Companion Piece Wrap-Up

Well, I didn't quite get around to blogging every day and all I can say, dear readers, is that I got fully absorbed in what was one of the coolest (if not THE coolest) workshops I've ever gotten to assist on.

Why cool was it, you ask? Well, let me share with you The 3 Coolest Things About the Companion Piece Workshop.

1) Not Having a Script: How do you rehearse a play without having a script? Well, there's more than one way to skin a cat (or workshop a play, as the case may be.)

What I learned is that often, a particular idea will dictate for itself the way it needs to be explored. For example, we found answers to how to use a particular set piece by simply playing with it and figuring out all of the possibilities off what it could do. Questions about character choices were brainstormed at a table, amid a smattering of YouTube videos that represented possible character essences. Answers to questions about structure and how to link themes together came from making detailed lists on brown butcher paper. These lists were arranged and rearranged until the structure became clear. One of the most beautiful moments that was found was a "Ladder Ballet," a pas de deux between two large, metal ladders. How do you choreograph giant ladders? Examine choreography with two actors doing it, then work with tiny paper models of the ladders! How to create a realistic fight scene? Improvise it!

If the kernel of the artistic idea is strong enough (and Companion Piece has a strong core indeed) and the theatre-makers are really listening, then the piece itself seems to tell you how to work on it. In a "traditional" process, the script can often become a crutch and questions send you further into the text to find answers. But in a devising process, it is the people in the room, the rehearsal space, and the world itself that contains the potential answers so it makes you engage and connect in a completely different way.

2) Having an Incredible Team of People: We had a scenic/costume designer who could mock up a magic trick on the fly, a sound designer who could mix a dreamscape simultaneously creepy and poetic, a lighting designer who illuminated both the stage and the storyline, a props master who searched the city for the plunger that made the most comical sound effect, a stage manger who brought cupcakes and effortlessly kept order, actors as intellectually agile as they are physically brave, a director who is both an auteur and a democrat, production assistants that documented and will archive 70+ hours of rehearsal footage, a production manager who gleefully experimented with the funniest way to chuck a rubber chicken across the stage, and a producer with an incredible respect for artists (and who is also an artist herself.) What a great and wonderful gift it was to be with such skilled, motivated, and friendly creators.

3) Having the Time & Space for a Workshop: In one of the many ways that the economy has affected the theatre world, rehearsal processes are often truncated. In these shorter rehearsal periods, it seems that ideas never die of natural causes; they are prematurely killed off by time constraints! Thus, safe and small choices are made because there is not the time to flesh out the risky, bold, imaginative choice. The time and space to explore and experiment is crucial and it gave us all a very strong start on Companion Piece.

You'll get to hear more about Companion Piece from the actual rehearsal process, beginning in December. Until then, thank you curious theatre-goers and practitioners for following us down this fantastic workshop trail! See you soon!