Not knowing anything about thyroid imbalance

My old friend, HitTail, has been taken over by a new group, and they're now planning on sending out either a daily or weekly email giving the weekly keyword suggestions which I'll then use in my blog.   I'm not sure what these are based on, but this week's email has as its suggestions:

the mousetrap study guide
sequoia cunningham dunedin
people wear ties

These are a slightly curious bunch: out of the three only the first brings up this blog on the first page of Google's search results.  The other two don't show the Random Notes up at all.   If I put in skinny ties, however, I come up number three on the results (as does the image on the right).   If I put in Sequoia Cunningham (without Dunedin), however, the first result brings up a video called A Severely Exhausting eXercise which was co-directed by a young man I worked with in the play, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, back in 2008.  Sequoia is also featured in it.   Thus the coincidences of the Internet.


I have written about all three items, (the Mousetrap one got its own post, almost entirely), but not to the extent that they'd seem to be items that would necessarily attract readers to my blog.  It's almost as if I wrote about thyroid imbalance and suddenly people started flocking here.  Don't think it's going to happen, but you never know. 


Talking of which (thyroid imbalance, I mean) I've only ever come across one person who had some issue in this area, although I think it's not uncommon.   I worked with this lady in the three years before I retired, and she'd had issues with it (alleviated by medication) for many years.   But that's about the sum total of my knowledge of TI. 

Still, if thyroid imbalance shows up next week in the HitTail stats, I'll be pleased...and surprised!

Goodbye Marley, Goodbye Fezziwig!

Today's matinee performance of The Christmas Carol brought the season to a close. The audience was the largest of those we performed to (apart from the two school performances) and it was good to feel that the house didn't have lots of large empty spaces in it.

Unfortunately Habitat for Humanity, for whom we were fundraising by putting on the show, probably won't do very well financially out of it. However, their view is that it raises their profile further (as did our connection with them with The Diary of Anne Frank) and that's good for them in itself.

Within an hour of the performance finishing, the set was already in a state of deconstruction, props were being loaded into cars, and it was as if the show had never existed. Such is the nature of theatre, of course. But another feature of theatre which is always intriguing is what the audience doesn't see.

When you go to a play or musical or any other piece of theatre, as an audience member, your focus is almost entirely on what you see on the stage. What exists beyond is seldom thought about. The set and the actors are 'real' for you for the time being, but of course they're not in the least bit real for the actors.

Standing backstage you will see the person who's just come off in tears laughing at some whispered joke made by another actor. You will see two stagehands kneeling on the floor, on either side of the french windows, ready to pull the doors open as one of the Ghosts walks back through it. (The effect for the audience is magic; the reality is a lot more prosaic.)

You will see me bounding down the stairs after a serious scene as Marley's Ghost, tearing off his costume, racing up to the make-up girl, wiping off all the carefully applied talcum powder, having my face made up for a second time - this time as Fezziwig with bright pink cheeks - while the wardrobe lady helps me into my multi-buttoned waistcoat, ties a long blue tie around my neck, helps me on with my coat, and sends me pounding back up the stairs again to the stage where, breathing a little heavily, I wait to turn into a character who couldn't be more different from the bitter and twisted Ghost.

You will see the eight-foot high Ghost of Christmas Future backing out through a revolving door, taking a couple of cautious steps to turn himself to the left (otherwise he will walk straight onto the head of the prompt) and then, all scariness gone, being helped down two or three behind-the-set steps supported by the arms of a stagehand, without whom he would likely take a very serious tumble. You will see the same stagehand hoisting up Tiny Tim onto Bob Cratchit's shoulders: after several failed but hilarious attempts during rehearsal to do it on his own this was the only speedy way to get the child up there.

You might also see the fire warden wandering his regular route through the building during the show; he is probably the only real safety aspect available. It's not that safety products are unknown in amateur theatre (or in professional, if it comes to that) but they're few and far between. And accidents do happen. In this show we managed to get through with no more than a single skinned knee (another one of the Ghosts); in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader we had chips and bruises and cuts galore - some plays are more dangerous than others!

