A RUN-THROUGH

My granddaughter, Ally, and I attended the rehearsal for "Inherit the Wind" on Wednesday evening, 6/22/10. It was held in one of the rehearsal rooms at Spectrum Theater, part of Grand Rapids Community College.

I had a chance to meet and chat very briefly with some of the cast members. Kitty Slasinski, is playing Mrs. Krebs; Francis Gentile, playing Mrs. McClain. I had met Mary McGuire-Howing earlier. She is playing the part of Mrs. Blair. Mary's son is also cast in the play, and is playing the part of Timmy. Different women with different lives and different reasons for being in theater, and completely enjoyable to watch. The young woman, Clara Osbeck, who plays the part of Rachel Brown, is doing an extraordinary job.

Rehearsals are scheduled so that everybody doesn't have to be there every night, all night, but tonight everyone is scheduled. Things were a little late getting started as the costume woman, Valerie, was there to measure everyone.

The plan was to do a run-through from beginning to end. We left at the end of act 2, but Ally has become a fan. She'll be at opening night. Even an eleven-year-old can appreciate hard work.

The director, Christopher Weaver, was coaching the delivery of lines, and helping them to understand what they, and their audience, should be feeling. He's continuing to tweak the blocking. Joe has said that blocking is ongoing, that it can be changed even after a play has opened. It's challenging, because they are rehearsing in a small room without props.

None of that, however, prevents this group of actors from working hard to get it right. Stage manager, Terri Foley, read the parts of Bert Cates, and the judge, but she works so hard at it, that things move along smoothly even with missing actors. Jim Burr, playing the part of Brady, is still in recovery mode after knee-replacement surgery, but makes the most of a tough situation. He's getting around with a walker on stage, and icing the knee when seated.

For all our Godwin friends--put it on your calendar. Plan on attending! Don't miss it! You'll love watching Joe. He's more than believable as Henry Drummond. It's very clear that he's been working, but more than that, even with the stops and starts we were hanging on his every word.


At right: young man in foreground is Sam Vandersluis, playing Howard Blair, gentleman in center is Jim Burr. Jim is playing Matthew Harrison Brady and is recovering from knee-replacement surgery.









In this photo L to R: Toby Weiner Dolinka, playing the role of Sarah Brady; Bob Rose, playing the part of bailiff, George Meeker; Terri Foley, stage manager; William Handy, playing the Reverand Jeremiah Brown.











Kitty Slasinski, who plays the part of Mrs. Krebs has brought popcorn to share with the members of the cast.

REHEARSAL WITH CAST MEMBERS

The definition of digest is: to obtain information, ideas, or principles from; assimilate mentally; to arrange methodically in the mind; think over,to arrange in convenient or methodical order; to condense, abridge, or summarize.

I spent the evening of June 2 observing the cast of “Inherit The Wind” at their second rehearsal. I’m still digesting it.

As I observed the group of people coming together to rehearse I was taken with what a diverse group they were—young, middle-aged, older, a couple, a student, an entrepreneur, a pastor and his wife (the movie star, the professor and Mary Ann, here on Gilligans Isle).

The room became electric. As the size of the group grew the buzz grew, too. Each person arriving brought their own special something to the group. It was evident as each person arrived they were leaving behind whatever the day had held for them, stresses, exhaustion, busyness. Coming together, there was a comraderie evident among the group. This is local theater. These folks are doing this because it gives them joy, it fulfills a need for them, and it shows. Each actor works to get it right.

On this evening they are working on courtroom dialog. Joe, as Henry Drummond, is grilling Brady. The townspeople are assembled as spectators in the courtroom, and are referred to as the “Greek Chorus.” Director, Christopher Weaver, works with them to help get the level, volume, and rise and fall of their reactions to match, and enhance, the action on the witness stand. Each one makes notes in the margins of “the book” marking what and where their reactions are needed. Christopher directs them like a choir, encouraging, tempering, shushing. He’s excited and clearly communicates his vision.

Joe says that the director is in charge until the performances begin, then the stage manager takes over. In fact, he told about one play where the director went to Chicago on opening night (yikes!). Tonight the part of the judge is being read by stage manager, Terri Foley. She is a woman of many talents, organized, and anticipating the needs of the group. This cast will be in good hands when the performances begin. Terri is also responsible for communicating pertinent information to all of the cast members. I think she must LOVE having email to do this!

I have no way to measure, or compare, but this seems like a successful evening to me. They are not required to be “off book” until July. Seems like Joe is about where he should be for that to be doable. Because at the moment, dialog is sometimes being paraphrased, the cues are hard to catch occassionally, and blocking work is being put off until there is a designer to build the set, but in all, this cast seems well on their way.

Our differences are what make us interesting to one another. The vocation we choose combined with our avocation(s), our relationships, our faith (or lack of), and our history meld each of us into the unique person we become. Even superficially, one can see that this is a cast of interesting, unique and fun people, all doing something they love.

REHEARSING

Joe is currently playing a hobbled actor with a tailbone/rollerblade incident, and a roofing nail into the foot accident. But, the memorization work continues. Act I is pretty much nailed down, and he's working on some of the longer pieces from Act II, which includes the scenes where he goes after Matthew Harrison Brady pretty intensely.

I was curious why he would be jumping around and not just pushing forward learning the lines as they come. Joe says that some passages are less comfortable to articulate than others. They are different in tonality, inflection, and emotion. They require more work to make them feel totally original and totally his. When they're finally right, he can comfortably move on, but not before. When they're done right, he can hear and feel it in their delivery, and then repetition is the key to any measure of confidence.

Joe mentioned something that I wouldn't have considered relative to the learning of lines. He pointed out that we all have a vocabulary which is uniquely ours. We're comfortable with it. We speak it fluently. When you start using unfamiliar words, or combining them in unfamiliar ways, it can feel awkward. That's acting and that is what he does.

Note: 5000 may be the number of words a typical person uses. When it comes to vocabulary, it is important to distinguish between the words someone understands, and the words they actually use. An average adult with English as a first language understands between 50,000 and 250,000 words. Some people with very large vocabularies, such as Winston Churchill, have been estimated to understand up to 400,000 words. Most people actually use about 10% of the words they understand. So a person who understands 50,000 words probably uses about 5,000. Shakespeare used about 29,000 words in his plays & sonnets, so we might estimate that he had a vocabulary of 290,000 words. There are at least 475,000 words in the English language, with some estimates as high as 1,000,000. And there are thousands added every year (Twitter, anyone?). So, there’s a lot to learn. (from Wikipedia)

Joe discussed becoming tongue-tied. It is an actor's bane, and can cause the rhythm and momentum of the moment to be lost. (Think Perry Mason in the midst of one of the cross examination zingers. Stopping to repeat a line wouldn't have been acceptable, and that is why live TV all but died.) Jim Burr is the actor who will be playing the part of Brady. I wondered if the two of them might be rehearsing together outside of the scheduled rehearsals. It turns out that Jim will be taking a little time off to have one of his factory-installed parts replaced. Here's hoping the new knee is better than the original!

Perhaps during recovery and rehab there will be some Brady/Drummond sessions. Joe has promised to stay off the rollerblades until after the performances, which sounds like a wise decision.

There might still be jurors needed. They are nonspeaking roles and will not likely be required to rehearse until the week before the performances, but would be required to be available for all performances. This could be your golden opportunity!

I will be attending a rehearsal tonight, and that will be the subject of my next post.