Thursday, April 1, 2010

My least favorite part of the process

Over the last two nights at rehearsal, we've tackled most of Orsino's scenes in 12th Night. We have a multi-leveled stage with lots of stairs, platforms, and even a fireman's pole. Normally, this sort of things sounds like heaven to me, as I am a performer who usually likes to run, jump, and through himself around the set until he finds a physical choice that jives for the role. In this show, however, we are using those different levels to represent different places of the world of the play; this makes a complete amount of sense, but it also means that my possibilities of movement are severely limited right from the word "go." Those sorts of limitations turn this part of the process from the intriguing experiment-through-imagination into the where-should-I-stand routine, which is much less interesting to me.

This sort of challenge pops up every few shows I work on, and it's one that I haven't yet figured out how to deal with in way that interests me. This overly technical style of acting doesn't engage me as an actor, and I'm still looking for the best solution.

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