Goodbye to Narnia, until next time

Narnia has been left behind finally, for this year. This brings both a sense of relief and sadness. After several weeks of intensive rehearsal, and nine performances, we’ve probably given it as much energy as any show can take – from an amateur troupe. But it’s still sad to see the set dismantled, and the props put away, and the costumes lying in piles. For a time the theatre becomes our second home, so we’ll miss that too, in spite of the fact that the facilities aren’t exactly A grade. Nevertheless, the Mayfair is the only theatre in Dunedin that most amateur groups will perform at: it’s a good size, but not over-large (like the Regent) and even though it was built as a picture theatre originally (as far as I’m aware) it has great acoustics, and a sense of place.
I was even more fond of His Majesty’s before they turned it into a nightclub – one of the many disastrous decisions made by various City Council members, back in the 60s and 70s, who appeared to have had little foresight or vision. His Majesty’s had been the home to hundreds of local amateur groups over the years, as well as innumerable touring professional shows. It was a good size, (again not overlarge) and a proper theatre. Its backstage facilities, by today’s standards, probably wouldn’t have been that hot, but the many companies who used it don’t seem to have complained a lot. I remember the rabbit warren of dressing rooms out the back, and the orchestra pit with the names of dozens of musicians scribbled on its walls. There’s been talk of revamping the Mayfair on a number of occasions (the company that owns it just doesn’t have the money to upgrade it) but in spite of it being an asset to the city, it’s surprising how little enthusiasm there is on the part of the City Council to help support it; yet they’ve been hundreds of thousands already on the blasted Stadium with far less support from people, and seem to be intent on spending far more.
Anyway, all in all, The Dawn Treader was a great success – perhaps not financially, but certainly with the audience. Those who came seem to have loved it, and many declared it the best effort yet from the Narnia Production crew. My wife took photos of the play on Friday night at the behest of the director, and until I saw the photos even I hadn’t realised just how good it all looked. There are some scenes in the play that I never see: I hadn’t realised just how the good the costumes looked in those scenes, and how great the art work on the sets was. (I usually have my back to the sets!) But when you can actually step away from being in the play and see it more as a whole, you begin to more appreciate the work other people have done.
We presented about a quarter of an hour of the play at church this morning, at the request of our senior pastor, who discussed some of the themes in the book/play. It was a bit like doing it naked: I didn’t have any makeup on (which was great from my point of view as it meant I didn’t have to have another big clean-up) and we had none of the scenery (it was still down at the theatre) and only some of the props. Nevertheless, the actors managed to rise to the occasion.

In the photo, Edmund, Lucy and Eustace have just arrived soaking wet on the Dawn Treader.

We continue to survive the Dawn Treader

The Narnian performances have been going well this (second) week, with much better houses; even though the bookings were low, the door sales have been high. Ridiculous, but there you go.
There have been the usual share of minor calamities, and my tail has been caught so many times either by someone’s foot or in a piece of scenery that tonight I finally got wise and took to carrying it until I was actually on stage. Seemed to improve things. The poor tail has had a rough time of it, altogether. The seam above it has been opened twice, it’s got a bit of a bend in it, and it’s grown…through being left behind when I’m moving forward.
But the tail is the least of it, though one muddle yesterday involved it. Before Eustace is supposed to ‘swing’ me by the tail, I’m sitting on the barrel minding my own business, and waiting for the tail to be pulled. Last night I felt a tug as usual and stood up, swung round – only to find Eustace hadn’t even got near me….! Don’t ask me what the ‘tug’ was – perhaps the tail moving of its own accord – but it took a bit of recovery to get past that.
Much more spectacular was what happened during the storm scene on Wednesday morning. I climb down from the poop once it’s begun, holding the chess set (with the pieces all blue-tacked on) and usually just waddle my way round the crew who are going in all directions. This time, however, something tripped me up – I thought it was a crew member, but the director thinks it was the ‘mast’ for the sail. Whatever, I went flat on my face, banging onto my left knee and making it feel as though I’d bust something in it. Absolute agony – well, I have to say that to make the story more interesting. Certainly it was painful, and I think I must have banged my hand at the same time, as my right wrist has been very unhappy today. Some of the chess pieces went flying as well, so various members of the cast were grabbing at them as soon as the curtain closed.
Tonight I managed to get left behind somehow prior to the Rhoop scene, and had to skip on as the curtain was opening. The only problem with that was that I had to do it ‘off’ the boat. Reepicheep had apparently been off for a little swim…
Amazingly the set has survived the season: the poop creaks and groans worse than a real ship, but survives having more than half the cast (of 19) on it at one time during the sea monster scene. It isn’t pleasant to be inside it when people are walking about on it; it sounds as though something’s going to give. The prow hasn’t fallen over, even though it’s not exactly the most stable piece of scenery ever produced, and none of the triangles have gone over either. Last year, apparently, my son (who was in the play) knocked over one of the triangles. At some ten feet tall or more they ain’t a small thing to come crashing down.

