Blogging about this baby is harder than I thought. There's always a bit of mystique in the rehearsal process and artists don't like voyeurs in the early stages - with good reason.
Sometimes we wonder if there's a play in there at all. Sometimes I wonder why I do this to myself. Staring down into the abyss wondering if there's a play in there somewhere. Watching the calendar shrink.
The slow work of trying to make concrete the invisible. Ideas abound, but bodies in space and time catch up slowly. This process of page to stage and back to page again is confounding sometimes.
We had Guy in town two weeks ago. Our lighting designer and production, old mucker from Grahamstown. What were we thinking? When we first planned his visit, we felt sure that the early June was the perfect time. We'd have enough to show him by then, and we'd still have enough time to polish before the festival. Gulp.
We didn't factor in the Wits prac exams and how incredibly fragmenting and time consuming they'd be. So at best we had some cobbled together scenes to show him, from all the material we've been generating. A hilarious "friday night" movement sequence, and this still tentative little narrative... girl travels to Joburg to find what happened to her dead father... meets taxi owner / tour guide megalomaniac... hmmm, but its sketchy at best and needs serious editing.
When we had a run on Wednesday I went home with a rock in my heart. That sinking ooooh noooo feeling. Stayed up late and made some bold cuts, shuffled some scenes around and now its looking stronger.
Its turning into a collage of ghost stories - strange little portraits of Joburg people past and present who's spirits wander the streets and tunnels underneath the streets.
We'll be taking a video clip over the weekend, and if we're brave enough we'll post some here.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment