Did you ever wonder what really happens at a rehearsal? Especially one of those early rehearsals, when there are no props, no costumes and when the actors still struggle with their textbooks? Well, then follow us and meet Roger, our “Bellhop”, who lets us peek into a certain room at EineWeltHaus on a particularly hot summer day:

Last night was amazing.

After holding us away from the actual text for a full month of rehearsals, Bogdan finally turned us loose with the text. It was unbearably hot in the rehearsal room but no one really cared. We were just supposed to say our lines with gusto. Since there hasn’t been enough time yet for us to actually memorize our lines, Bogdan told us to read them when necessary.

That definitely contributed its own flavor of humor. Melody dramatically played Maggie’s enthrallment with the music, her head thrown back in ecstasy, her voice trembling with excitement – but held her script high in one hand so that she could read her lines. David  convincingly portrayed his Italian tenor’s gastric distress with a wonderfully convincing Italian accent – then stopped suddenly in the middle of a sentence, saying in his own voice as he consults his script, “Wait, what comes next?”. Jim stormed around the room, over the top as you can get as he played Saunders – then suddenly stopped and yelled, still in Saunders’ voice, “I can’t read the damn lines without my glasses.”

• 

• 

• 

We laughed until the tears came. We wildly cheered each other on when there was a perfect moment. We encouraged each other when, despite three or four tries, we still couldn’t get one part right. It was challenging, demanding, exhausting work, but at the end of the evening we looked at each other in puzzled amazement that four hours had gone by in such a short time.

Being on stage and bringing joy, laughter and entertainment to our audience in November will be a wonderful experience, of course, but participating in this chaos in rehearsal as we all struggle together to create a harmonious whole, is a life changing privilege.

There is no room for the individual here. What we accomplish will only be what we can do together. The trust we are building in each other as we do this, and the sense of creating something wonderful together out of dry text and stage directions on the page is satisfying far beyond anything that some drug could produce.

3 August 2018

Author: Roger Voight

Pictures: Christine Fuss