Tonight we were in the R-R Theater, beginning to run Act I with blocking. We changed a few of the pairings, so I am now with a different actor at the beginning (and he towers over me--and everyone else--so that's really fun). Jay was great on "Old Red Hills of Home". We had to, of course, adjust some of the blocking because the stage is bigger (well, duh) than the room we were in before, and to make sure we are out of the way of moving set pieces!
"The Dream of Atlanta" (or, as Frank calls it, "The Atlanta Song") went well. At the end we are all adoring the Governor and his wife on their float as Leo walks among us ("How Can I call This Home?"). Then we realized that we hadn't run the vocal parts on this number, so we briefly went over those, learned it fast, and went back to blocking. During one part (before we break into our solos), Jon (who plays Leo) is singing about the oddness of Southerners about four inches from my face, but I can't look at him. It's quite amusing. Another amusing part is when I get to beg Aaron (my new partner in this scene) for a balloon, wherein he tells me to "Settle Down". (This is so a scene from my childhood...)
We then get "The Picture Show", Frankie and Mary's duet, which was so funny! Jonathan (who plays Frankie) does this great scat number at the end which the audience will love.
After that, we turn back to the float, and head off, while Leo and Lucille sing "Leo at work/What am I waiting for?" I have to say, this set is going to be awesome--all these moving parts, etc. This is the first time we are actually offstage. Wow.
Following this we have Newt's "Interrogation", Leo's arrest, and "Big News!"
This was probably the most fun I have had in the entire rehearsal process.
After the bar owner (Joel) kicks Craig out of his bar early Sunday morning, Craig bemoans the lack of exciting news events to cover in Atlanta ("Big News!"). While he singing this, he's alone onstage. It's a long number. So Frank decided he needed some people.
Abby and Vera (Iola and Monteen) are in one group, on stage left, while Dawn (the nurse) and I are on stage right. We come in around the middle of the piece, and improvise things with Drew, who plays Britt Craig. It is so much fun. He, Dawn and I are working together when he sings "Soon the women'll vote/ and we'll all go to hell!" (which the guys in my office will love). He manages to drag us all downstage with him before we scamper off for our lives.
It was so much fun. Frank was cracking up, and so were we.
Sadly, though, the funeral scene is almost right after this. So I have to be all sad and stuff. That also went well, although Frank wants to work a bit on the blocking.
After this, we had some notes. Frank said one thing that really helped me--that if he hasn't said anything to you, it's probably because he likes what you're doing. Whew! He also gave us some pointers on how to develop a character, etc., etc. for the funeral scene. For me, this was pretty easy, and I've done some work in my theater notebook about this. But I just love stuff like this.
So it was a great rehearsal. Tomorrow's may or may not happen, depending on Ohio weather (lovely). But it is great to rehearse in the theater, and with such a great cast.
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