For the past five weeks – two days a week, every week – we’ve been rehearsing ‘Mother Sky’. Covid (yep, that thing again) has obviously thrown a curveball for any creative endeavour and we have all had to adapt. With regards to production there are countless guidelines and recommendations, but for pre-production less has been said. A key focus during prep is obviously rehearsals, so how have we approached them differently this year?
Well, Zoom meetings have naturally become the norm, and as we have cast members scattered all over the UK it’s been impossible (and possibly illegal?) to get people in a room together. But the limitations also led to some unexpected positives. So here’s what we’ve been learning during the constantly-evolving rehearsal process:
Positives
– Let’s start with a practical one: no one is physically at risk with online rehearsals. It’s been a hell of a year and we didn’t want to put anyone in harms way. This was the only logical option for rehearsals. We are planning to organise a number of outdoor rehearsals for key scenes as restrictions continue to lift though.
– Being able to record and rewatch recordings of each rehearsal, then give minutely-detailed notes for every performer after the fact, has been a real blessing. In person this is not usually the case, as you have to flit between watching one person then another during each practice run and often miss a lot.
– Similar to the above point, I’ve noticed rehearsing remotely creates a more intense focus for both myself and those performing, as you have to consider so many things at once – eyelines, where other actors and the camera will be on the day, and wanting to express and react clearer than ever for each other so we can get where we’re trying to together. For me, the fact that every cast member has been able to get it spot on throughout rehearsals is nothing short of a miracle. If they can do this with little stimuli around them, I can’t wait to see what they do in person, on location, with each other there to support.
Negatives
– Proximity: how close the actors are and whether they are higher/lower, beside/in front determines a lot of their behaviour, and this has been a constant agitation for the majority of our cast. Unfortunarely, there’s nothing we could do to change this.
– Small screen size. Compared to stage work (sorry theatre folk), on-camera performances are all about micro-expression and seeing the thought. A big challenge has been quality of digital image to watch back. Any low-res images or playback viewed on smartphones has made it hard to tell if an actor is hitting their stride at times.
– Glitches. We’ve all come to accept the time delays and occasional freeze frames of a zoom meeting, but it’s wreaked havoc a number of times during rehearsals as timing of lines and the pacing of a scene rely on clear communication. But again, little we could do about this.