Making Magic

My rehearsal on Monday was off to a bad start. Two out of five of the actors were sick and would not be able to make it. The director was running late because he was dropping off posters to get printed. Then the stage manager calls my cell. He's suddenly fallen ill as well and won't be coming either. Some other frustrate-y things also happened, but I don't believe that a very public forum would be the appropriate place to delve into them.

Needless to say, that by the time I showed up for rehearsal, I was in a big ball of negative and unfocused energy.

Fortunately for me, one of the actors who was there (getting over his own bought of sickness), took Michele's class with me this past December.

So as we are sitting there, waiting for the others to show up, I suggest we grab some chairs and start our relaxation exercises. I hadn't done relaxation since the class and neither did he. In her intro to it Michele mentioned that people should not confuse the name of the exercise with its purpose. The purpose is not to relax you into a state of slumber. Quite the contrary, the exercise actually puts the body into a state of true wakefulness and alertness. In fact, she doesn't like the term at all, but Strasberg came up with it so, gosh darn it, the name is sticking. For those of you who are curious as to what the exercise entails, this is pretty much the closest thing I could find (Michele having modified it in some parts to suit her own teaching style).

Anyway, I close my eyes, breathe, and start rotating my right shoulder blade. Immediately I feel that familiar tingling sensation going through me as my body starts to wake up. I carefully move through all the major muscle groups, stretching them in ways that they never get to go on a daily basis. Whenever it feels like there's tension somewhere, I make a sound. I find that gives me the added benefit of a vocal warm-up as well.

Typically, in Michele's class, this relaxation exercise can take anywhere from forty-five minutes to over an hour. I never know exactly how long it is though because I don't have a watch and time always seems to fly in that class. This time around, we worked for maybe fifteen minutes, but by the end of it I felt incredibly focused and at peace. I was ready to work.

I only have one scene with Chuck and since we were both at this rehearsal, I knew we were going to go through it. And I was dreading every minute leading up to it. I was scared of this scene. Scratch that. My ego was scared of this scene and it's incredibly raw nature because it knew it couldn't bullshit or hide through it. You see, in this scene, I show up at the police station thinking I'm there to find out they captured my husband's killer. Instead, the officer in charge of the case let's me know that, yes, they caught him, but my husband is still technically alive. The killer stole his brain and has been keeping it alive in some aquarium attached to a bunch of wires... and uh, would I like to see him? Ouch. It's a tough scene.

But this time around, there wasn't going to be any pretensions. I did a quick sensory of the police waiting area before walking in on a present scene partner.

I cannot describe to you the exhilaration I felt when that scene was done. It was beautiful. I felt overcome with a sense of absolute serenity. Lines that once seemed awkward or weird had flowed naturally. By the time we finished, the room had gotten very, very quiet. I was amazed that I had actually forgotten anyone else was there with us. We were told that we were riveting. That you didn't want to watch this terrible thing that was happening, but that you couldn't turn away from it. Those are the moments that actors live for.

I knew I had overcome a big battle with resistance after that rehearsal and I look forward to pushing onward.

Next up: the battle against "it was so good last time, I wanted to recreate that moment again"