How to disappear…directors blog 1

This is the first of a weekly blog from the YAC rehearsal room, where I shall endeavour to pass on thoughts and musings on how the show is progressing and give an insight into how we’re working. This will be the 8^th YAC show I’ve made, and will be the 4^th for the studio theatre so I’m always conscious about keeping things fresh each time. Each new project is essentially original in that it’s a different play or show, it can’t be exactly the same…but sometimes you see work by directors or companies and it feels a similar formula, the pattern has been set and it never frays far from that. Part of this problem can be with working with the same artists. Its incredibly useful to have a shorthand with working with people, an understanding where they just know, its intuitive. But its also so important to throw the doors open and invite new people in, a fresh draft never hurt anyone…

 So with this production I’m working with almost completely new people, 7 of the 8 actors haven’t performed with the YAC before and I’m pleased to be collaborating for the first time with movement director Shona Cowie, composer and musical director Nick Calpin, and designer Lucy Campbell. With these artists I want to find a new way of making work, to learn something myself and bring fresh ideas and impetus to the production. I think my work has a ‘Julian Ollive’ stamp on it, I’ve been told it does and believe there is an aesthetic that I’ve developed but its important to me that it isn’t too fixed or prescriptive. You don’t progress by just doing what you know. Its also important to keep providing opportunities for new young people to us. Auditions are strange things, for both sides, for me I have to make judgements on people very quickly. Its true you get a sense of peoples ability pretty quickly but its crucial to stay open minded and not be too rigid in your expectations, because those people might not come through the doors.

 We start rehearsals on the 18^th and work pretty intensively on it three times a week through to the production, actually with a week off in the middle this time (which is nice!) I always refer back to previous rehearsal schedules I’ve done for a barometer of how long and intensive a schedule should be. I learnt from an early show that over 10 weeks is too long, its difficult to sustain momentum and you end up losing people along the way. Its quite a long piece this one so we’ll be pushing it through to make sure we’ve got a grasp of it before going back and adding in the finer detail. This isn’t an easy thing to do, leaving parts slightly under done but a rehearsal process is about layering. Those layers can’t all be laid down at once, I’m looking for broad understanding and interpretation of character initially, along with basic blocking in the space. Then the second time through we deepen the character intentions and physicality (hopefully off book at this point), then some sound may come into the process and refining transitions between scenes. Pretty rarely do major staging changes happen after the initial work through. I go into rehearsals with a fairly clear idea of where to place things, this comes from a detailed knowledge of the performance space but also I work quite pictorially when I work through a script so see it quite clearly in my mind.

 I’ve been wanting to do this play for a while so I’ve had some time to digest it but now is the time to fix thoughts and get some detailed text work done before rehearsals start. So I better go do it…

YAC auditions!

Audition call for Young Actors

York Theatre Royal Young Actors Company (YAC) is holding auditions for their latest production of How to Disappear Completely and Never be Found by Fin Kennedy. The production will take place in the studio theatre 21^st – 24^th March.  

Charlie’s used up 8 of his 9 lives; in debt, in trouble and in despair, he holds the urn of his cremated mother in his hands. With his life crumbling around him he is offered the chance to change his one remaining life forever. But to do this he will have to make ‘Charlie’ disappear forever…

YAC was created for 18-25 year olds with the objective of providing performance opportunities for young adults, acting as a bridge for some into the professional industry. The artistic vision of the company has a specific focus on new, contemporary and site-specific work. The company is run by artistic director Julian Ollive, the theatre’s Education and Young Actors Associate. Founded in 2008 the YAC first produced three new site-specific pieces for the York Youth Mysteries. Since then the company have produced a new piece of work exploring questions and ethics around genetics called An Exact Science? EQUUS as part of the TakeOver09 festival, Terrorism, Elsewhere in collaboration with Belt Up Theatre, Celebrating Severus at The Yorkshire Museum and most recently Little Angels by Hannah Davies.

