We’re doing our first complete run of the show off book this evening. Ordinarily, eleven days before opening, the books would be long gone, but there are a lot of words in this show, and despite early cuts (disposing of the expository bits between Kent and the Gentleman that I call the “Previously on Hill Street Blues…” scenes) we’re still making small trims in an effort to keep the running time under three hours.
I have a nice little scene nearly at the top of the show, where France is betrothed to Cordelia because Burgundy won’t have her now that Lear has disinherited her. And then I get to hang out and finish reading the last two Lemony Snickets until well into the second half, where I am responsible for carrying off maimed or dead bodies and bringing in bad news (the British armies are moving against France, Goneril has poisoned her sister and then stabbed herself—did I need to preface this with a spoiler alert?)
This is my first work with Cedar Lane Stage, which rehearses and performs at Cedar Lane Unitarian Universalist Church in Chevy Chase, Md. The CLUUC campus is a lovely, leafy collection of buildings on a hillside sloping down to Rock Creek, with the Beltway just beyond. As with most church buildings, there are a number of other groups using the space at the same time—a woodwind choir rehearsal, an AA meeting. All last week it was a little tricky to stay focused because someone was rehearsing selections from Carmina Burana. Lear is howling at the thunderstorm while the organ upstairs is blasting out the reprise of “O Fortuna.” It kinda fits.
(Actually, King Lear‘s familiarity makes for lots of mashups. There is a short story by James Thurber that I will have to track down that puts together a radio evangelist with one of Edgar’s “mad Tom” scenes, and the killing of Oswald swirls into the mix at the end of the Beatles’ “I Am the Walrus.”)
We perform in the church auditorium. There is a set of steps leading up to a shallow stage, but in this production, as in most CLS shows, most of the action is on the floor of the auditorium, with audience seating on three sides. By far the most distinctive feature of the space are the floor-to-ceiling windows on two walls. Nice views of the surrounding woods, but it means that any lighting effects are completely lost on matinee performances, and we’re doing two of them.
I’m working again with Tom (Gloucester) and Dan (Kent). I’ve seen good work in the past from David (Fool) and Kelli (Regan), and I’m seeing more of it here. Everyone else is new to me, including our Lou (Lear). This is my first time working with director Ed. Ed is a stickler for punctuation (and what Shakespearean isn’t?), hence his nickname and the title of this post, thanks to Brett (Albany).