Directors Notes 5 (a video)

This is Andrew Gillies and Fiona Highet in MISSING Rehearsal playing Ian and Carol



Interesting few days leading to a second stumble through for lights on Saturday. The challenges for actors on new plays are particularly volatile in that as we discover more and more where the play sits or how it technically and thematically plays out, there are often text changes, cuts, shifts, and re-assignment of choral lines as well as blocking changes. It becomes clearer and clearer to me that Florence has written a world that is disintegrating for the protagonist(s) and antagonist(s) alike. Also the world of the community (chorus) is such an essential aspect of the piece that as we struggle with actor operated scene changes of furniture and props, we have discovered that the worlds increasingly overlap and eventually collide (especially for the cop Carol). This needs to be reflected too in the lighting and sound design so daily calls to the designers to discuss how we manifest this. Pieces of "furniture" from all three worlds invade one scene. Actors finish one scene as another actor begins theirs. In my minds eye I feel like a camera is constantly zooming out from an ECU to reveal a world in the background.