One Day In..

One day in, and suddenly the need to allocate some of the rehearsal time to the production elements arose. As part of the design, an enormous photograph of Marianne as Mimi will cover the back wall of the stage, complimented by a head-to-toe portrait around a window (the crucial narrative element) stage left. In order to get these pieces ready in time for the show, the photographs had to be taken today, causing a break in the rehearsing and investigating of the text. Adding to the oddness of the day was a caterpillar cake, bought by the stage manager Ellie in honour of Dom’s birthday, who plays Fleet in the play. We couldn’t find a knife anywhere in the building, so after many attempts to behead the caterpillar with the end of a plastic spoon, Dom took charge and marched the cake into the café next door – the home of the cheapest coffees in Kings Cross, and something of a major resource for our rehearsals – and waited as the owner dissected his cake with a ridiculously large, lethal blade.
Giggles began as soon as the first photograph was taken… We were sharing a studio with another company having press shots taken, and their centrepiece was a rather intriguing suitcase with lifelike human legs sticking out of either end. The cast were required to pose in character, before chatting to another casually as the photographer circled them. Very soon, the effort to ignore the bizarre surroundings (combined with too much sugary cake) resulted in a hysterical trio of actors, whose efforts to maintain professionalism only served to heighten their state. This actually proved to be a highly valuable session, not just for obtaining the images needed, but more importantly in giving the actors a chance to bond outside of the work in the rehearsal room. After a bit of fresh air, we returned to the table in the rehearsal room, and dived back in to the complexities and joys of Glyn’s play.

The first day

The first day – actors cast and production team assembled, and we gather at The Poor School in Kings Cross for 2 ½ weeks of rehearsals on Glyn Maxwell’s new play, Mimi And The Stalker. Within the first few minutes, it was already apparent that the actors in the company were completely unique in their working styles, a quality that was sure to help their portrayal of characters whose differences define their relationships. The unifying factor for everyone in the room was the excitement felt towards working on such a lyrical and insipired script – Glyn’s first in prose from what I’ve gathered – and in the initial read-through, the language and skilful use of writing technique enthralled everyone. The trick, as Michael pointed out, was to find a method of giving life to to the lyricism without causing the storytelling or clarity of events to suffer. We began a systematic breakdown of the abstracts within the piece, and found parallels between the narrative and our modern world to aid us. The play focuses on an 18-year old girl who becomes a Hollywood star by being cast as Shakespeare’s Juliet in a new film. It wasn’t hard to find links to celebrities such as Kiera Knightley, Natalie Portman and, of course, Claire Danes – and by discussing their responses to the bright spotlight of fame, we started our journey of understanding Mimi’s.
Scheduled within our text-based first day was a production meet-and-greet, where the passion and dedication of all involved was made immeditately apparent – everyone from Tim and Paul, the artistic directors of theatre503, to Mr. Maxwell himself, expressed their excitement and commitment to making this production as successful as possible. The degree of work necessary was never ignored in the speeches and subsequent conversations, nor was the challenge of putting together such a complex and challenging play within a limited time frame and a fringe environment, but I couldn’t help but notice everyone left the room smiling with anticipation at the project’s future…