Auditions are being held at the Theatre Royal on December 13^th and 15^th December from 7 – 9.30pm. We are looking for an ensemble of eight company members who will play multiple parts between the ages of 18 – 25 yrs. Auditions will take place as a whole group. We are looking for committed and passionate young people between 18 – 25 yrs old who are available to rehearse Wednesday and Thursday evenings and Sunday afternoons from January 18^th. This is an exciting opportunity to create and perform in a contemporary play in a movement-driven style in a professional environment.

For more information and to book for into an audition day email julian@yorktheatreroyal.co.uk or call Julian Ollive on 01904 658162.

Little Angels – director’s blog 4

The lights are positioned and focused, the paints dried, the grass is laid and the satellite dish is up…meaning we are raring to go! There are lots of little limbo states during production week, periods where you’re waiting for the next event to happen. I’m currently limbo-ing before the company arrives at 4.30 for our tech part 1, which we continue tomorrow at 10. The tech for those not ‘in the know’ is the setting of the technical elements, principally the lights and sound into the piece more formulaically, getting the levels right and the length of the transitions from state to state. Its also the first time the actors get into the theatre space, so there’s time to be spent working out the time it takes them to get from the wings to the stage and where props and set need to be positioned. It can be quite a fraught time, with a temper being known to be frayed from time to time. But I think we’re pretty well set and I’m envisaging (and hoping) it’ll go smoothly.

Certain elements and decisions as a director you can’t make until you’re in the actual space with all the actual elements. For example, lengths of music and there in and out points, you can’t set until we know the lengths of journey into and out of the stage space. Positioning of set always needs a refocus in the space, especially as the studio is a thrust stage so you always have to be conscious of making sure you are effectively playing to all three sides. Everyone has paid the same amount so everyone needs an equally good view of the action. I’m always very conscious of this and it needs constant modifications by watching from different positions throughout the tech and dress.

Filling these little limbo moments is difficult I find, as its hard to concentrate on other things, you just want to get going. We are at the stage of needing and wanting an audience. There comes a point in the process where you can’t really see the wood for the trees, you’re too close to it to be able to see it objectively. By this I mean the clarity of choices made, hence the clarity of the characters and story. Until an audience sees it, then lets us know their thoughts, its hard to truly know what you’ve got on your hands. Could it be the greatest play ever written (probably not), or could it be the worse play ever written (definitely not) but where exactly does it fall? The production becomes such a precious thing to you, you love it and nourish it and therefore become very protective over it. Nobody likes criticism, you want everyone to love it, but that’ll never happen. I suppose the best we can hope for is that it communicates to some people. That it has meaning and significance and causes the stirring of feeling and engagement in some way. That would be nice…but we’ll have to wait and see.

Little Angels – directors blog 4

25/08/2011

We are one scene away from completing the play, that sounds very grand and final but it means we are just one scene away from having gone through every scene in the play. Perhaps nothing to shout about after 4 weeks of a 6 week rehearsal period, but it’s a significant marker nevertheless. The process for this production has probably been more in-depth early on than previous shows, part because of a slightly new approach I’m taking this time and probably partly because of the plays requirements. Its essentially a naturalistic play that demands fully developed three-dimensional characters, that have full and completed back stories. The intertwining of their lives, through their collective histories, is essentially the crux of the story so it must be right and must be understood. Also there’s probably a bit of me wanting it to be right straightaway…its difficult to leave things that you know aren’t right, which may mean the actors are being overloaded with much information. But only they can tell you that, and nobody’s said anything thus far…If anyone’s moaning their doing it quietly!

 So this evening brings us back in contact with Jean, rather with Maggie, who has been crusing around theMediterraneanfor the past 2½ weeks and re-joins us. After such a large break from rehearsals I’m slightly fearful that all has been lost but I’m sure it hasn’t and actually it will nice to re-discover that character and reintroduce her back into the story. The character of Jean is a tough one; she’s murdered her husband, beaten her children and essentially ruined their lives…but…there are reasons behind every decision, possible justifications for every action we undertake. It doesn’t make them right, but they are there nonetheless and so it is with Jean. She is still a mother and she has a daughter that needs her now. All the characters we decided right at the start are escaping the past, for some reason. They may be doing this through ignoring it, denying it or confronting it head on but resolutions are being sort or being foisted upon them. That’s the control that Chloe, our protagonist is trying to gain, making the choice to remake and remould her future from putting the past to bed.  

