Rehearsal diary of a madman

Every summer, actors head out of the Cities to what is called Summer Stock Theater, or – more playfully for some – Actor Camp. Some professional, or semi-professional, theater in some lovely semi-tourist town has a theater in the middle of their quaint downtown or on a lake in the hills somewhere in North Carolina where they produce four, five, or six productions in only eight, nine, or ten weeks, from full-on musicals to tear-jerking productions of "The Glass Menagerie." For actors, designers, technicians, stage managers, and the artistic director, its generally a blur of frenzied blocking, memorizing, forgetting, tripping, building up, tearing down, and drinking. The Paul Bunyan Playhouse, professional summer theater in Bemidji, MN since 1951, is one of those places, and Zach Curtis is the Artistic Director there. This is his diary of one particular – and typical – production. Sunday. Day Zero. Company members from the Twin Cities arrive today. Rooms are ready; everyone has a fridge, an info packet, directions to the grocery stores and Walgreens and late night libations. I have to wait for each person, because the Company Manager is performing in the current show, and they have a matinee. That’s okay. She has to do it all day for the one show I’m in. Handshakes, hugs, everyone has questions. 10 pm: Production meeting with TD, stage manager, {etc.}. So many questions without answers, so far. “We’ll figure it out” is said for the first of at least 300 times in the week. Monday. Day One. 10 am: Read through at the theater = Twin Cities folks meet Bemidji folks, more handshakes and hugs. Contracts, tax forms, paperwork, and more. Reading of the play. Good? Everyone happy? Show sounds great already. 2 pm: Rehearsal in the black box theater at the University — which beats the cold, loud, six car garage we rehearsed in for the first three shows of my first season. We block Act One. 7 pm: Three hour rehearsal after dinner. Block Act Two. Hey, look at that! Show’s blocked! Tuesday. Day Two. 9 am: Production meeting with the usual suspects. Blocking the show answers dozens of questions, and raises hundreds more. 10:30 to 1, 2 to 5:30, 7 to 10: Rehearsal. Get used to it, Actors, because that’s the next 8 days of your life. Wednesday. Day Three. 9 am — production meeting. Questions, questions, questions. 10:30 am: We’re probably going to stumble through Act One today. Actors are already trying to walk scenes without scripts, with varying disastrous results. Everyone wants to be off book soon, not just to learn lines, but to deal with the eight dozen props that just showed up. 7 pm: Act One pushed off until tomorrow, because there’s a show tonight, and one actor is stage managing that show, and another is in it, so there’s not a lot we can rehearse. Wait until the next show that I’m in — we can’t rehearse at all on any show nights. (Try not to think about that yet.) 10 pm: One might assume the day ends here, but there’s socializing to do. No one has really slept more than 4 hours a night since Sunday. I’m going to regret that tomorrow when… Thursday. Day Four. 8 am: I’m up and ON THE RADIO. There’s an 8 in the morning now? We do a weekly theater interview, two radio shows every Thursday, 8 am, 11 weeks, and I have to go with for every one. (Note to self: Ask marketing director why she hates me). Oh joy — it’s 9 am: and we’re in a production meeting. I’m beginning to question the wisdom of morning meetings. Rehearsal: We’re running Act One today. We do. We then spend the rest of the entire day fixing a lot of stuff. People are starting to get tired. And slap-happy. And we’re not even half way yet. Friday. Day Five. Tonight the cast heads to see the current show, so, we’ve got only 7 hours to cram 10 hours of work on Act Two. We do it. We have to. There’s a run-through tomorrow, for the cast of the current show — because they head home on Sunday. We see the show. (The actors see a show. I go back to my apartment and nap.) Then it’s off to the American Legion for karaoke and adult beverages. We’ve earned it. (That’s what we say every night. Oh, note to self: You really need to finish that set design for the upcoming musical, or you’re going to be mad at you.) Saturday. Day Six 9 am: Fun-time meeting — except this one’s important because we strike tonight — my Technical Director has a meticulous plan to make everything go smoothly. I’ll find out later that he’s lying to me, but I don’t need to worry about that now. Then: First time through the whole show, and we have a freaking audience. Luckily, they’re all supportive and entertained (and exhausted). The run goes well, and the cast is given the evening off — sort of. We don’t rehearse, but we need everyone after the current show to help strike it. . . Yeah, what are you gonna do about it? 10 pm: The show closes. We attack the set. 11 pm: The set is gone. Seriously. Well done, all. My crew has exactly 44 hours until I expect to be rehearsing on stage. May God have mercy on their souls. Sunday. Day Seven. Rehearsal all day. Running the show, working scenes - we’re getting into the nitty gritty here. People are off book (mostly). I head to the theater at 10 for our wonderful evening production meeting. The set is coming along really fast. My TD and Master Carpenter look like they just wandered in off of a mountain after being lost for six weeks. And they’re only halfway done. This meeting produces more questions about the show and the set than we have had combined so far. Everyone goes back to the dorms to sleep. For a couple hours. Monday. Day Eight. Now I’m getting impatient. I want on that stage, because that first rehearsal is always a crazy train wreck. Actors tend to get on a set and forget everything they learned for the show. I know, because I do it too. 7 pm: The cast applauds on their first entrance to the theater. The TD is happy. Or delirious. Take your pick. He’s smiling, that’s good enough. Tuesday. Day Nine. 8 am: I’m sleeping in the booth balcony while my Stage Manager and Lighting Designer go through cues. They wake me up to get approval. We start cue-to-cue at 10. We’re done at 1. We have a dress rehearsal at 2:30, and another at 7. If we’re lucky. Sometimes we only get one in on this day. I’m starting to question the sanity of doing summer stock theater. But the show is starting to look really good. Also, the newspaper is here for pictures and an interview. So, smiles, everyone, smiles! Wednesday. Day Ten. Opening Night. We get an afternoon dress in, and everyone goes away for a few hours. The crew is still painting in places, and the house is being cleaned. . . The calm before the potential storm. . . 8 pm: . The show opens. (Curtain is at 8 to accommodate those who want to stay out on the lake just a little while longer.) Everyone is happy. A toast all around at the after party. Everyone gets a few days — but not nights — off. Thursday to Saturday is a blur of budget meetings, script readings, design consults for the next show, and a lot of sleeping. Then, on Sunday, we’re back to Day Zero. Rinse, lather, repeat for five plays a summer.❦