Directors Notes :)

Hi guys,

The rehearsals for our 'fresh' take on Edward Albee's 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?' is going very well.

During the first week of rehearsals I changed the name of our play to 'We've Got Guests!' as our play comprises of an edited first act of the original play centring on Martha and George arriving home from a university party and inviting some guests over to continue drinking into the night. Our one act play is all about the relationships between the characters, whether husband or wife, friends or colleagues etc. We invite the audience to view what starts off as an intimate evening between husband and wife which then spirals out of control as the night goes on. As Honey and Nick's discomfort grows, so does the tension between all of the relationships involved!

Our first week of rehearsals before Easter break focused on getting the actors familiar with their roles and who their characters are on a more personal level, looking at what type of upbringing they might have had, what their worst fears are, best holiday, pet hates, first love, hopes and dream etc all through games and exercises such as hot-seating and improvisation. These proved to be effective exercises and we could all see a development of the characters in the actors improvisations which would prove useful for when we started working from the script.

After Easter we have begun to work on blocking the play. Monday, we blocked the opening where Martha and Geroge arrive home from the party. Tuesday, we blocked the Guests arrival up to Honey and Martha's exit, Wednesday we blocked George and Nick's awkward conversation, Thursday, we blocked up to the end of the play and on Friday, we put all of these together and tweaked any major problems and worked on timing, comedy and line delivery.

The play is pulling together nicely and I have a very positive attitude to how it is going to go. We have another weeks worth of rehearsal where we will work more on timing, pace, comedy, delivery, volume, diction and further work on character building.

I am very happy with the speed at which lines have been learnt and accents have been worked on (it's sounding good!) and also at the brilliant memory all of the actors have in remembering all of the blocking they have been given.

I am very pleased to have the actors in costume now as it has had a huge impact on actors discovering their characters even more. Next week we will be bringing in props and look at finding suitable set for the play.

It's going well so far! :)

Abbie x x