly Father (Hamlet)
Mister Ronald Blackwell–King Henry V (Henry V)
Ms. Devon Bailey–Constance (King John)
Mister James Tuck**–King Claudius (Hamlet)
Master Arthur Koster–Shylock (The Merchant of Venice)
Mister David P. Otero–Lord Capulet (Romeo & Juliet)
Miss Suzanne Garcia–Cressida (Troilus & Cressida)
Master Raul Vasquez, Jr.–Mercutio (Romeo and Juliet)
Master Stephen Torres–Antony (Julius Caesar)
Mdme. Lisa Mercier-Taber–Lady Macbeth (Macbeth)
Mister Gregory Taber– A Doctor of Dubious Compassion

*Performing March 4 & 8 only
**Performing March 8 & 9 only

BLESSINGS
With Gratitude for your Grace and Generosity:
Our Families and Friends for letting us Play
Marcel Nunis for Support and Friendship
Loreena McKennitt for the use of “Prologue” from the Quinlan Road recording “The Mask and the Mirror” www.quinlanroad.com

rehearsals are done. the show has become a dark, roiling thing that none of us could have ever conceived of…and it is wonderful
thank you, all
see you at the rogue!!!

I’m impressed! Last night was our “dress rehearsal” for Muse, which opens Friday night.We spent approximately 6 hours in groups reharsal, with an our for each of us individually with Greg; last night was the first time we ran the entire piece and it was a lot darker than any of us expected. Greg wrote the intros for each monologue, which were originally intended to be more tongue-in-cheek; the ones he ended up writing are brilliant (one is taken from a novel-I’m not telling you which so as not to spoil the surprise).

Cutting to the chase, i think we’ve got a worthwhile piece to show the public. The character work we did last week served us all well; I found it remarkably easy to stay in my Parkview character because I had the attitude line to draw on. I felt my monologue was strong in terms of both language and connecting with the audience. That is the most difficult part of doing Shakes, in my opinion: being able to do more than talk pretty. With emotions and relationships and an attitude I was able to convey the depth of my character’s feelings

after much reflection, all i can really say after tonight’s rehearsal is thank you. thank you to the amazing group of people who joined us (both in body and in spirit) at theatre taber for a wonderful, astounding, inspirational, and humbling evening of totally attitude driven bullshit…and some of the finest acting i have ever been privileged to see.

thank you and thank you and thank you.

and a special shout out to marcel and renee for your support…it’s good to know who your friends are. and to mister albritton: thanks for chronicalling the event. we look forward to working together again.

as to the rest….the proof is in the work.

etonne-moi
g

tonight’s rehearsal was devoted entirely to character work. one solid hour of complete and total, full-body physicalization of a character’s emotion core, spine, effort action, image, and attitude line. the intensity was such that i found myself, as director/coach, having to do a step-out to detach from what was happening.

we began with a game of red light, green light to get warmed up and to get the nature full-body involvement squarely seated. from there it was straight into emotion core: the single, central, driving emotional force within a character. lisa’s terrifyingly helpless regret almost brought me to tears and stephen’s rage shimmered like blacktop on a hot summer’s day. spine work opened up some new vistas for a number of people. finding the character’s essential need (beyond the limits of the scene or the play) brought a delicious vulnerability to suzanne that was simply compelling. when we began the effort work, the physical transformations were astounding. from light to heavy, indirect to direct, sustained to sudden, and free to bound the actors ran the gamut of what the body can become. i’ve never seen devon freer, and i thought dave was going to collapse in on himself. then they combined the elements into full effort actions and gave birth to brand new people. with imagery new physicalizations blossomed. i have no idea what the images were that they were using, but i couldn’t take my eyes off jim’s hands except for those moments when i was being drawn into arthur’s subtle, but undeniable, presence. we ended our focus work with attitude line and, once again, the transformations were striking.

the evening finished with a couple of monologue runs. i can’t say much about that for fear of spoiling the surprise…but i can say that ron brought it all to bear and owned the room.

tomorrow is our last official rehearsal: a little warm up, a little play, and then some well deserved and highly anticipated sharing of the work for group response…and then a little wine and a lot of good talk with even better people. and it just struck me that, whatever this show becomes, and we won’t know that until next friday, we’ll have done it all on about four hours of rehearsal.

well whaddya know about that…?

we had our first group rehearsal for muse of fire last night… i am still stunned almost 12 hours later. we’ve worked individually on visualization, fluency, language, relationship, emotion, action and character, and we continued in that vein as a cast yesterday. the dedication to the craft, the commitment to artistic excellence, and the willingness to rush blindly into new territory were palpable. everyone brought their own work to the process and then enagaged this new process of ours as fully as they were capable…and who could ask for more?

tonight we move into specific character work and i’m so looking forward to what emerges.

thank you all (lisa, tom, jim, dave, ron, suzanne, devon, stephen, arthur) for being who you are and for doing what you do.

etonne-moi

g