Romeo and Juliet - Rehearsal 12

5.2
This scene probably didn't need another rehearsal, but I'm glad we had one anyway.  Zach (Friar John) came up with a new direction to take the very small character that actually makes this scene work better.  He's made Friar John a slow talker.  The means that Glenn (Friar Lawrence) is constantly waiting for information.  It gives the two characters even better contrast than we were getting before really hightens how much Friar John doesn't know and how much Friar Lawrence is upset by his news.

2.3 and 3.3
These two scenes are certainly coming along.  We did some touch ups and some character work, but most of our time was actually spent on the moment in 3.3 when Romeo (Johnny) tries to stab himself.  At the run on Saturday, this moment looked overly stagey.  I knew it needed fixing, but it took me a long while (too long, in my opinion) to figure out what the problem was.  I realized that, while I had the Nurse (Wagoner) stopping Romeo from stabbing himself, all the Friar (Glenn) was doing was speaking words at him.  When it hit me, it did so like a ton of bricks.  DUH!  The Friar has to try to get his ass over there to stop him too.  Once I had Glenn take just a few steps toward Johnny in that moment, everything looked better.  Phew.  Bullet dodged.

4.5
We had some structural issues with this scene.  People were in weird places.  But, once we got everyone on their correct pages emotionally, everything else just sort of fell into place.  Katie (my AD) threw out the suggestion for them to all go completely over the top for one run of the scene.  And, while some of it was quite funny, they all got at some really great stuff from going too far.  Once we brought them back down and told them what to keep of the crazy stuff, the scene started to have the aweful, sad feel to it which was just perfect.  In short... lookin' good!

3.5
This scene is a very odd scene in two parts.  The first part is tender and bittersweet and sad.  The second part is scary as hell.  Even my costume designer said so.  I wanted to make sure we go the second half of this scene just right.  I wanted it just scary enough that everyone feels all of Juliet's pain in that moment, but I didn't want everyone to think that Capulet regularly beats his daughter.  What we've got is a scene that is just scary as hell and when Capulet decides he's done with Juliet, she could just as well be a dish rag as his only daughter.  I think the topper was when I stopped them in the middle and had Jay (Capulet) give AJ (Juliet) a big fatherly hug when he first enters.  It really is the icing on the scary cake.  It let's the sweet part of the scene linger just a little too long so folks start to get settled and then hits them with scary Capulet.  Good stuff.  Oh, and as for the first part, AJ and Johnny are getting more and more comfy with each other.  And the more comfortable that they get, the better this intimate scene looks.  I can say no more... you'll just have to see it for yourself. :)