Photo is of the poop deck.

Narnia and some more bruises

Found it hard getting back into Narnia again after a two-day break. I already felt a bit under par, and by the time I'd had my tail caught in the poop deck's back doors, had it stood on later in the second act (undoing the seam again), and fallen over, flat on my face, in the storm scene (scattering chess pieces across the stage in the process) I was beginning to feel it wasn't quite my day. In the fall I came down with a clump on my left knee, which is of course would be the one that's not feeling the liveliest, and though I don't seem to have done any major damage, it's quite unhappy at the moment. I don't think I'll be adding that particular stunt to the play from here on in.

We had a large audience of schoolchildren, which was good, even though they failed to laugh at any of the real jokes. Instead they laughed at an odd line of Eustace's: There's a strange look on his face. Don't ask me why that struck anyone as funny. Who can understand the nature of audiences? I'm sure someone's done research on it somewhere, as they have done on everything from Electrolux vacuums to how many days of the year the average person sneezes on, but I doubt that they were able to come to any decent conclusions.

Apropos of nothing above, I've just been listening to John Adams' violin concerto again (with the sound turned up - there's no one else home). It's hugely energetic in the two outer movements, though it's not always easy to feel a cohesion between the orchestra and the soloist (Adams says that'ss the way he's written it), and it must be a bit of a nightmare for the soloist to figure out where he is at any time - though admittedly he hardly ever stops playing anyway! The Chaconne is a strange piece, with the constant bass line moving at the 'pace of a glacier' (to quote Adams). The line, however, never moves consistently; as the piece progresses it gets more and more out of sync with itself, and the listener is forever thinking - whoops, they've forgotten to come in. That's part of its charm and design, no doubt, and it adds a curious edginess to the slow movement.

Another Dawn Treader review

Alan Firth, of St John's Anglican Church, has once again written a very favourable review of a Narnia production. Alan has supported the shows since the beginning (I think), not only by attending but also by writing them up for the Church website.
I particularly liked this paragraph in the review:
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, scripted and directed by Erina Caradus, is structured almost like a cinema film, with rapid cuts between scenes but no breaks in the action. The set design and stage management is complex and very effective. Fine painted backdrops set the scene on many of the islands, while a mobile and versatile Dawn Treader set fills much of the stage for the shipboard scenes. (The ship's crew double as stagehands, to the extent that handling the ship is sometimes indistinguishable from handling the scenery.)

It just occurs to me that Eustace says at one point, 'I bet there isn't any tax here'. He's such a fussy character, going on about British Consuls, and depositions and other such nonsense. Yet the one thing he never mentions is his lack of a passport...curious that!

Narnia reviewed

While trying to see if the review of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader was in the Otago Daily Times online, I found the short article and photo that we've all been waiting to turn up in the newspaper. The lack of this piece in the newspaper has been a bit of a sore point with us, as it would have helped with the advertising. As it was, the review took two days to get in, and then was not quite buried in an obscure part of the Saturday paper.
Anyway, I can't quite figure out how to copy the original version of the review and still make it readable, so here's what it said:

Painstaking Presentation
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
Mayfair Theatre
Sept 18, 2008
Barbara Frame

