Banging the Drum for Major Barbara

Rehearsals for George Bernard Shaw’s Major Barbara are underway; all scenes have been provisionally blocked, but there will inevitably be some changes as we go along. This is the first time I have had the responsibility of keeping the notes for stage positioning and movement and now that I am transposing my notes onto a master copy, I realise just how challenging a task it is!! I seem to have actors sitting when they should be standing, standing when they should be sitting, moving to stage front when they’re already there, walking around sofas which do not exist and entering stage right when they’re already positioned stage left!!! However, our director, Guy, helps by keeping it simple, keeping movement around the stage down to a minimum and he never changes his mind…( said with tongue firmly in cheek!!)

We are part way through an audio recording of the entire script so that all actors can have a copy to take away during the summer break – no excuses whatsoever for them not to have learnt their lines by August!!!! And what a challenge that is going to be as there are some very weighty speeches to be learned. On top of this, most of the cast are having to master new accents. We have an Irish woman speaking cockney, an Antipode speaking Upper-Middle class English, an Irishman speaking Antipodean and Scots speaking Upper-Middle class English, regional Northern English, cockney English, and a variety of random, indefinable regional accents.

This is my first stab at producing and now I’ve worked out what it entails, I’m starting to enjoy it and I’m rather glad I volunteered!!

More news to follow after the summer break………