01.03.12
So, we have one further week in the rehearsal room for The New Electric Ballroom. Both Assistant Directors have contributed on last week’s insights – Jacobie Gray writes the words and Katharine Cullen has provided some special photographs from the rehearsal room.
The tides lapping the edges of our increasingly existential script spilled over into the rehearsal space this week when an excessive down pour and a severely blocked storm water drain caused flooding in our room. Thankfully all props remained dry, apart from a few waterlogged shoes and a drowned 1960’s style microphone… but that could be giving too much away…
Four flights of stairs later and fending off a passer-by with a passion for retro furniture attempting to solicit our set, Michael and I safely deliver The New Electric Ballroom to its new home. A light, airy, hot drama room in the Old Teachers College. Kate tweaks the space, whacks on a fan and we’re away again, continuing to nut-out the complexities of Enda Walsh’s brain.
Thursday saw our first stumble through of the play from beginning to end. I sat on book noting any hiccups in the script and if the actors lacked at all in word perfectness, they certainly made up for it in commitment. With repetition being a key theme of the play, there’s a lot of similar phrasing, enough to drive you crazy really if you were learning the lines, my hat’s off to the brilliant job the actors are doing so far! Drilling, drilling, drilling…
