“Lend Me A Tenor” -- One Actor’s Diary
Part 4
(Hill Country Community Theatre, Sept. 28-Oct. 15)
by Preston F. Kirk
Editor’s Note: This is the fourth in a series of stories that will track the experience of being an actor, from audition through the last curtain call. It will be an inside look at the process, the foibles, the fears and the thrills of live theatre! To see the writer’s previous diary entries at any time during the upcoming weeks, go to www.hcct.org/
Aug. 28 - Second Gear - Whoa, Nellie! This whole production seems to have suddenly gained momentum. Mark Fernandes, who portrays the batty bellhop, is at the rehearsal for the first time since auditions, flavoring it with his crisp and distinct professionalism. A new Production Manager has been hired, and a “Set Construction Work Day” has been set for three hours on Sat., Sept. 2. And HCCT veteran costumer Audrey Chase provided Director Barry Pineo with preliminary sketches for costumes.
Elaine Behrens is the Volunteers Coordinator, and if she gets a good showing Saturday, we could be slamming doors by Monday. Barry will be “pleased as punch.”
My tinnitus (noise/ringing in the ears) is louder than ever and making it difficult to understand some of the directions. But the good Lord knows that patient Barry has plenty of volume and gets through to me. In a half dozen ways he keeps cautioning, reminding and cajoling me not to “do a take” or a facial/physical reaction to another character’s line.
“Quit mugging!” he exhorts. A grin, a blink (I’m not exaggerating.), a wiggled eyebrow, a jaw drop - any unspoken response at the wrong time catches his attention, as it will the audience. The unnecessary expressions distract from the momentum of the play and from the other actors. It also can ruin the smooth transition from one action that is ending to a new and unfolding situation. Old habits are, indeed, hard to break.
Aug. 29 - New Mantra - “Pick up the cue! Pickup the cue!” Barry sounds like a broke record, and rightfully so. Momentum in a farce is critical. But my feeble brain trying to remember when not to blink and where to move and what comes next must look like a slow-mo replay of some yawning drama.
Stephanie Ellis is the newly hired Production Manager for HCCT, and - presto! -- tonight we have three of the six critical doors in place, which really changes timing. Yikes! I practically hang my fly on the doorknob several times when I don’t giving Mike Morelli/”Max” the “gopher” adequate time to swing it fully open.
Stephanie, a Texas native, a graduate of Tarleton State U., was a scene shop foreman there specializing in set construction, painting and design, as well as a member of a national theatre honors society. She has spent the past three years as a “faux” painter in private homes and offices, transforming ordinary surfaces into exotic wood finishes or the look of various stones.
She’s thrilled to be “back in the theatre world,” and we’re thrilled to have her.
More kissing and more comedic timing. Poor Mike is exhausted, doing his Executive Director duties at HCCT by day, selling seasonal ads for the playbill like gangbusters, and then rehearsing 3½ hours most nights. And Barry wants a kissing scene to have split-second timing and movements, but will not reveal how long is “long.” “I don’t want you counting�. You’ve got to feel it, Dude!”
Kirk Tatum/”Tito” gets a grueling workout (Yeah. Right!) as a body in the hotel bedroom. We shake him, jump on him, open an eyelid, bounce him around, and it is really hard for him to keep from laughing, although his fiancée is afraid that he will actually relax and go to sleep. No way!
White tie and tails, Audrey Chase/Costumer reminds me, will have to have a very tailored look and HCCT’s wardrobe department only has two tuxes, both of which swallow me up. Our limited budget for this show will require my trying to persuade a tuxedo shop to loan us not one, but two, since Mike needs one as well. She gave me the “size sheets” and suggested I “shop” for a swap - tuxes for program credits.
Aug. 30 - Leading Men - Barry emphasizes that “Tenor” has three male leads - Mike, Kirk and me and that compared to the five supporting roles, we must carry the load. “(They) have it easy,” he says, naming the four women and the bellhop. He exhorts us to get the lines down pat and “Stay on top of your s***.” No wonder I am going to sleep this week and waking up with incomplete lines running through my head and a rueful feeling that 30 more days will barely be enough time to get ready for the first curtain. Lord, help me!
A window, a phone table, a mattress and springs (from Highland Furniture), a few handheld props like wine glasses, a pill bottle, a piece of curtain doubling as a fur. More and more the set pieces are coming together. Handheld items make holding and reading scripts even more difficult. Kind of ironic that one old “flat” (wall panel) has huge musical notes painted on it.
Final “blocking” (stage movements) were worked out tonight with everything always subject to change. For example, two doors open tightly against one another eliminating some “business” on stage that has already been rehearsed multiple times. We rehearse a deliriously funny chase scene involving four characters and a camera. Also, deliriously exhausting for Mark and I who are pretty well drenched by the 10th take.
Also, tonight, for the first time, we did a complete run through the act one. One hour and 15 minutes, which Barry believes will drop by five minutes. It was not always pretty.
Although it is almost 10:45, Barry comments profusely, noting that Wendy James/“Soprano Diana” and Priscilla are “off the book” and working throughout at “performance level.”
He tells Priscilla, “That was full blown. I genuflect before you.
“You had some nice things going on,” he tells the rest of the cast, but she exploited the possibilities of this show. She was there with all of it! You’ve (cast) got a lot of work to do. I get to sit on my butt, but you have to act. �I never expect all the work (stage directions) to come back (in performance), but. ...”
Dale and I head for the house and hope Leno himself has a few good lines to lighten our mood.
Aug. 31 - Act Two Run-through - Barry notes that Emily Morelli/ “Maggie Saunders” keeps “going Munchkin on me” and wonders if the high voice is due to her pregnancy even as he tells her how beautiful pregnant women are.
“Keep going! Keep going!” Barry shouts, “even if I am walking on stage,” and we finally struggle our way through Act Two, with him permitting us to “pull it (script) out when you need it.” In the cast meeting afterwards, he notes, “We’ll be off book Monday�and it could be pretty ugly.”
As we sit (flopped?) on various steps and stage piece facing Barry in the audience area, he surveys the cast and proclaims: “I could not have arranged a better stage picture. Curtis (Ashby, former production manager) left us a better stage design than I first thought.”
The director asks me to read the notes I have been taking, and I promptly do so - out loud. “No! Silently, to yourself,” Barry says. “See! You don’t move your head back and forth or make faces.” Guilty again.
“I’m not singling you out, Preston. Honestly,” Barry continues. “If it’s funny, you don’t have to sell it. Just say the lines loud and clearly, with intent. Acting is what you are doing to another character. It doesn’t have to be too big.” Point taken, but I am still not quite thrilled at setting such a fine example for others to avoid.
“Preston, you are a much better actor than I think you think you are,” Barry says emphatically. “In fact, everyone is just great - not perfect - for the parts they’ve been chosen.” Mark is the exception, he notes, since the playwright envisioned that character as a slight and hyper man. “Don’t make it hard on yourselves. Acting is easy. Learning the lines is hard.”
The cast votes to rehearse on Labor Day evening rather than pick-up a Friday night rehearsal. Barry also announces that he’ll be cutting the length of rehearsals by 30 minutes since there are “diminishing returns after three hours. The trade off is that you have to come in sharp�prepared for ‘accreting detail’.” Apparently, he’s going to really fine tune each actor’s characterization and delivery and we need to “Hoover” up every nuance he suggests.
Barry recalls an actor who relocated from England was amazed at how Americans would work all day and then rehearse or act at night while typically exhausted. Actors in that country rehearse dayside . . . “and most of them make a living acting!”
That said, I’m almost tempted to immediately book a ticket for my Anglo-Saxon roots and pass on the upcoming long weekend which will consume hours and hours of memorizing dialogue. Some of the others will be coming in on Saturday to help build the set, but I will definitely lay low and - with Ronda Dale’s (my wife’s) generous help try to commit more lines and blocking to memory. Labor Day. How appropriate!
# # #
