39 Steps: What a Week!

Good Evening,

What a fantastic week this has been! We ended our first week of rehearsal today, strangely enough, by working on the first scene of the play. Many times, rehearsal starts at the start, beginning with scene one and going from there. But, I think, it all depends on the play.

After our first night of rehearsal, we had two nights of physical exploration and play. If you read Rebecca Noon's blog post Saturday, you will surely have an idea that this is a physical company of actors. We had some questions to explore which would help us on the production side of things (would we need certain set pieces or would the actors be able to do it, etc). I also wanted to introduce the company to this text and work them together as an ensemble, so as we started to approach getting on our feet, instead of starting with Hannay's monologue at the beginning, we began with the train sequence, which I had broken down into four separate "beats".

I was hoping to find an entry into this text through their talents as "physical" performers, i.e., their background in Lecoq-based training. We had a great deal of fun working these moments and I feel that it was the right place to begin.

By Saturday afternoon, we began working with some of the more traditional scene work. Although, I don't think anything in The 39 Steps is all that typical. This work is difficult to describe outside of the room. I don't think I will attempt that tonight except to say that it's creation, in all its various forms - working as an ensemble to discover what the play is telling us and finding in ourselves as artists how best to craft the moments. Let's say this too - it's a comedy, so suffice it to say, we are having a lot of laughs...

...we look forward to sharing this laughter with you in 34 days...

I've pasted a couple of images from the week below. Enjoy!

See the full gallery on Posterous

39 Steps: And now some words from...

Good Evening,
Today we begin exploring the thoughts of various other members of the company. We start with Rebecca Noon. Enjoy this guest post and see her on stage in 35 days…
Rebecca Noon is a producer, actor and deviser based in Providence, RI. She is a founding member of Strange Attractor Theatre Co. with whom she is currently developing a new play based on Ibsen’s classically “unperformable” epic “Brand”. You can follow more of her thoughts on play-making at http://rebeccamakesplays.wordpress.com.

Hello to the Perseverance/39 Steps blog –
I am performing in The 39 Steps, which is a dream play for someone like me, a character actor who loves doing funny voices.  I am playing the three "romantic women": Annabella Schmidt the German spy, Maraget McTyte the demure Scottish lass, and Pamela Edwards the young and beautiful Brit who gets caught up in the lead character's get-away. What's even better is that the other actors in the show are three of my favorite collaborators.
Aram Aghazarian, Roblin Gray Davis, Jed Hancock-Brainerd and I make up the theatrical devising company Strange Attractor.  We have made a few shows together, most recently presenting Phase II of a show in development at the Perseverance 2nd Stage, The Brand Project (working title).  We all met while studying together at the London International School of Performing Arts, which is a Lecoq-based school in London that teaches devising and collaboration and, quite humbly, how to build the theatre of the future.  Since graduating in 2008, we have all been working at doing just that.  In 2009 Perseverance first invited Aram, Jed, and I (who all live on the East Coast) to perform in a show in their season, Eurydice.  Roblin was directing and we all jumped at the chance to work together in Juneau.  The joy of being a guest artist in such a warm and creative community impressed us right away and, at the end of that winter, we all looked forward to returning.  This time however, rather than having Roblin in the director's chair, we are all on stage together, which is always the most fun.
Which brings me to what I am actually the most excited about.  For the past year I have been pretty exclusively devising shows, which at our level means working without a producer or designers or a director.  Truthfully, I love the crazy amount of work that comes from working this way.  I love the all-consuming manic energy that comes with producing a play that you are simultaneously marketing and creating.  However, it does get exhausting.  When Perseverance proposed that all four of us could be actors in this play, supported by a team of talented designers and a generous director who recognizes what we bring as an ensemble, I knew this was a dream come true.  I think we all did.  Jed, Aram and I knew we had to put our East Coast lives on hold for a few months and return to Juneau to take this opportunity to play together in a supportive and creative environment.
And alright!  Enough with the love-fest!  How is it really?  Well. . . great!  We haven't even had a week of rehearsals yet, and so I am sure there is still time to get grumpy and resent working with a script that I can't invent and get annoyed at whatever small thing comes up that feels large at the moment, but for now I am in awe of my capable partners. I sat back at rehearsal last night and watched them work a scene I am not in.  I had one of those moments that comes at the very beginning of some shows where you just say to yourself, oh yeah.  This is going to be good.
-Rebecca Noon

39 Steps: Start at the Start

Good Evening,
Blog/Day #4

Starting at the start is appropriate for today. We have begun. We have begun physical and dialect work with the actors. All departments are ramped up and busy finding props, and building pieces and painting the walls (see photo).
And tonight, we begin working with the text and putting this thing up and playing with it. I ask the actors to learn the lines for each "beat" we will be working so that we can have full play and freedom of movement and expression. We work with the lines first, running them, hearing them, hearing each other say them and it gives me an opportunity to hear rhythms and the language construct in a way that, really, I've only heard in my head before. Then we play and work at building the scene piece by piece, deconstructing the scene in terms of what's going on, where are we, what are the relationships and much, much more. It's another exciting "first" night in the process.
There are many "first" night with the last one being Opening Night...in...36 days!

39 Steps: Productions Meetings and Physical Play...

Good Evening,

…blog day 3...

Things are ramping up.

We had our production meeting yesterday which is run by the incomparable Production Manager for Perseverance Kathleen Harper.

Production meeting are invaluable in the process of creating a show. It’s a chance for all aspects of the production to come together and “check-in”. Make sure everyone is on the same page about who’s doing what, when things are do, and, most importantly to work out any problems that may  have come up and see how to “problem-solve” them.