That huge dedication has gone into Dunedin City Baptist's Productions' presentation of C S Lewis' classic is evident. The detailed sets, props and costumes have been meticulously designed and constructed. Music and lighting have been selected with care, and the performances are clearly the result of painstaking rehearsal.
The story is a fantastic one: Lucy and Edmund, well known to Narnia fans, find themselves obliged to spend a long summer with their disagreeable cousin, Eustace. An argument about the merits of a painting suddenly propels them into another world, where they are reunited with their friends Aslan and Caspian, and during the course of the voyage to the end of the world they find out a great deal about themselves and the nature of existence.
Everyone in the large cast does a good job. Matthew Scadden, as Eustace, convincingly goes from nasty to nice-ish after a harrowing spell as a dragon, Dara Caradus is a confident and radiant Lucy, and Mike Crowl occasionally steals the show as Reepicheep, the pugnaciously noble giant mouse.
A good pace, co-ordination, and indeed just plain hard work are much in evidence. Erina Caradus' adaptation of the children's novel tidily condenses many adventures into two hours, and a great deal of thought has gone into every aspect of the production.
About 100 people attended last night. This is a great entertainment for families.

There was some quibble amongst our lot about the use of the word 'painstaking.' I thought it was complimentary, but some felt it emphasied 'pain' too much (!).
I met Barbara, who's someone I've known for about twenty years (she's a librarian), in the supermarket the day the review came out. I told her that I'd intended to steal all the scenes, but she said she felt she had to mention at least some of the younger ones (!).
We think there were rather more than a 100 people present on the Thursday night: the theatre was at least half full, and it holds around 400.
Nevertheless, it was a very positive review, and gratefully received!

More on the Dawn Treader

I’d never enjoyed the book, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, as much as some of the other Narnia stories, but working on it as a play has made some its values clearer. Nevertheless, the episodic nature of the story isn’t easy to overcome, and the curious way Eustace is redeemed long before the ending makes that part of the book seem less important than it is.
Alongside this part of the story is the quest for the seven lords, and Reepicheep’s desire to get to the ‘utter East’. These three are mixed together in a way that perhaps isn’t totally satisfactory; in other words none of them is quite important enough of its own, or rather none of the three is stronger than the others. Even Eustace’s change of character after meeting Aslan isn’t given the prominence it might deserve. I’m not sure what the point of finding the seven lords is, apart from its being a hinge to hang the story on - or as my wife suggests, a story about finding ‘that which was lost.
However, the audiences seem to find the play works for them, and perhaps I’m unusual in not enjoying the story as much as some of the others.

In general the play's gone well since opening night, although the houses haven't been too good. Seemingly the houses for Ruddygore and Cats weren't good either. Perhaps it's the economic climate, or maybe the large number of shows on at present; or perhaps the upcoming Arts Festival has already chewed up the 'discretionary' income...

Dawn Treader on a roll

First evening performance of Dawn Treader, and a much more responsive audience. Although the place was full only in the centre section, the audience was involved and heard the humour and laughed and did all the right sort of things audiences should do. Which encouraged the cast greatly. So confidence has been restored for everyone: the director’s very happy and the cast feel affirmed. Great!
Everything on the technical side went pretty well except for two incidents that were out of the control of anyone: a curtain got stuck on one of the triangles when it was being moved, and held up the show, and then in the second act, the front tab just wouldn’t open, no matter how hard the bloke on the curtain tried. We were seriously considering options when it suddenly came loose and things came back to normal.

