I'm doing a bit of "live" blogging tonight as I watch tech for The 39 Steps here at the BU Theatre. An invited dress for The Atheist should have just begun over at the Wimberly Theatre. Here's a bit about the last four days.
Saturday (Sept 8)
Final rehearsal in the Huntington Ave rehearsal hall for The 39 Steps. I watched a run through and it was great fun, there are some new bits and references to other Hitchcock classics worked in.
The lights are focused on stage at the BU Theatre.
It is also the final rehearsal in Connecticut for The Atheist. I missed that run but reports are that all is going very well. It's also the travel day - everyone returns to Boston.
Sunday (Sept 9)
The crew starts around 9:30 AM getting ready for today's "Ten out of Twelve" tech rehearsal. That means that we will rehearse for 10 hours over a 12 hour period. Noon to Midnight with a 2 hour dinner break. It's a good days work - we manage to get through about 50 pages of the script (better than 1/3), but not quite up to intermission. We discover a few things that require a bit of re-blocking, take a few notes, have plenty to work to complete. There are a ton of props, hundreds of light cues, many many quick changes, 4 varieties of smoke and fog, and decibels of sound cues. Then add four actors, two stage managers, four deck crew, and four dressers figuring out how not to bump into each other. A recipe for lots of hard work.
The lights are focused for The Atheist and the crew does a few last notes to get the set ready for tech tomorrow. It's a day off for Campbell, Justin and Steve.
Monday
It's a day off for The 39 Steps cast and crew. Scenery, Props and Paints all worked a long day completing some old notes and starting on some new ones.
It's a 10 out of 12 for The Atheist. The technical rehearsal period for this production is much shorter... only about 14 hours before the invited Dress Rehearsal versus about 33 to the same point for The 39 Steps. It is a great day's work, we tech through the whole play once and then run it back through again without stopping. We finish early.
During the breaks I find out why the boys didn't reply to the last few posts with rehearsal stories. It's because the stories are not fit to print. Unless we want to invite a libel suit or perhaps an international incident. Besides - this blog isn't really about scary hotels, B&Bs, golf or politics. Use your imagination. It's also obvious that they did a lot of work in those five days. They were extremely well prepared for tech rehearsals and we would not have made so much progress without their advance work.
Tuesday
Today is our second 10 out of 12 technical rehearsal for The 39 Steps. We pick up where we left off on Sunday and finish the 1st Act in the afternoon session. We may finish the play tonight, but even if we don't we'll have tomorrow to finish up and run through it all again. That will leave Thursday (an 8 out of 10) and Friday to run it a few times to be ready for Friday evening's preview performance. That will be my favorite night of the week. I'll (hopefully) be home before midnight.
Both design teams and all of the staff are doing great work as the shows are looking great!
Meanwhile the scene shop is building Brendan and the stage managers are prepping for rehearsals next week. The painters are working on Streamers and prelim scenic designs for Third are expected any day now.
If you have any questions about what goes on at tech rehearsals or about these shows feel free to ask (use the "Join the conversation" link below) or Check out this glossary for an explanation of just about any theatrical term there is!
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