Yesterday’s meeting went well. At this point, everyone is on track. The walls of the theatre are being painted, the costumes are being pulled, props are arriving in the rehearsal hall. Our biggest conversation centered around incorporating certain elements of the lighting into the set design and making sure that some of the “gags” we are looking at trying to create will come off as we’d like them to. There can be a pretty big difference between the design stage and what actually gets created. There are practical and budgetary concerns which come in to play in all the areas. And, of course, new ideas come up that may be inspired and better than the original. All these options and challenges are explored to help bring the magic alive. It’s a truly collaborative process and a great joy to be a part of.

Also wanted to share how fun rehearsal was last night. You will meet the actors soon through this blog, but here’s a sneak peak at some of the physical stuff we were doing last night.

We were playing around with physical space and how bodies could possibly interact. This may or may not be an image you see on stage in…37 days!

-Bostin Christopher, Director

First Rehearsal Thoughts and a Sneak Peek at the Set

Good evening,

...it’s blog day #2...

Our first rehearsal was amazing. First rehearsal gives everyone a chance to meet and share with the cast all the wonderful design work leading up to the beginning of rehearsal. It’s an exciting time and it was a joy, as the director, to see all these elements intermingling. It also got the actors excited to play and that’s always a joy to watch and be a part of.

We started with introductions and design presentations:

See more of the first rehearsal meet and greet photos are on thefacebook page: https://www.facebook.com/PerseveranceTheatre

We’ve assembled a fantastic team of designers:

Sheila Wyne – Set

Art Rotch – Lights

Val Snyder – Costumes

Riley Woodford – Sound

Kathleen Harper – Props

And holding us all together is our stage manager: Nikki Dawson

I’m thrilled to be working with all of them!

Now a little sneak peek at part of the set model:

This is part of the world where the show will come to life. Exciting stuff!

More in the coming days. I’m off to our weekly production meeting to get all these moving parts together and ready for opening night in…

38 days.

-Bostin Christopher, Director

39 Steps: Good Evening...

Welcome to Alfred Hitchcock’s The 39 Steps at Perseverance Theatre!

It’s the 33^rd Season at Perseverance Theatre and I have the honor of directing the first show. The 39 Steps is a theatrical romp based on a novel by John Buchan, adapted by Alfred Hitchcock for the 1935 film and adapted again by Patrick Barlow based on an original concept by Simon Corble and Nobby Dimon. Whew!

It’s part homage to Hitchcock, part tribute to the Theatre and an all-around good time!

Of course, we’ve been working behind the scenes for many months – designing, casting and working toward bringing this wonderful adventure to life. In that time, I’ve been reading a wonderful blog that Ken Davenport, a New York Theatre Producer, has been doing for his Broadway revival of Godspell (http://www.godspellblog.com). It’s a wonderful behind the scenes look at how a show gets made that he started with 100 days to go until opening. I realized what a treat it would be to do that with our show and when I realized that our first rehearsal was exactly 39 days from Opening night (Sept. 23^rd), I didn’t see a way we couldn’t do it.

So, we will take you behind the scenes with a little something each day: set designs, costumes, who’s who on the team, marketing, etc. As much as we can, we will bring you on this ride with us. Enjoy the adventure and we will see you in…

39 Days!

Bostin Christopher, Director

Artistic Director Art Rotch's Musings on This Wonderful Life

Before getting involved in theatre, I was a student of history. As a young man I learned about my grandparents- who passed when I was young- from stories I heard, and in the case of my father’s family history which was well-documented, books I read.  Reading those books led to others and today, I still have a soft spot for plays that are set in the past, involve colorful characters, and tell us something about who we are. 

This Wonderful Life is set in the 1930s and 40s, the time of what Tom Brokaw dubbed ‘The Greatest Generation’. This  generation of Americans survived the great depression and then fought the Second World War. It was a time of ‘can do’ and the era of American exceptionalism. When my friend Ed Christian first looked at this part, he said George Bailey reminded him of his own father, also of that generation.

In my family, it was my grandfather, Arthur Rotch, who lived during that time. He has a story of missing his generation’s war, though it gets a little goofy:

He served in ROTC during World War I and graduated in 1918. He spent the summer of 1918 trying to get overseas in time to serve, but a balky appendix kept him out of action till after the armistice. Family lore describes this young man trying as hard as he could to get assigned to a unit that would be sent into action as quickly as possible. Much later, he served in a naval reserve unit and told tales of escorting destroyers down the Quincy river before they headed into action – usually commanded by young captains who drove much too fast for close waters.  I heard most of these stories in my father’s voice, who passed them on with mix of humor and pride in my grandfathers’ stubborn commitment to serve as best he could, while still filtering in some of his regret that he had to stay home.

What my grandfather did was not as glorious as leading men over the wire in France, or commanding a destroyer in the pacific, but like George Bailey, he did what he could, and is remembered proudly by his family for it.

I thank Ed for his remark that reminded me of my family’s connection to Frank Capra’s characters and their time. Ed plays so many different characters so well tonight, as Terry Cramer describes in her director’s note later in the program, I’m sure you will see someone you love rendered in his performance. Maybe it will be Mary, or ZuZu, or Martini the bartender, or Uncle Billy. Like listening to my father tell the story of my family, you can sit back and hear Ed tell you this story of an iconic American family.

What Ed does tonight is one of the hardest, and most rewarding things for an actor: To tell an entire story himself, with no castmates to catch him if he drops a line, and no breaks while others are on stage. It is a remarkable theatrical achievement for one of our most stalwart company members. When I lose myself in the play, which happens every time I’ve seen it so far, I always at some moment remember my father’s voice. It is pitched differently from Ed’s, and the accent is northern, but I remember it because it was the voice that told me those stories of my grandfather.

May you remember your favorite storyteller and your favorite stories tonight, as you listen to one of Juneau’s most gifted tell you one of America’s best holiday tales.

Art Rotch

Artistic Director