Active Inquiry

Production Week Wobble!

9th June, 2021 - Posted by Gavin - Comments Off on Production Week Wobble!

Pam, who plays the role of Dot in Waiting For Dot, part of our Reimagining The Future double bill, shares some of her thoughts on the stresses of production week:

We embarked on this project 3 months ago in early March and it has been great fun: meeting new people, albeit on-line, playing silly warm-up games, discussing ideas, developing characters, forming, storming and norming into our eventual 2 sub-groups under the expert guidance of Gavin and Liz to improvise and finalise a script. Talk about out of your comfort zone! 

But now it’s Performing week and I’m having a serious case of the wobbles.  Not helped by multiple personal stresses, I am absolutely beset with nerves, mostly around that old chestnut – I just can’t remember my lines!

I talk all the time and it just flows; our script grew out of improvisation, which seemed so easy.  But, for a play, we need to have cues otherwise everyone is lost.  I can’t even think about nuances of performance when I’m obsessing about lines.  I’ve formatted and re-formatted them, used post-its and highlighters, recorded the cues onto my phone and spoken my responses on my walks (I must look like a mad woman!) but I just can’t get them to stick in my head, in the right order.  HELP!!!