Beginnings

Four shows completed and it's safe to say that we're off!

Let me see, let me see...Show One was at King's Ely school on Monday night and as I write to you now it's Friday morning. So much seems to have passed three or so days!

Right. Our opening performance. It's always a big step to welcome an audience to your play. We cocoon ourselves away for weeks in a rehearsal room; doing our utmost to understand our story, whilst working out how to tell it as clearly as possible; with truth and impact, whilst, being a comedy; seeing how to squeeze out every drop of funny juice.

Ollo treading board as Viola

Sure, we've been making each other laugh, and we can trust our director's steerage towards our goals? The acid test will always be conducted by the audience. We rise or fall on their sword. In their reactions (or lack of reactions) we learn (and must quickly adapt) what we have.

This learning curve is even steeper in open air theatre (compared to conventional indoor)...where we have to contend with a host of peculiar obstacles. For instance, being heard above nature or man-made noise.

Meeting this particular demand has been a challenge for me in this past week. I play a woman, and moreover a delicate, young noblewoman who is in mourning for her brother before falling madly in love. In the rehearsal room I found a certain degree of size that seemed appropriate to my character's journey.

Reaching for the necessary degree of vocal and physical size in the outdoor space has been a sort of messy juggling act. Anxious to be clearly heard I push my voice out, but to the detriment of variation in tone, pitch, volume, quality...the performance gets stuck on one note, one gear. Subtleties are lost and ultimately the story is not told with colour. Over these opening shows I've been striving to achieve bold size, but not at the expense of delicacy and truthful connection.

After the show we drove to our first Travelodge hotel...one of many to come! 

#travelogical

Then up and out at 8.30am the next day to a wealthy little village called Burford where a few residents are hosting a cultural festival. We were booked to do two shows in a beautiful garden.

I should probably explain at this point that we are travelling players in the oldest sense...we go everywhere with our complete stage, costume and props. It's all loaded in a big 'Luton' van which we drive alongside in our people carrier; 'Sharan'.

#who's got the keys to sharan?

When we arrive on site we unload our stage and build it in place...considering where the evening sun will set during the show (the audience can't see us if the sun is shining in their face!) Costumes and props ready to go and we take a break to eat and do a thorough physical and vocal warm up before the house doors (or rather garden gate) is opened to the public.

Burford Garden

Show 2 and 3 successfully complete we loaded up and headed back on the road to stay in another Travelodge (Milton Keynes) before waking up and driving to a beautiful National Heritage site...Raglan Castle.

This was a real corker of a location...the castle was majestically ancient; a timeless and elegant degree of ruin. There was even a bloody moat! We set up and then got into costume for a photo session with a professional photographer...photos for press and such.

Then lunch and Show 4. With the sun setting in strikingly beautiful and vivid shades of crimson...stage right.