Crescent Theatre Blog

There are just three shows to go in the run of The Rivals which finishes tomorrow, and tonight’s performance is once again a sell-out.

For amateur semi-professional actors with the day job to contend with, a run can always become draining. Time vanishes and dishes are left uncleaned, clothes go unwashed - and credit card repayments become overdue (something I only realised this morning, dammit).

Add to that the exhaustion of intense rehearsals we had leading up to opening night, and the number of pre-show bananas being eaten is now rapidly increasing as the show nears the end of its week in the Studio.

Every night has, of course, been different - as our audiences have varied in size and composition. Some have keenly watched in studied silence, others have guffawed and chuckled loudly at even the mildest provocation.

On a whole, our performances too have ranged from understated subtlety to overblown bluster. In between has been a whole lot of hitting the mark - which has been great.

There have been a couple of stumbles, but more often that not, everybody is finding something new every night and improving things just a little more each time. With the cast being sat at the side of the stage, it is a treat to watch new things emerge even now.

In particular, Mrs Malaprop is proving to be comedy gold (just as we knew she would), and Sir Anthony Absolute is coming dangerously close to exploding. Last night (Thurs), I even swear he started dancing at one point(!)

Passion, hilarity, arguments, camaraderie, melancholy, pathos and joy. With three shows to go, The Rivals has already had it all.

And that is just what’s been happening off-stage…

If we had a curtain, it would be going up for the first time tonight as, after rehearsing since January, The Rivals hits the stage.

It’s been an interesting process with games, balloons, fruit-based vocal exercises and stage combat - alongside the regular rigmarole of line learning and blocking. I even went on a trip to Bath and the cast were doing so well early on we got a two week break(!) But now it’s time to get on there and do it.

Tonight is a £5 Preview, which, with only one Dress Rehearsal (even though “the prejudice has always run in favour of two”), is a tacit admission that there may still be a few rough edges - though none of them are deliberate I assure you!

But for the cast, it is very much our opening night - and so today will be spent with emotions rattling between sheer excitement (”we are going to be ace!”) and utter fear (”are we going to be ace?”) And at the last count it looks like a near full-house tonight, so those feelings are getting exaggerated to even further extremes…! Good sales are a validation of hard work, but make the stakes a lot higher.

But, whether a big or small audience, when it all comes down to it, in a few (long) hours it will be up to us to walk the walk and talk the talk. And if we can manage to do both at the same time, then we really should have a show on our hands…!

Update 16:00 Director Ian Nicholson reports tonight has now sold out. That’s good news by and large, but means he won’t be able to see the debut of his own show…!

We had our technical rehearsal for The Rivals last night. A ‘Tech’ can often be a tortuous affair and it’s not unheard of for them to go in to the small hours, but our director’s minimalist approach meant that things were fairly straightforward and taken care of in good time - and we’re now good to go with tonight’s dress rehearsal.

Proving that his talents don’t stop at directing, renaissance man Graeme Allan was in attendance to very kindly take few shots for us. You can see a quick montage above and a bigger selection of pics on Facebook.

There’s a bit of a buzz around the Crescent at the moment, and it is maybe a little strange that three plays about one of humanity’s most horrid plagues could have engendered such fervour and positivity. The Terrorism Mini-Season started out with a couple of performances being cancelled due to (let’s be honest) disappointing sales, but has quickly picked up a solid momentum that has now garnered two top-tier reviews and well-deserved credit for all of those involved.

What could have been a trio of commercial suicide bombers has turned out to be compelling and provocative drama, quite at odds with what ‘am-dram’ is commonly perceived to offer. And if the number in the audience last night was anything to go by, things have turned around at the Box Office too. Bravo, indeed.

With all this, it’s a little scary to be next up with The Rivals, which opens next Friday. Gulp.

Not only do we have to deal with an impending Tech, building confidence, the nerves of nailing lines and moves, stepping back instead of stepping forward (or, in my case, not stepping at all)…

Not only, as the Birmingham Post reports, do we have to abide by our house rules which include referring to everyone in the proper form…

…but now myself and the rest of the team are tasked with carrying on the momentum and maintaining that buzz - and following two five-star reviews.

