Cowardy cowardy custard!

Hi there readers, sorry it's been so long - did you miss me?

The challenge laid down in my last blog was, unfortunately not taken up by any of the people I mentioned so either;
a) they are cowardy, cowardy custards
b) no-one actually reads this blog except Director Guillotine and Miss Pross and maybe she doesn't even read it, just logs in to make sure I've written one.

Let me bring you up to speed with the world according to Producer Guillotine...

At the weekend Director Guillotine and myself stayed at a fabulous hotel in London, meaning two things;
1. No flags were going to be finished
2. We could visit the Dickens Museum in Bloomsbury

We first went to Soho, Dr Manette's house actually is (not Dr Manette as in the person in our show, I mean Dr Manette in the book by Charlie boy himself, whilst wandering around we found this little side road off Greek Street called... wait for it... MANETTE STREET!!! Am I too excited? I thought it was very cool but maybe I need to get out more... Anyway, with a little bit of ingenuity, a text service that answers any questions and a belly full of lovely pizza we wandered down to the Dickens House museum. It's basically his house that he lived in for a couple of years, but there was lots of interesting stuff there, including a flatulent old lady. We also pushed our luck a bit and asked them if we could send some flyers for the play to display on their counter in the little shop area - and they said YES!!! Woo Hoo! Director Guillotine will liberate an A5 envelope and we get get these on their way to them, how cool, it's almost like Charlie himself is giving us his approval...

So, onwards to Monday night, slightly later start on Monday due to Sound man's kids but it gave me a chance to do a little more flag sewing - nearly there on the Union Flag now...

Director Guillotine wanted to do a complete run through of the first act tonight and suggested we might get two run throughs in (in 2 hours?!?). We did have some challenges however; newbie victim girl can't do Mondays at the moment so she wasn't there, Darnay's Father was also absent along with other newbie peasant and Defarge had been very careless and "misplaced" his voice. Evremonde was a little too excited at having to run a small child over in his carriage, I missed, Dr Manette stood in for the Attorney General and became Churchill again and everyone wanted to see Miss Pross' custard...

On the very positive side, Barsad's new voice was a winner (well done), Lucie is putting everyone to shame with line learning (teachers pet), we have ANOTHER two newbies (welcome, welcome) and Evremonde showed me his pencil case, after a conversation about some correspondence from Boulogne...

Waiting for the train that never comes....

Hi there readers, just wanted to give you a quick update on Monday's blocking and to let you know that there will be no blog after Thursday as I have a work event to attend, unless one of the other cast fancies writing something for me to post??? Evremonde? Miss Pross perhaps? Maybe Lucie would like to try her hand at it? Darnay? You're always moaning that my grammar is wrong, fancy a go yourself?

Let's see shall we?

So, anyhoo - Monday ah yes - Tardy notices given to a few of the cast, Director Guillotine and myself included (those wonderful people at South West Trains making an hours journey 2 and a half hours and then leaving me stranded 2 stops from my car)!!! So we started a little late in Room 1 (as Sound man is putting the kids through their paces for their show, he has the hall until 9 for a couple of weeks) with the runaway carriage scene. Director Guillotine has choreographed a piece to music (no it's not becoming a musical) for the beginning of the scene that I think is excellent! In fact I think that his vision for the show is quite inspirational - okay I am a little biased, but this show will be fantastic and I've already sold three tickets!!!

We have also located a guillotine for a bargain price (one which as Producer I am happy to sign off on), Wardrobe Mistress has yet more fantastic costume bargains and has started to match cast members with costumes(wonderful work WM, we are utterly delighted), Barsad will also be Soldier in scene 2 (thanks so much), Defarge will also be a Judge and Miss Pross has got some fabulous fabric for her costume!

Blocking is going very well, Director Guillotine is delighted with everyone especially as lots of people already have good characterisations going on and we're not even working on that yet!

We could still do with some more men, so if anyone knows anyone who has some free time....

Spare a shekel for an ex-demon?

This weekend I have been mostly making flags.

To the extent that I went to bed last night still thinking about them as I hadn't finished (I made a boo boo and had to redo a whole section which probably cost me two hours or so). Besides from the muck up I made, I am extremely proud of the one and a bit that I have done. My living room is covered with bits of thread and I keep forgetting to pick up the pins from the kitchen (I'm surprised Director Guillotine hasn't moaned about it - actually he's been very understanding and I left the house in quite a pickle!!!).

Last week ended with the first blocking session of the show, Carton cried off the rehearsal using some flimsy excuse of 120 mile round trip for one line, whilst Darnay came for his one line's worth of blocking... The scenes were set to music (all v.dramatic) and everyone had to learn to count to 10 (easier for some) although Director Guillotine thought that 60 divided by 6 was 12 (!). The peasants were outstanding and got a special mention in Director Guillotine's lovely email sent out on Friday to the cast. He was also chuffed to bits with Darnay's father and Evremonde in their rather difficult scene and was completely luvvied out with how great we all were.

Miss Pross took on the usual seamstress role (and I don't mean Seamstress, as that's someone else completely) and unpicked elastic from fitted sheets (for the flags) which was a great help and saved me loads of time at the weekend, so thank you very much MP.

The last scene that was blocked involved Lucie, Defarge, Mr Lorry, Dr Manette and myself and it was quite amusing to note that all of us had been Demons in the summer when Director Guillotine was Director Demon (we all love him see?)!

Blocking for scenes 6-10 tonight, a big court scene and some more set to music and Wardrobe Mistress will be setting up shop at the back to try some things on the cast for size, pheasant costumes if Carton and Darnay had anything to do with it...

Yes, Mistress!

Wednesday - my first production meeting as a participant rather than a chauffeur. I had drawn up an agenda and even circulated it to the production team and to be honest I was quite proud (yes, I know, little things....). Even better, we'd found someone to do lights for us (yet another worry off my mind)!

Sound man sent his apologies as did Lights guy so in the end it was just Director Guillotine, Wardrobe Mistress, Researcher and me and a long, long list of things to discuss. Director Guillotine and I had assured Wardrobe Mistress that we would be done by 10pm (Ha!) and I was hoping that we would be done even before that (ha ha!).

Anyway, I could go through what we talked about but it would send you all into a coma and I'm feeling nice today (well, I do sometimes). To cut a long (I think we finished at around 10.45pm) story short, we had a very successful meeting (well I thought so), with some great ideas batted around and Wardrobe Mistress was outstanding!!! I will not have to worry about costumes at all as she has it all in hand and then some!

Obviously we've come out of it with lots of things to do and think about (yes, more) but Miss Pross is proving to be a positive mine of information so I think I might have to pluck a few gems from there....

Reading with Subtitles and Heavy Metal

Oh my, where does the time go? Is it Friday already?

My apologies readers, for not having blogged sooner, but this week has been rather busy, I can tell you - and I still haven't made the flags (but more of that later).

Last week when I wrote, I seethed at having to stand most of the way to work on the train so I couldn't sit and write some fantastic prose for you all. However, on Tuesday morning I took a slightly later train that was much less busy and had time to sit and write to my hearts content. That should have formed the basis of my blog. I could have just typed up what I had written straight into here and it would have been witty and insighful and informative. Except it wasn't, it was drivel. Looks like you had a lucky escape last week!!!

So let's start with Monday Monday (laa laa la la la la). The first read through with the cast in their roles. Carton and Darnay provided subtitles for Evremonde which I thought was a little mean (stop teasing him or you won't be allowed to sit together any more), I'd never tease Evremonde in such a way - would I? (Do you have your pencil case with you today?)

We had yet another newbie to add to our brood, a friend of the Revolutionary who said she didn't mind what she helped out with, so she'll be on stage as well!!! As well as that we had one of the not so newbies return to the fold and will now take the part of Peasant woman having been very poorly sick, (glad you're feeling better again).

Some of the music was also showcased by Director Guillotine although my ipod player was on batteries and kept stopping - not very helpful when you're trying to create atmosphere... Barsad was delighted with our choice of end song - we're pleased you're pleased!

Overall Director Guillotine was delighted with the read through, asked some of us to be less girly (the boys) and some of us to be less posh (the peasants) and all of us to come back next week!! Hoorah!!!!

The Things we do for Love

So, I'm sitting here looking at the long, long list of things I need to either do or think about as Producer Guillotine and the tune that's going round in my head is "The Things we do for Love". There's so much more to this than I ever imagined and it takes up my every other thought. Don't get me wrong, I never thought it would be easy, I just didn't know....

Director Guillotine and I had a "TOTC free" night on Friday, but then Saturday and Sunday were not, from buying stuff to make flags and working out how to make said flags, through to producing prop lists and a set list. We have had some rather excellent news to ease my worries a little bit; Setman and Dangerous have joined the team and Setman is already on the case with the props (hoorah!).

Wardrobe Mistress is hard on the case as well and is making me think about yet more things I didn't think about before (my brain hurts) and Stryver has joined the fold once more (well done, you won't regret it). Tonight is the first read through with the principal characters and I must admit I'm rather excited....

I wonder if I could get myself an Assistant....

CASTing

So, this morning I thought I could sit and write a lovely long prose with lots of interesting quips and observations about the read through and auditions whilst on the train on my journey to work (which takes an hour). What better way to spend the time than giving you, the reader, some insight to the world of amateur dramatics? Well, thanks to South West Trains, you're not going to get that now, as instead of providing a train with 8 carriages, they thought it would be great to just have 4! So I spent 45 minutes of my hour journey standing, not really conducive to writing witty and remarkable stuff! So this is what you've got instead. Don't blame me, blame South West Trains!!!

Anyway, where were we? Oh yeah, read through on Monday. The first outing of the script that Director Guillotine and I spent painstakingly adapting. It was nervy I can tell you. The turnout was pretty good, the script seemed to go down quite well (except for one who had to see me after class for a little extra tuition) and enthusiasm for the show seemed to be building - not just from Director Guillotine and myself. Everyone got to read for different parts and hopefully gained an understanding of the play and what parts they wanted. Oh, except for my little pupil who needed the extra help and had to be put back on the right track after being given the panto version of the play - including dancing pheasants!!!

So audition night rolled around, quicker than you can say antidisestablishmentarianism and Director Guillotine and I were VERY excited (and I was more than a little nervous as I was auditioning myself). Everyone who was at the read through, except two people (I think), turned up to put themselves forward for a part which pleased Director Guillotine a lot. He has told me since that the quality of auditions was exceptional and made his choices and decisions incredibly difficult, so well done everyone who auditioned.

The die has now been cast, or the show has anyway (hee hee)! You can see the full list of actors and their roles at http://www.cast-online.org.uk/ as I can't be bothered to type it all out here, suffice to say that someone who wasn't going to take a lead role has taken a lead role, we have a peasant woman who thought she might not be in it, a newbie who will be handled quite nastily in her first show and someone who hasn't been on the Colnbrook stage for over 5 years - I told you Director Guillotine was persuasive!!!

Anyway I must end this, as I'm being bombarded with emails from Miss Pross to help me produce, so to finish I just have to say, the cast is FABULOUS, the show will be AMAZING and I am so excited about the whole thing, I couldn't get to sleep last night until the wee small hours. Now, when exactly do I order tables????

In the beginning

Am I crazy? Hmm a tough question. Maybe you need to be a little crazy to be into amateur dramatics. Actually, thinking about my fellow thespians I think that's probably true...

So, anyway, here we are again, new show, new Director (who will be known as Director Guillotine for the purposes of this blog) and new Producer (that's me, that is). Now, I need to get you, the reader, up to speed with a few things.

Director Guillotine put forward a play for the spring at the AGM last year. He wanted to do the Elephant Man (then this blog would be all about elephants I suppose), then he discovered that the license for amateur performace had been withdrawn as a touring group were going to be doing it and had refused amateur performance at the same time - nice I thought. So we then had an EGM and Director Guillotine put forward a Tale of Two Cities, which was voted in. Fabbo.

Then Director Guillotine needed a team, so he asked me to produce the show, now I have never produced a show before and had no idea what to expect or what I really had to do, so foolishly I agreed, perhaps because I live with him and he can be very persuasive... So that's me now, Producer Guillotine with spreadsheets, a producers book with Paris on the front (I thought that was rather clever) and no free time from here to the show... What have I let myself in for????