We’re starting to get our set and props into rehearsal now. We’re still a little way off completing our set but the sooner they come in the more they can become habitual for the actors. By this I mean they know where they can place their feet under the table, for example, which has only one single leg, rather than the four legged one we have been using. Small details make a difference and a prop and a characters relationship to it can help an actor define their performance and make it integral to the telling of the story. For example, the way the pram is held and used tells us how the person feels about the baby within. Also for our production, the props and furniture really define the space, it encloses the characters and restricts their movement, which we’ve been imagining so far. The construction and deconstruction of the set is a key part of the design concept but also the metaphorical concept of the show. Of the clearing away of the mind to allow space to think and consider. So we have the clear space – we just need to work backwards!

So the show is only just under three weeks away so I’d suggest now is good time to start getting your ticket, or go crazy, buy loads!

Little Angels – blog 3

16/08/2011

Design by Claire Browne

I had intended to update the blog last week, in response to the terrible scenes we saw in Londonand subsequent other cities. I had in mind a title something like ‘The positive side of youth’, although hopefully I would have thought up something a little pithier than that. As I watched the scenes unfolding in mesmorised shock I was also thinking of the completely opposite experience of young people I have and have had over the past couple of weeks. Last week I was running a ‘Play in a week’ for 8-10’s in the afternoons whilst rehearsing Little Angels in the evening. Masked faces, lawless behaviour and mindless vandalism couldn’t be any further away from my time spent with young people that week. It was a week of joyous laughter, unbridled creativity and a profound sense of collective achievement. It made me feel proud in our provision for young people, that we are offering positive experiences for young people in a safe and caring environment, whilst they offer us their enthusiasm and willingness to learn. Some of our society may be broken but I think we must stand tall and proud with the parts that are not and shout quietly but confidently about our contribution to a positive and proactive society.

Our way through the play thus far has felt a bit like the American TV series Quantum Leap, where we shift about in time and place, but our reason being to fit around the actors that I have available. The play shifts about in time, the main narrative thread works chronologically, in the present but in the re-told past we shift in time. In this way it doesn’t feel too unnatural to be jumping about, it just means giving the company a strong understanding of the before-time circumstances of the scenes, so we know what has come before and imagining what has happened between the events we see. We’ve been spending a lot of time on improvising these before-time moments, to understand what attitude and intention the character is coming into the scene with. For example, at the opening of the play we see the central protagonist Chloe enter late at night with a baby monitor. From here we imagine what her day has been like thus far, for how long has she been up with her baby? Has she had any time to herself? Many decisions need to be made that will affect her attitude when she enters the stage space. By improvising the before-time to this scene, which we thought was Kealey, her baby being put to bed, we create a stronger understanding for the actress of her role and a clearer image from which to work from when she enters that space each time.

 These improvisations I believe have really deepened the actors engagement with their roles, by improvising in role they have to understand the character, consider how they would react in real-time, rather than just waiting and responding, which is what a script essentially makes them do. Our discoveries always feed back into the scene, they give us justifications for their actions and words. It’s another layer on which to fall back on as we work through the play as its crucial we justify everything we do, it must all make sense and has a logical relationship to the other characters stories.

 We’re still playing about with the script, which is one of the best things about working alongside a writer on their play. There are moments in scenes that we feel don’t quite work, or we have suggestions from becoming so intertwined in these characters. Hannah is very open to change and suggestion, which I imagine isn’t the case with all writers. I think this comes from Hannah also being an actor, she understands that a script doesn’t live until someone reads it out loud and occasionally some lines just jar because perhaps they were written some time apart or the right phrase didn’t pop into their head at that moment. So rather than walking on egg shells around the script we can freely express our thoughts and opinions, then pass them through Hannah for her approval. Its been a really positive process so far, many a mile to go yet, we haven’t touched the transitions or latter part of the play but we do so with high spirits and a focussed intensity.