The Voyage begins

First performance of The Dawn Treader this morning in front of a fairly quiet audience of school children. They laughed at a couple of things early in the piece, and then seemed not to get much humour out of it after that, which was a bit of a surprise. I think a lot of the humour is geared at adult understanding of language and such, and may have gone over their heads. Or they may just have enjoyed it all in a quiet way!
Don’t know what they thought of the five and a half foot mouse, except that the applause at the end was okay (he’s described as being two foot tall in the book). You can see photos of an actor called Warwick Davis playing Reepicheep (in the tv series) - he's closer to the right size, though I think I prefer my costume to his. That one looks all-enclosing and rather too fluffy to my mind. Warwick Davis also played the Goblin bank teller in the first Harry Potter movie.
In general the actual performance today went well, but it’ll be interesting to see how it goes in front of an older audience.
No major disasters, which was a relief, and all the scenery managed to get into the right place at pretty much the right time without hold-ups. Eustace was left burbling on a bit at one point, but not for long, and one of the ancient sea captains didn’t make it on stage for his couple of lines, so the other two captains covered for him. (He has to make a very quick costume change, and just didn’t get there.)
I sat down this morning about seven o’clock and wrote out a resume of the scenes, just to get them better into my head. Apparently everyone is having the same trouble trying to remember what comes next at certain points in the play – it probably differs for everyone, and may even differ from day to day. Yesterday, for example, I managed to miss getting on in time for the ‘water’ scene, having got left holding the chess board (and blue-tacked-on pieces) and finding nowhere to put it down, or no one to give it to. It’s not been a scene I’ve missed before.
We’re still making changes to the thing: the director has just rung me up to say we’re getting rid of the ‘waterfall’ – it’s only on for about thirty seconds (if that) and it causes a need to shift the infamous poop deck out of the way yet again, and then put it back. For the sake of some quiet at a moment that needs quiet, we’ve made alternative arrangements for Reepicheep’s departure from the play.
It’s amazing how insecure even amateur actors get. If we don’t get feedback we think we’ve done badly, even when we know in ourselves that we haven’t. It must be something to do with putting yourself out there in a vulnerable way; you’re kind of opening yourself up to the public, making a kind of fool of yourself. And if you don’t feel as though anyone’s thought it was all okay, you immediately drop into some ‘I’m terribly insecure hole.’ Well, I guess you have to just run with that, and keep on pluggin on!

The photograph is of Reepicheep (holding his tail for some reason - maybe to display it to the photographer). Taken this morning while he was offstage for a few minutes.

Just about there for the Dawn Treader

Well, we’ve now had two Narnia dress rehearsals, and virtually ironed out all the problems. The long Sunday rehearsal helped in this regard, but there are still a few issues. Shifting the poop deck is often a bit of a pain: like any heavy object it takes a bit of getting started, but glides smoothly once it’s going. And getting it in the right spot is another difficulty. However, that’s coming right.
And some of the scenes in front of the front tab are just a fraction too short for the backstage people to set up for the next scene. However, even that’s coming together. Hopefully by this tomorrow I’ll be able to say that it’s all gone smoothly. We play in front of one of our few school audiences tomorrow, and I imagine they’ll be very forgiving!
It’s interesting, now that we’ve been inside the play for so long, that it’s very hard to gauge how it’s really going to go across to an audience. But that’s often the case with this stage of a production. And it’s easy to lose confidence. Hopefully the first audience will restore things in this regard.
I had my makeup on again tonight. It’s a fair facial covering: grey undercoat with stipple on top, plus lots of detail. Took about half an hour to get it on tonight, but hopefully the artist will have it a bit more sussed tomorrow.

Long Narnia rehearsal

Yesterday I got into my Reepicheep costume at one p.m. and didn’t get out again till eight. Fortunately, even though it was a lovely day outside, it wasn’t hot in the theatre, so I wasn’t that uncomfortable – though I did pull the hood back off my head whenever there was a chance.
Rather than it being a rehearsal where we aimed for a straight run-through, we stopped at every scene change to make sure all the cast and crew knew what was happening with the scenery and such – and then often practised this again more than once. In several instances we made adjustments to the way things run, for expediency’s sake; it’s just too late to start adding bits to the script to cover scene changes.
It was rather frustrating in terms of keeping up the energy for the acting, but hopefully it’s solved all the problems we’ve had with the ship and the ‘triangles’ (as the large sets are called: they’re triangular-shaped constructions with a different piece of the scenery on each side; and this year they had additional flaps so that fewer of them have to be used. Complex!)
A lot of the cast were in their costumes, so that side of things was beginning to come together as well, and most of the props and additional bits for various scenes (such as the treasure cave) are starting to appear as required. It seems an enormously detailed show, now that we’re right in the thick of things. Obviously the acting side of it is the least complicated! My coracle is now virtually complete; instead of being a skeleton of a boat with troublesome wheel castors that won’t move easily, it’s got a ‘skin’ on it, and flows along with barely any effort on my part. Fortunately I’m not in it for long, as it’s quite wearing on the legs!
I was very tired at the beginning of the rehearsal, for some reason, and it took a long time to feel as though I was thoroughly ‘with it’, but it often seems that I have more energy in the midst of performing than I have when I finally stop. Suddenly I become an old man again! (Okay, 63 may not be super old, but it’s a time when the body’s starting to feel the strain of having been up and running for a good long time.)

