Day 24 & 25

The show has arrived! The Windham, Tranquility Base, phase of this process is officially over. Tomorrow we take a much needed day of rest and than we begin performing this show wherever we happen to be at any given moment including: bellemeade NJ, wilkesbarre PA, and Manhattan NY.

Yesterday morning we began with a "blitz". We ran the whole show as fast as possible, including transitions and monologues. Our goal was to take the show to the point where it is being done TOO fast so that we could then scale back and chose our moments to take long silences and use dramatic patience. It worked, the show was cut down by 15 minutes and then when we ran yesterday night we were able to maintain that sense of urgency and energy while taking the time we needed to hit the most important moments. The "blitz" turned out to be a great way to shake things up and light a fire under our asses, which is important considering the fact that we do not have dress rehearsal audiences.

This morning was the best run of our show yet. We both felt fresh, clear, and focussed. Our characters are taking on a life of their own and we could not be prouder of our work. Tonight was- honestly now- a little less fantastic. Maybe it was the chinese food we ate, or maybe it was the logistics of the next week dawning on our fatigued brains, but it was a little tougher to focus in. Tina said, "this is good." This is the perfect way to move into our next phase. We now know how vulnerable this show is, and how much focus it will require from us to give this gift to audiences. Although we have a lot to celebrate, we cannot afford to get sloppy or cocky. If anything, this is the time when we most need to sink our teeth in. The show deserves our best. These audiences deserve our best. And the time has come to release this beast.

We will spend the next few days in transit, practicing wherever we get the chance. We will also be packing for our MOVE TO DETROIT. (Which is actually a real thing, not just something we're talking about in a play.)

We spent some time today reminiscing and reflecting on our journey here at Tranquility Base. We compiled a list of things that worked and things we would change. We will include this and further reflecting in the coming posts. I don't know if we'll be posting every day anymore BUT we will certainly be posting about our journey to see Bianca and Hannah Roman, and everything that goes down there as well as our jaunt into the big city. Merde.

WE MADE A PLAY!

                                                                                              -Tina and CJ

Day 23

Looong day and an even looonger story short: We ran the show twice today.
Worked out lots of kinks and messy parts.
It is still a bit too long for our liking, but it is just a matter of practicing transitions over and over and over again...
we spent the day memorizing and went for a long run today with the dogs which was a fabulous way to get out of our heads.

life is good, we are exhausted. we need to start thinking about cleaning this place and packing up!
It feels surreal!

I've been thinking a lot about what it means to be a theatre artist and why I want to be an artist. I am searching for something that I can not quite yet name or explain, but somehow it feels as if theatre and self reflection are my tools to get there.

                                                                                     -Tina

Day 22

It looks like we're planning a bank robbery in this living room. There are now four clip lights each mounted on a chair, two foot switches, notes on every wall, and a table in the middle of the room with two chairs. We've created two playing areas using the clip lights and we are using a little square table to imitate the large long banquet looking table that we'll have at the IAM space. We placed the foot switches in the places they'll be on the night and we used a lamp in the back corner to represent the house lighting.

This morning we worked out all lighting cues and we planned the journey of the table throughout the play. We could only guess at lighting cues because we didn't have all the lights yet but we promptly bought two more lights and a new foot switch to make our lighting dreams come true! We have worked out the journey of each prop at least in a rough way. Tomorrow morning we'll write out the preshow setting and type out the tech cues we've ironed out at tonights rehearsal. (Tonight we stumbled through the show and checked to see that our lighting cues would actually work. For the most part they did.) Also, we've made final changes to texts.

THIS MEANS: within the next 12 hours we will have set every detail of the show. Perhaps some small changes will occur in lighting or something like that but the point is that all we have to do is run this show as much as possible. What a great feeling. The thing is made, we just gotta execute.

                                                                                              -CJ

Day 21

This morning we had a specific list of moments and instances to work on from the run last night. It was SO helpful to have a really well defined goal list for rehearsal. It may sound obvious, but it resulted in way less tension between the two of us and way more productivity...except...for the dreaded blanket dance. Last week we improv'd the whole show with fresh material. In the improv we did an EPIC on-the-spot dance that we literally cannot seem to recreate again! We watched the video of ourselves quite a few times and decided that it would be best to choreograph a small chunk for the run and work the rest tomorrow morning. Frustrating. but we will nail the blanket dance eventually!

The rest of the day was super quiet and relaxed. Maybe it was the grey skies? I took a LONG nap. I don't know what it is. Maybe this cabin has a sleep spell on it, but I feel like all I do is rehearse and sleep!