For our turn, we won’t have such weighty themes as incarceration, torture and genocide in our arsenal. We won’t be able to employ the earnest seam of realism which propelled ‘T2T’ so well. And we won’t be able to say “fuck”.

However, we do have the theme of love, which, as someone once said, will tear us apart. Surely, being torn apart is a form of terrorism or torture…?

Also, whilst the nature of a classical text demands a certain theatricality (is that a word?), Director Ian Mr Nicholson has reined in our initial tendency towards hammy melodrama and grounded our performances in a form of heightened realism. It works well.

And when it comes to profanity Acres has a mouth like a storm drain. Barely one of his lines passes without a trio of curse words being uttered, albeit genteel ones.

(It should also be put on the record here that Rob Mr Mrozek, as Acres, is currently in danger of stealing the show, the theatre and all of Brindleyplace to boot. Last rehearsal, he delayed us for nearly 15 minutes as the entire cast laughed and cried in hysterics at one particular moment he introduced. Worth the price of admission on its own, when you see it you’ll be thankful you were there to witness something that will take on almost as much historical importance as the invention of the wheel).

So, when it comes to comparing The Rivals with the prevailing Terrorism plays, there seem to be quite a few parallels and perhaps there’s not that much for me to be worried about - we can match everything they have. What’s more, the team can perhaps rest easy because The Rivals also has something that no other play can match…

Mrs Malaprop. Our weapon of mass distraction…

My workroom at home is overwhelmed with dresses and netting and gauze to make petticoats and overskirts and ribbon to make ruffles and bows - and that’s just the men’s costume!!

No, seriously though, this production is going to look GORGEOUS. We have more costume fittings on Sunday 29th, when hopefully it will all come together. Mr Nicholson, our Director, will be absent, so he can’t say he doesn’t like it! It’ll be too late, ha ha… Sewing buttons and bows and hems and hooks on April 1st - no joke.

Want to see the end result? You’ll just have to buy tickets. Suffice to say that it’s late eighteenth century with a modern twist and lots of colour…

Mary's Office

One of the most famous aspects of The Rivals is the duel at the climax of the play. And today at our dawn rehearsal, our director got hands-on as he enthusiastically put Messrs Frost and Jones through their paces.

With the mighty clang of the clashing swords, it was very dramatic and exciting.

But it was also a little scary as the untrained blades swung around a little too much at one point - providing at least one cast member with an impromptu haircut…

This morning, myself and Sir Les Stringer (Sir Anthony Absolute) headed to Birmingham Costume Hire to try on a selection of outfits kindly prepared for us there by Paul Spilsbury.

Amidst this Aladdin’s Cave containing everything from hula skirts to astronaut suits, was a fine array of jackets for us to try - and one potential option may even see Sir Anthony delivering a little sing-along number thanks to its musical buttons! My jacket looked rather splendid, even on top of a t-shirt - so it was a shame to have to leave it behind.

Things are starting to gather momentum around the production, which brings both nervousness and excitement. But if even if I don’t manage to get those pesky lines learnt in time, thanks to Paul and our designer Mary, I should at least look the part…(!)

Having been given leave to miss today’s rehearsal, it was with a clear conscience that I headed to Bath in order to immerse myself in the world of The Rivals. So, rather than merely pretend to ponce about on the North Parade, I got to do it for real (amidst torrential rain and hail).

It was a hoot to wander through the city’s impressive architecture and imagine how the play’s characters, with whom I’ve now become so familiar, would have paraded around. Seeing places referred to in the script was certainly fun and brought passages of the play to life.

SIR ANTHONY: I observed your niece’s maid coming forth from a circulating library…

There’s an ambiance around Bath that our director has encouraged us to learn about and bring to the performance. Surely, the play could not exist without the backdrop of Bath’s social setting at the time. So, as well as wet feet and a stinking cold, I hope I’ve brought a little bit of the city’s personality back with me…

The results of the recent photo-shoot for The Rivals are in, and you can see the chosen publicity shot above, featuring Alicia Crockford as Lydia Languish.

Thanks go to photographer Petra Setvinova, and to Sarah McCaffrey for all her efforts in organising the shoot.