Couple of footnotes

Forgot to say that after today's rehearsal I was one of the guinea pigs for the make-up artists, who were having a training session. Unfortunately, you might say, because I'm an animal in this play, my make-up isn't going to be straightforward. I came home eventually about three o'clock (the rehearsal had finished at one) after having had my face covered in grey makeup, along with various pinks and whites and blacks. I'd washed off the worst at the theatre, but needed a good soaking to get the rest of it out of my beard.
Can't say the idea of this process is grabbing greatly - but the makeup did look effective when they finally got through with me!

Recorded Woody Allen's Melinda Melinda last night, and watched it this afternoon when I was too tired to do anything else. Talk about inconsequential. It has a bunch of four unnamed characters talking about an incident in which a woman walked uninvited into a dinner party. One writer thinks of it in tragedy terms, the other as a comedy, and we get to see both their versions on and off through the movie. But neither version goes anywhere; the connections between the two stories are random; characters leave husbands and wives with a fair amount of speed; the woman in the comedy version manages to wind up with Will Ferrall (playing Woody Allen, basically) and suddenly the movie stops. We see no resolution to any of the stories, and the ending of the tragic version is cut off as abruptly as the movie itself. Bit of a fizzer, really.

Two rehearsals

On one hand Narnia is hotting up in terms of more rehearsals, and getting closer to the opening night, while on the other hand all the work on the acting side is struggling to survive against the necessities of sorting out all the technical logistics jobs. And being a Narnian production, the technical aspects are considerable: frequent lighting changes, music and sound effects and voice-overs. But over and above this is the complexity of the scene changes, which in this production are made more difficult by having to shift the Dawn Treader around the stage – constantly.
Often it’s the script in a production that gets cut; today it was some of the scenery. Parts of the boat are just so unwieldy at speed that they’re going to go. This will truncate it a bit, but better that than having people getting steamed up backstage because the thing is just so awkward.
Last night we had a straight tech rehearsal without lines; the problem with these is that the actors lose interest after a while and starting playing up. Not seriously, but concentration becomes an issue. Today we had a proper rehearsal, but with all the scene changes incorporated. Oh, dear. It’s the sort of rehearsal that makes you want to go out and refund the ticket money. Well, it would if you didn’t keep a positive attitude. Fortunately the backstage people are, for the most part, fairly equable characters. They don’t need to be temperamental like the actors (!). However, it must be said that the actors were pretty well behaved too, all things considered, and in spite of injuries…
Firstly Caspian tripped up the poop deck stairs and took some skin off his knee – enough to have him dropping blood all over the stage. Secondly, Eustace, who, you might remember, have a bit of his forehead skinned the other night with Caspian’s sword, twisted his foot while running below the stage from one side of the other. And then, right towards the end, as I was being lifted up out of the ‘water’ – after Reepicheep has inadvertently gone overboard – I gave my shin a sharp enough knock against the side of the boat to give it a nasty graze, something that shouldn’t happen again, as that part of the boat is due for removal.
So all in all, a tough rehearsal today. Another long one tomorrow, and then the dress rehearsal. Fortunately there’s a night between the dress and the first performance. That may give those who need it, time to sort out all the last minute details – the ones that seem to be accumulating by the hour!

Nearly Narnia

From today we don't leave Narnia until sometime in the week after next, when we have a couple of days' break from performances. We had a run-through for (most of) the principals on Wednesday; it was a bit chaotic, because we were back to not having the boat to perform on. (We were rehearsing in the Green Room at the Mayfair.) The young ones got a bit out of hand at times, including one moment when Caspian managed to hit Eustace on the head with his sword (purely accidental) and nick a piece of his forehead. No one noticed the blood for a half a minute.... Tonight we have a walk-through with the technical people; I imagine it'll go as these sort of rehearsals usually go: slowly and awkwardly and frustratingly. But it's a necessary process. The boat is starting to look more authentic, particularly the poop, which looked the outside deck of someone's house, as someone put it.

