Physical Session - Creating street scene

Today was a very productive session; I mainly chalk it up to only have a few members of the cast in room. The concentration levels were brilliant and no one was talking instead over our director. This has been a huge problem throughout the rehearsal. There's a generally sentiment that when you are directly being addressed or asked to do something then you can just start chatting. This mentality is detrimental to making strong work; we could be getting notes could unlock a better performance or key things that have to happen to make the play run smoother. So by having a small group of people working together we manage to choreograph the sequence quickly and effectively.

This sequence I took semi-control of creating. It was a lot easier than I thought it was going to be, the key was keeping it simple as possible. The sequence involved knocking into Charlie is he wanders aimlessly through the space until he eventually falls. The female members of the company are then allowed to do a little contact improv with him. This then leads us to walk backwards and Charlie jumping into arms, walking with him leading Olivia into the space; we then control him like a puppet and disperse moving on to the next scripted scene. The sequence is really strong and I feel it communicates the state of Skilling's intoxication and how he's being pushed around by the world. It's so important for this piece of the play to have clarity and still be exciting as it's close to the end and the audience will more than likely be a little tired. This sequence will hopefully wake them back and grab their attention again.

A moment that really stood out for me was the immaculate transition to the prostitute scene. Watching from the side, seeing Charlie follow Olivia off then Chloe take the focus is a moment of theatre magic. The slickness of changeover is what makes it so good; it snaps the audience out of this physical theatre-y world we just set up and brings that back to reality. I believe this will be a very effective moment because of this. To make this sequence even better I feel like we can add more moments of contact improv when we interact with Charlie. This could take the form of some interesting moments of shifting weight or some lifts. This will add an extra dimension of communication and add a further sophisticated layer of body contact that could give Charlie more to work with.

Overall this was a very successful session and am glad we could get a good amount of work done in a small space of time. I hope this focus and concentration can continue into future rehearsals.