Wednesday, February 16, 2011

It's A Question of Trust

I have something to say, and I'm not really sure how to say it without it coming out all wrong.  I am currently in rehearsals for an Oscar Wilde play called An Ideal Husband.  It is a great play, and very well written.  Sometimes the lines are hard to memorize, and the actors in this play are great.  They are doing an excellent job, and working really hard. 
My problem is simply that nobody really talks to each other!  They come, rehearse, leave.  Come rehearse, leave.  It's a phenomenon that I am having trouble dealing with.  This cast hasn't gelled together and become as one.  We are still so uncomfortable with one another.  I don't really know what it is, but nobody ever says much to each other.  Our director doesn't give us notes when we are done either.  Nothing specific any way that would help us other than be louder.  At my last rehearsal, the assistant came up to me and asked why I have never had an English accent.  What?  That's the first I had ever heard of that.  I had a cold that night, and was having a hard time doing one, but she claimed I had never had one the whole time I'd been rehearsing.  Well, that was a load of crap. 
Mabel and Lord Goring kiss in this play.  Last night was the first night we got to rehearse that scene (I came in about a week and half later than everybody else), and he didn't want to kiss me.  I found it quite funny.  He knows I am married, and so I think he is worried about that.  He even said once, "I've never kissed a married woman before."  But come on!  This is a job.  Lord Goring kisses Mabel.  Let's try to create some illusions that those two characters are in love with each other, please!  He also was used to the other Mabel.  She's taller than me.  It was very funny to watch.  Everybody was laughing any way.  I think by the end of the night we started getting it right.  I've just never had a kiss be so uncomfortable before.  The director said, "It could be worse.  I could have you kissing Kolby again."  Kissing Kolby was nothing like this.  He just kissed me, and had no reservations about it.  That made it a lot easier.  If you don't remember, that was when I was in a short play called The Kiss.  I put pictures on my facebook page, but I guess I never did here.  I checked.  Oh, well.  That's not really relevant.
And I don't really believe that Lady Chiltern is in love with her husband either.  When I watch her kiss him, it's just so weird.  Something is wrong with it.  But I think it all comes down to just what I said before.  We don't know each other.  We aren't comfortable with one another, yet, and that is something that is so essential in a cast.  At least between the characters who interact with one another onstage.  We have to trust each other, and know that the other person is going to come through for us.  How can you trust somebody you barely know?  Well, they are actors, so they should at least be pretending to trust each other.  I just don't see that really happening right now.  Did I mention the show opens in two weeks.  Yes, yes, it does.  My only show dates are March 11th & 12, though, so don't get tickets for any other dates. ;)  Go here for ticket information.  I am having fun despite it all, so come and have some fun with us, too.  This play is really quite funny.

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