July 11, 2008

The second waterlily blooms, the third, still a tightly clenched golden fist, rises from the depths.

Rehearsals for AYLI are inefficient but high spirited. N’s energy and sweetness are almost beyond bounds. He even goes along with it when our gray, lumbering Jacques starts directing– "Could you maybe say that from over there?. . . Could you point as if there were real brook?. . .Could you be a little more energetic in that speech, to motivate my entrance?" I would have stabbed him already, but our director lets it play itself out, and N’s good nature does not flag, and all ends well. Our Rosalind’s impressive grasp of her lines turns out to be attributable to her having done in role in UNCA’s all-girl wild-west version, arguably the worst production of this play in the history of the world. But she is smart and sparkling here, so that debacle was clearly not her fault. If I’m reading the schedule right, at last one of my scenes will never have been rehearsed before first run-through. Oddly, I don’t care.