We continue on with The Dawn Treader

Another Dawn Treader rehearsal today. I was tired when I arrived, and much more tired by the time we finished. It hadn’t helped that I’d stayed up watching The Red Shoes until 1.30 am, but even when I did go to bed I slept very fitfully, and felt as though I’d been more awake during the night than asleep.
I sometimes wonder if actors aren’t mostly introverts: they appear to be extroverts because they get up in front of people and perform, and they’re often quite noisy at social occasions. But in a rehearsal setting they swing widely from putting themselves on the line in terms of their part to looking like hurt children when the director chides them in some way. And as hurt children all that energy and life can fizzle away in a moment.
I said in an earlier post how each time you begin the rehearsal period for a play you have to overcome that feeling of inferiority in regard to the other actors (who are probably doing the same) and you have to build up a sufficient level of trust in each other to be able to do what can often be quite daft things – especially if your character is in any way ‘out there’.
Acting is a bit like a bloke wearing an engagement ring: being regarded as slightly odd goes with the territory.
Anyway, today at our rehearsal we used a different room. We’re rehearsing in the old King Edward Technical College building right in town (it’s now called King Edward Court) and have been using a large corner room in which the Dawn Treader ship fits (even if our heads virtually touch the ceiling when we’re standing on the poop deck, or where someone incautious can knock their head on a fluorescent lamp swinging from the ceiling). Today we worked in an even larger room, full of sunlight, some carpet around the perimeter (which reduced the level of echo - the other room is very echoey), and a general feeling of plenty of space. We were working on scenes that don’t require the ship, and discovered that nearly all these scenes were ones we’d done two to three weeks ago, and hadn’t really worked on since to the extent that we felt at home in them. So the afternoon was a series of disappointments not only for the director, as she saw all her hard work seeming to crumble, but for the actors, who probably mostly felt as dispirited as I did, because we seemed to be forgetting lines and moves left, right and centre. We came away feeling as though we’d all been sacked from the wine of the month club.
However, now that we’ve got ourselves back into these scenes, we’ll hopefully cement them into our psyches a bit more, and the next time we come back to them, things might be a bit more cheerful!

The photo is of the Stuart St frontage of KE Court; it's a vast building that extends over a good deal of the block.

Narnia again

Another long Narnia rehearsal today, with a lot of time at the end spent trying to get the movements of the ship right. Because we change the audience’s point of view of the ship from scene to scene, it has to be moved around the stage. At the moment it’s only the actors doing this, although in due course hopefully there’ll also be some stage hands.
There are a couple of issues: remembering which way it has to be turned, and what has to be moved out of the way, for one; and getting all the right bits and pieces picked up or shifted out of the way for another.
There are some twenty or more people involved at any time, some of whom have got to get to another part of the ship and some of whom have to move things. All in all it’s taking quite a bit of co-ordination. Without this complication, we’d probably have more time to rehearse everything else! However, it’s an essential part of the play, and has to be worked out thoroughly.
We’ve just about covered all the play – I think there’s only one or two small scenes right at the end that haven’t actually had any rehearsal time. But since they only involve the main characters rather than the people who play pirates, sailors, dufflepuds and ‘crowd’, it should be a bit easier to get them sorted in the next rehearsal. Once they’re done, we should be able to concentrate on getting everything really tight and tidy. We went back and did some of the earlier scenes again today, since they involved the ship, and it was a relief to find we still remembered what to do and say…!

