Geva Cohort – “Informed Consent” Part IV – Rehearsal Week 3

(Informed Consent, directed by Sean Daniels, runs from March 18 to April 13)

Now the hard work begins – learning all those lines!  I watched as the cast started at the top of the show, several times.  Most of the actors said many of their lines in almost a monotone, sometimes looking off in the distance, as if they were mentally picturing the script.  As they repeated them, I could almost see them working to internalize the words, to make them feel natural and spontaneous, instead of rote.  Anyone who’s ever had to memorize a song or a poem can probably relate.  Not only must the actors learn their lines, they also pretty much have to know the entire script, because their dialogue depends on that of all the others.  And they must be able to be interrupted mid-stream, whether for a correction or a break, and jump right back in, without returning to the beginning.  Stephie Kesselring and Frank Cavallo were overseeing this rehearsal in Sean’s absence (he and the playwright were at an ethics conference at the U of R), supplying missing or correcting lines.  Stephie was very encouraging, when they stopped at one point and she said, “you guys are really close.” 

The beginning of Informed Consent must be particularly difficult to memorize, because it’s not a conversation;  it’s strings of stories, and sometimes just a snippet of a story, interrupted by another actor’s story.  Jessica Wortham, who plays the anthropologist, likened it to a song, with each actor having little solos, interspersed with some unison lines.  And in fact, they refer to the opening and a few other parts of the play as a chorus.

At the second run-through of a different section, Stephie warned the actors that she was going to stop them at mistakes, because the “actors weren’t helping themselves” when they erred or lost the pattern.  Fajer Al-Kaisi, who plays the anthropologist’s husband (and reminds me a bit of Kal Penn), needed a lot of lines, but interestingly, knew when it was his turn to speak!  At one point, there was this amusing exchange:

Fajer:  Is that it?

Stephie:  That’s kind of it.

Fajer: That's me, Captain Paraphrase!

Rehearsals are generally about 8 hours, with an hour lunch break, and union-mandated 10-minute breaks periodically.  At one of those breaks, I asked a couple of the actors what they do during their evenings.  Right now, it’s mostly homework – memorizing their lines.  They also connect with their loved ones, since all of the actors are ‘out of town.’  What an odd profession, to be someone else’s entertainment, and to be away from home and family for weeks at a time.  I felt a bit guilty when I snuck out after only 2 hours to return to my own home, knowing they had hours more to slog through before returning to their Geva apartments out by the airport.  And I felt lucky to live in a city with a first-rate theatre that can attract such talent, show after show, and grateful to these people who have chosen this (to me) strange and difficult way to make a living...