“Sense & Sensibility” closed on June 1st, with nice big responsive crowds the final weekend. Thanks to all who came out. I haven’t had time to miss Hedgerow, however. I’ve been here all weekend directing a three-reading series titled “RECKLESS ENTERTAINMENT: The Humor of Noel Coward”. (Below is an example of the humor of Noel Coward that we did not include:)
[THE BACKSTORY: Hedgerow is making major improvements and renovations to the 1840 grist mill they perform in. They’ve already added a glass atrium to eventually become the new lobby and welcome center. And within hours of the final “Sense & Sensibility”, the theatre was stripped bare so the stone walls can be re-pointed with fresh mortar. So:]
For the month of June, Hedgerow is throwing a party up the hill! At the Farmhouse Studio (containing the costume shop, scene shop, offices and housing for the resident Fellows), a large room off the kitchen is the main space for rehearsals and classes. In 1985 the theatre burned down to the walls, and for years the “Big Room” was the only performance space they had. Last summer the Big Room hosted some short runs of solo performance and scene showcases, scheduled when the mainstage was dark. It was successful enough that they’re slowly rolling it out as a regular second performance space.
Last weekend I had the privilege of directing concert readings of Coward’s three best-known plays: “Private Lives” (Friday night), “Blithe Spirit” (Saturday night) and “Hay Fever” (Sunday matinee), featuring the Hedgerow company. The Farmhouse has a lovely porch on two sides which makes a charming and rustic open-air lobby, and there are obvious advantages to having a kitchen as your “green room” (even if the audience is constantly tiptoeing through to the shared bathroom). Wine, cheese and dessert served at each show. Each event was a cozy, casual party with fabulous actors speaking fabulous words.
Prior to rehearsals, I was tasked with bringing all the readings in under two hours, and cutting props and physical business from the dialogue. I’m rather pleased with the results. “Hay Fever” didn’t need a single stage direction announced, other than “Curtain” to button each act. I was the reader for the other two. I only read a brief description at the top of each act for “Private Lives”, and then contributed some Foley sound effects for the bits of domestic violence required by the plot (just a few slaps and a few shakes of a “crash box”). “Blithe Spirit” needed table thumping and more crashing, and one or two internal stage directions, but otherwise flowed just fine without much interruption from me.
You might be alarmed at the thought of doing Noel Coward without cigarettes or martinis or gramophone records. But the props are just the trappings. The heart of the “style” comes from the attitudes of the characters, and how they respond to their problems (or their brief moments between problems, ha). You remember the cigarette floating between the actor's fingers, but the real "style" was their hand on their hip, the arch of their eyebrow, and the way they dealt with their scene partner. And of course, the icing on top of the style: that perfectly poised wit that Coward is famous for (in some lines you can feel Noel accepting the mantle directly from Oscar Wilde).
I’m always a fan of cheeky titles. Both definitions of “blithe” are equally applicable to “Blithe Spirit”: “showing a lack of proper thought or care: not caring or worrying” and then also “happy and without worry”. And as a seasonal allergy sufferer, I see “Hay Fever” as absolutely being a reference to the annoying parts of that otherwise lovely and mood-lifting season, Spring.
It’s been a whirlwind process, with one four-hour rehearsal for each. Fortunately with such sharp casts I was able to end each rehearsal early. We basically had time to read through each scene, and choose a few moments to try again, where there was either some physical moment essential to the plot (=figuring out how to make that clear while standing at music stands with scripts), or the speech pattern wasn’t making the argument or the joke clear. But the maxim “Directing is 90% casting*” is never truer than with a concert reading, and I must say these readings were cast extremely well for the dual purposes of sharing these plays clearly and showcasing the Hedgerow company.
My “blocking” was basically an Excel spreadsheet, assigning the music stands as logically as I can (based on who talks to whom most), sometimes shuffling characters around based on exits and entrances. It also has the virtue of being a built-in “French scenes” character plot on the same single page.
...Well it made sense to *me* at least...