The run tonight was really good. I think I was still in my stumbly/nap/rainy day mode, but luckily CJ was super focused, which really kept me centered. The only thing is that the show is really slow right now. All the material is there and set, but it is taking way too long...as our professor once said, "We need to drive that train!" Aka pick it up!  (and seriously work tech and transitions)

On another note, the dogs (Ben & Jerry) have FINALLY picked up on the fact that we are rehearsing. They no longer enter the stage in the middle of a monologue to lick our toes. We're really going to miss having dogs around :(

So yea, we're feeling really on target. There is positive pressure in the air! Feels like tech week!

                                                                                     -Tina

Day 20

This morning we storyboarded the show, and started working out the kinks we knew we needed to work before our FIRST FULL RUN.

One of the moments we worked is called four arm blanket dance. We know that it looks cool because we've seen it on camera but it feels rediculous to do. To add to the trouble, we've improvised it in the past and we are now trying decipher our video recordings. However, the dance is cool because its impossible to tell whats going on with out arms... so it was a difficult and kind of foolish time trying to work out that moment.

I will say however, that deciding on our storyboard for the show was surprisingly easy. I think Tina and I were both a little tense over breakfast because we knew that today was the day we had to make our final (ish) choices. It turns out that the beginning, middle, and end of the show were all found in good form in our notes from previous rehearsals. Most of the time was spent working out the kinks in between. Also, the workshop elements of the show seem to be flowing nicely from our content, which is vital when experimenting with extra-theatrical audience participation stuff.

So, on to the run itself. I'd say it went as well as could be expected. Lighting and costumes were a mess, but we are only just now in a position to work those problems out, so thats okay. The middle section of the show is really crisp, and it has existed in this form for a while so its in our bones pretty nicely. The ending feels a little- something... unjustified perhaps? The thought is there but we need to work into it more smoothly from the middle.

This part of the process is all about refining our material. We are now able to look at monologues in the context of the show's arc and say that certain details are unnecessary and other details need to be stated more clearly. Every line, gesture, and decision has a purpose for the show. In many cases, moments overstep the purpose for the show and they need to be checked. In other places, the show is asking for what is obvious to us actors to be stated clearly for the audience. It feels really good to be working to widdle down, rather than reaching out in the dark for more material. CLARITY IS KEY.

                                                                                     -CJ



P.S. Here is a horrible quality photo of an awesome project I've been working on. (Kudos to Mako Fujimura for coming up with the original idea). Yes, it is a bird nest donation box.
                                                                                    -Tina

Day 19

Today was a loooong time coming (for CJ) he FINALLY sat down and typed out his improv'd monologues. It was tough for him to solidify his words (even though nothing is set in stone yet). I practiced my monologues in our rehearsal space using some of the inspiration from our character work yesterday...then...

WE DROVE TO NYC TO VISIT THE SPACE! CJ drove almost the whole way there! (This is a big deal because he is new to driving and new to stick shift!) I took over in the NYC area for some serious traffic and crazy drivers. Long story short, stressful driving, no parking, and an overpriced parking garage later we made it safe and sound without any damage to my beloved car. More importantly, we made it to the IAM space ready to go. There we met Meaghan, who was beyond awesome in answering all of our questions about lighting, tables, chairs, and blocking out windows. There is a beautiful big window in the space that is awesome in every other way (except when you are trying to do a theatre piece with cool lighting and you can't get full black out from the city streets). She showed us that we could pull down the projector and save a lot of time and effort by using the huge projector instead of buying literally a TON of fabric. We feel great about the space and the set up...it is becoming real. We really are doing a show!!

On the way home we stopped at handy dandy WalMart to get the best and most important gadget in the whole piece: tap on/off extension cord. This literally makes our piece completely conducted by us! Part of our goal with creating Vacant Lots was to find out if a theatre piece can be made and performed by 2 people on a low budget, and this gadget is really helping us achieve that goal! This takes us one step closer to being able to do our own tech while acting! Here's a picture just so you get the idea. Basically we can tap this button with our feet and get both of our lights to black out without having to perfectly time and count silently "1, 2, 3, light off." EPIC. We were so excited the second we got home we tried it out just to make sure it worked (and it did!).


                                     Also, we're taking tomorrow off. Relaxation (and peach pie).

                                                                                                          -Tina

Day 18

Character Day!

We focussed on character... duh. The morning had us doing small exercises like finding centers for each of our characters (Tina and I are both playing 4 or 5 different characters.) We worked to find out triggers, like colors or objects, that can allow us to snap in and out of character quickly. We were also trying to flesh out the characters that seemed more cartoonish. We want all of our characters to be intricate and lifelike.

At night we did character interviews on four of our characters. For this we worked specifically with the characters that carry the most weight in the show. Most of these characters are based on real people, so a large part of the interviewers job was to shake the actor away from the people they know and allow them to submit to the character they are playing.

Partway through the day I had an artist moment and started feeling all strange so I went outside and ran what felt like 10 miles... probably more like 1? It was amazing.

                                                                                             -CJ