April 3rd, 2009

Hi Everyone,

I hope everyone had a good rehearsal and has a fun weekend. Our next rehearsal will be on Sunday at 2 in THE SPACE (TF Green). Remember that character bios are due Monday, when we will also be doing stage fighting again.

The most exciting event during warm-ups was today was the slow motion race that lasted about ten minutes. It was really exciting to watch, especially people's victory dances at the end. Congrats to everyone for having a super-long attention span! We then did our first attempt at Three Steps with our eyes closed, and it went pretty well.

The first scene we worked on was Act III Scene II, with the Porter (Jen) reading from the chair, M&M (how I will further denote Macbeth and Lady Macbeth) washing each other on the ground, and the other witches walking on the grid, responding kinesthetically to the Porter's words. Later on, Jen walked on the grid as well and the not-Jen witches interacted. Remember to experiment with levels and bend your knees during these exercises. We continued rehearsing the scene by having M&M wash each other using Jen, and then we concluded with a read through and staging of the scene. It involves Harry and Quyen lying together on the ground while the Porter moves parts of their bodies, and Lady MacDuff acting very weak in front of M&M, but actually being strong.

After that scene we worked on Act III Scene IV. We started staging it as though everyone were sitting on the mini-platform in the space (you will see it on Sunday if you don't know what I'm talking about), and then diverged into playing a game. The game got kind of complicated, so I will summarize the rules here:

* Harry wants to get close to Nick. He can move three steps and then must wait for one ofthe witches (Emma and Quyen) to touch him before taking another three.
* Nick wants to get far away from Harry. He can take five steps and then must wait three seconds before taking another five.
* Olivia wants to get Nick close to Emma and Quyen, and so must drag him to them.
* Emma and Quyen can walk wherever they want, because they are God.
* When Emma and/or Quyen are touching Nick, he cannot move.
* Nick can resist Olivia's touches, but cannot move to get away from her.
* Text overrides everything. If Nick says a line from the scene, he can take ten steps to escape from Olivia, Emma, and/or Quyen. If Olivia says a line from the text, Nick has to go with her.
* Only Emma and Quyen can say whatever they want. Nick and Olivia can speak lines from the text. Harry cannot speak.

Like I said, it's complicated. Finally, we had the witches make Harry a witch during the game. And that's the end of those rehearsal activities. M&M stayed late for character interviews. We went through a lot of information. I don't think all of it's necessary for everyone to know, so I won't write it up here, but let me know if you want to see it. Sufficed to say that Lady Macbeth slept with Duncan and is very contemptuous of Lacy MacDuff who tells her that it was God's will that her child died. Macbeth thinks that Banquo is "too much of a little boy" and wouldn't really trust him leading an army. Something almost happened between Lady Macbeth and Banquo after Banquo's wife died, but apparently it was too awkward for anything to really transpire. I think those are pretty much all the details that relate to other characters in the play. The other detail I like is that Macbeth's nickname on the battlefied is now the "Norweigian Widow Maker".

Again, if you're interested in learning more details, or have any other questions or concerns, feel free to ask.

Thanks,
Carolyn