Twin still dying

I've been reading through the latest draft of my novel, My Twin is Dying, again, as I think I mentioned the other day. I've been pleasantly surprised, and, apart from correcting a few proofreading errors and tidying up a few odd sentences that didn't quite work, it's been easy on the editing. I think that's because basically the chapter I'm up to at the moment, and those preceding it, have all been thoroughly gone over several times. I'm still to come to the sections that haven't really had a good sorting out. And of course, the ending is nowhere near sorted: that's been one of the bugbears of the book as a whole. I know what I want to do at the end, but I just can't seem to get it all to work together. It needs to have things working out logically for the climax not to seem over the top, and at the moment, they're all a bit forced.
I've also begun the 'variations' movement of the string quartet I've been writing on and off for some months. The opening section seems fine - or it did when I first re-listened to it (!) - but the first variation isn't working at all well, so it might be time to abandon that and try something different.
On top of this I'm trying to memorise the rest of the lines for the play. For some reason my character suddenly starts spouting forth more than he does in a while towards the end of the play. So instead of popping an occasional line into a scene, suddenly I'm having real conversations.
I've just checked out HitTail, and find that Anna Leese soprano flower named after has turned up as a search phrase. Could it be because that's the current question on the Concert program's weekly quiz? I think it might just be! I didn't know what the flower in question was when I heard the quiz, but I suspected it might be a rose, and it turns out I'm right. Curiously enough, the phrase the other searcher put in didn't help them to find this out!
Here's the gen: The Anna Leese rose (WEKscemala), was bred by Tom Carruth of Weeks Roses, California, USA. It has blooms of an eye-catching combination of orange red suffused with apricot yellow, set off against mahogany red new growth. A bushy grower to one metre high. Bred from Scentimental x Amalia.
Sounds delightful, as of course Ms Leese herself does...!

Update on Narnia and the Dawn Treader

Yesterday (Saturday) the Narnians had their first taste of working on the Dawn Treader itself. The ship is still in a rather primitive state, but at least we could go in and out of the cabin door, climb up onto the poop deck (which took us within inches of the rehearsal room’s ceiling) and feel as though we were getting the sense of our eventual surroundings for when we go on stage.
The poop deck is well above head height, so there’s a ladder of about eight steps to get up to it. We’re told by the builder that it will take 10-15 people without problem (rather like those lifts where they tell you so many kilos or so many people – you always wonder why telling you how many kilos the lift will carry is of any use), but even having a few people up there feels uncomfortably crowded (at least it did to me) and there’s a sense that the railing around the poop isn’t really secure enough to hold anyone in an emergency. It’s going to be strengthened, thank goodness.
And standing on it while it's being moved is a bit too exciting for my fractured nerves, but I guess I'll get used to it!
We’re now just about towards the end of the play, in terms of blocking out scenes, and it’s noticeable that my character, Reepicheep, gets more vocal as time goes on. Of course, the end of the play almost belongs to him (okay, give or take a couple of other important characters), and there’s that thrill of reaching the ‘end of the world’ and the sweet, sweet water that isn’t salty to the taste, and various other aspects that he’s been waiting for all his life.
And today, five of us went out to have publicity shots done, which meant traipsing around by the area in front of the St Clair Salt Water Pool while we got organised, and some people got their costumes on (the guys modestly getting untrousered and trousered in our car). I’d already been dressed since just after church this morning, because I was also made up: a kind of intermediate, experimental make-up, but it looked okay.
We went around to the back beach, beyond the Pool, getting odd looks and comments from various passers-by, and finally had the photos taken right along the end, where the cliffs rise up behind you, and the sea storms away below. It’s a wonderful spot, and the day was blissfully sunny (after what seems like weeks of rain and cold). Erina, our director, said it’s strange how actors tend to be shy in public. None of us, initially, was enthused about walking in public in our costumes, whereas we’d all be much more comfortable on stage. We like to keep our audience at a bit of a distance. On the other, hand, once you get used to the idea of looking daft in public, you just go with it, and none of us was that embarrassed.

Photo courtesy of Brett, from his Picasa album: Flatting in Dunedin

Rehearsal Progress

For some weeks we’ve mostly been rehearsing scenes from the first act of Voyage of the Dawn Treader with just the main characters. That meant that in general there were no more than seven of us around at any time. Today we added in the ship’s crew, and suddenly just under twenty people are all trying to occupy the same space.

Most of today was spent on getting the ‘crew’ into their right places for the half a dozen scenes they’re in. Fortunately one of the cast has some nautical experience and can suggest what different people would be doing, but it’s obviously quite a task to find reasonable things for that many people to do for several scenes.

The ship has been built, though not decorated as yet. We’ve yet to find a workspace where the ship, the ‘triangles’ (multi-purpose triangles that can be set for different scenes) and the actors can all come together to rehearse. Several places that were possibilities have fallen through, but there are still some options left open. Let’s hope we can get into one of them soon!