We suffer, we suffer. We worked on what I've come to think of as Act II. It's really a rather arbitrary division that encompasses the last 40 minutes, just a little more than half the play. The plan was to work our way through it and then to run that much. Sometimes the ends of shows, ok, MY shows have a tendency to have under rehearsed endings. This plan was made in a conscious effort to avoid that.

We had done the same work on Monday but I thought if we repeated it might really stick. It did, but it turned out to be the rehearsal where all 4 cast members decided to let go of their scripts. That is always a painful rehearsal for whoever is doing it and those around them and it is can be difficult to make any real progress on getting the actors to work on their faces when they are reading the scripts inside their head. (That is faces as in, "You had really good faces during the play." So I've adopted it as what to call work on the intent of the play. Or rather stolen it from Tom Markus.)

Anyway, all four of them were going for it tonight and it was wild. Everyone had that glazed over look, kind of like zombies, until we had gotten through it once. Then they all realized they can do it, especially after we spend time repeating the especially soft parts. I am often rewarded with a nice run of a section, in this case half the show, at the end of the rehearsal block.

These are the rare moments when I realize how much a privilege it is to be there as actors breathe life into their characters. It's true for Stage Managers also. We see things that the audience never sees. Things we try that do not work. Alternate ways of looking at a moment. Sharing of life stories that relate (or not) to something in the show. It's mostly about bonding and building trust. Making a shared life together that becomes its own story. The story about telling the story. For me, the process is everything. I don't go out there night after night and test myself and conquer the fears and feel the exhilaration of sharing it with the audience. I have to enjoy it vicariously through the actors, the bravest people I know.

GOD OF CARNAGE runs from October 13-November 6, 2011. