Week 6: Entry 1: As the show unfolds

Acting is a very strange activity. And this show is a particularly curious beast. Tilly No-Body is very much about dialogue: that might sound strange given that it's a one person show. Yet, dialogue, as I've previously mentioned, can be with a prop, a sound cue, a lighting state, a piece of the set, and of course the audience. Therefore, every night feels very different, as the audience is such an important part of the experience, witnessing Tilly's journey, sharing Tilly's decisions, celebrating her successes and fearing for her failures.

So far we've had three more shows since the first night. Friday night included a talk-back, which was terrific. The audience's questions and responses were so intelligent and interested, illustrating the fact that not only had they followed the play attentively - and it's quite a demand on an audience with regard to narrative - but they had also been provoked by the issues. I could tell that some of the audience members were students perhaps assigned papers on the play, and they were so astute in their questioning. This is one of the exciting aspects of working in an environment that encourages excellence in practice, research and teaching: all three aspects of which interweave with this project. There's an element of intellectual curiosity, as well as enjoyment of shared story-telling. The educational part of the project is important to both myself and Miles, and we were delighted at the way in which both Reed and Sabba contributed so fulsomely to the talk-back, taking centre stage so that actor and director could stay on the sidelines.

Saturday night was a strange night for me, as suddenly the props seemed to have a life of their own. The Frank puppet decided to fall off his chair. The walking globe decided to take a stroll around the set. One of the hats decided to attach itself to my boot. The pompoms on the pierrot costume decided to pop off whenever they felt like it. I firmly believe in what the Polish director, Jerzy Grotowski, advocates: discipline encourages spontaneity. This show is very tight in terms of where everything is placed and the exact timing of moments. That allows for me to feel safe enough in the structure to be playful and unexpected. However...I could rehearse this play till the cows come home, and the props and costumes might still develop a life of their own.

Another anomaly of acting is that time loses all its usual structure. The show - on stage - felt very slow to me, and sometimes I almost felt as though I were wading through treacle. And yet, we ran at one minute faster than usual. Certainly, the audience was very warm, and Reed's dad was in, so I wanted it to be a good show to reflect Reed's contribution.

The Sunday matinee was interesting, in that the energy a performer has at 2pm is quite different from 8pm. I'd had a lovely breakfast, the day was a little rainy with the signs of Fall in the air, and I was really looking forward to the performance. During the show, I became aware of what a challenge the piece is to the actor: while the stages of Tilly's decline into madness might be cumulative for the audience, they are very episodic for me as the actor. In some ways, I hop in and out of the emotional content far more than the audience does: they are able to share in her journey, while I as the actor have to be a little bit more of a puppeteer, guiding the character through the turbulent seas. At the end of the performance, I walked out into the autumnal afternoon, and felt a great deal of affection for Tilly. What a strange life she led! What a strange thing acting is! What a delicious thing live performance is! Vulnerable and life-affirming, at one and the same time.

Week 5: Entry 4: First Night

What a lovely audience! They just seemed to get it. They laughed in the right places. They fell silent in the right places. They expressed their spontaneous appreciation of moments with a flutter of applause. They were just great friends to share the auditorium with. This play is about audiences and actors and the relationship between the two, and this audience was very good fun.

Actors have no real purpose without an audience. And Tilly uses the audience as a friend, a confidant, someone to whom she can confess true feelings, and give them some insight into how she feels about Frank and his plays. I don't like audiences to feel they don't have an importance and an input, which is why I love live theatre. It's a new thing every night, and it's very exciting to feel the atmosphere that can exist.

This is quite a short entry, because I'm just off to warm up for the second night. I like second nights even more: there's something slightly more 'real' about second nights. It's the 'real' show. Last night, some of the props played up: they were mischievous. Not that that really bothers me: I like anything being a partner - a prop, a costume, a sound effect. But I'm looking forward to feeling the play's real rhythm and story telling. It takes me about 3 1/2 hours to prepare for this show. From 5.30-6.00, I warm up my voice and body, and scamper through some lines. From 6.00-6.20pm, I warm-up the theatre space, tuning the lute and testing out a few other little things. From 6.20-6.40, we curl my hair. From 6.40-6.55, I put on the make-up. From 6.55-7.15pm, we finish styling the hair. From 7.15pm-7.25pm, I sit quietly and contemplate a few photos of Tilly, Frank and their children which are stuck to my dressing room mirror. From 7.25-7.40, we get the costumes on. From 7.40-8.00pm.... Well, you'll have to come and see the show to find out what happens for those 20 minutes...

Week 5: Entry 3: Dress

Dress rehearsals are like a mini performance, and we were fortunate to have a number of students come along to form an audience. Suddenly the piece sprang into a whole new life. We suddenly were reminded just how funny the play is. Tilly is really quite a quirky character: she has humour and charm, and is touching in her desire to please. While we knew this was latent in the text, it took the live presence of the audience to ignite that dialogue and texture.

Just like tech rehearsals, I love dress rehearsals. There's an excitement and preparatory state, and Miles, Reed and Sabba have been perfect in creating a good, collaborative, working environment. And the Dress rehearsal is about Dress! And I have 6 wonderful costumes, which under the lights look even more impressive than in the fitting room.

Also, there's now hair and make-up. I have a terrific dresser, Myrelle - a Design major - who just knows how to create a perfect dressing room atmosphere. Myrelle has learnt how to do something with my hair to make it look appropriate to the period, and she's a natural. I've also been taught how to create an appropriate amount of dramatic make-up, with the dark German Expressionist eyes and the bright red lipstick. I find it hard to recognise the person looking back at me from the mirror. Myrelle is particularly good at creating a very calm atmosphere. She knows at what time we need to start curling the hair, at what time to step into the costumes (I wear 5 of them all at one time, so once I'm in them, there's no getting out! There's no last minute rush for a pee!). She's great at setting the personal props that are put in pockets in the costumes. She's terrific. And she's never done it before. She intuitively understands the rhythm of the backstage life and the gentle build-up to performance.

Week 5: Entry 2: Tech time: Let there be sound!

How our composer David Roesner got through the technical rehearsals is almost as impressive as the soundscape he has created. David stepped off the plane from the UK with no sleep for over 24 hours on Friday night and found himself straight in the technical rehearsals. On Saturday morning, the spotlight was metaphorically on him. David has designed a soundscape across 5000 miles and 8 hours' time difference, responding intuitively and artistically to many of our demands. Often he had nothing but a few moments of filmed rehearsal on YouTube, and yet the soundscape that he has created adds a texture and a personality to the production that I could never have imagined.

David often works against the dramatic texture of scene: if the scene is already melancholy, then he finds a pulse or a key that counterpoints that to add to the audience's emotional journey. If the scene is frenetic, he finds an atmospheric cranking up of tension in a different time signature from the written text. In this way, he weaves a whole new thread into the fabric of the production. There are times when the sound acts as a partner to the actor: Frank Wedekind's spirit is often conjured up by the soundscape. Other times, Tilly's inner state is revealed. Some of the melodies that I have written for the cabaret songs are reconfigured in motifs within the music. Sound effects are given a life that renders them more than just a ticking clock or a tram screeching or a train bell clanging.

This is all very fortuitous, as David and I had not worked together before, but I just had an intuition about him as a person and a musician. I can't imagine what the play would be like now without his sophisticated and subtle score.

Week 5: Entry 1: Tech time: Let there be light!

I love technical rehearsals. This is the first time everything really comes together: the lighting, sound, costumes and set, and much of the focus is on the technical aspects in a way that the actor can actually feel quite free and exploratory. The darkened auditorium, fractured by the light of laptops working out lighting plots and call-sheets, is a-whirr with the excitement of artists in creation.

For the lighting designer, it's the first time that they can really get to work. With costumes, props and set, the rehearsal period allows usually enough time to fine-tune much of the design. But it's only once all the colours of the costumes and set, and the style of the piece is fully evident, that the lighting designer can really weave their magic.

And Tom Munn is just the man for such magic. Tom is the Professor of Lighting Design in the Dept of Theatre and Dance, and he plied his profession at the San Francisco Opera for 25 years. This man knows his stuff. He knows the emotional effects that can be created through light and colour. He understands the rhythm that can be evoked by fade-ups, fade-downs, picking out moments with a follow-spot, etc. Because this is a particularly theatrical piece, Tom also has the chance to create some great theatrical effects with shadows. Frank Wedekind's style of performance was hugely influential in the development of German Expressionism, all those black and white, shadowy images of Gothic streets and castles, vampires and maidens in distress. And Tom is using the impact of a large shadow against a small person in some truly exciting ways.

Usually in a tech, I spend time as an actor sitting in the auditorium watching the effects being wrought with light. This is a one person play so sadly I can't do that this time. So I shall be relying on photographs and video to let me in to the textures and colours.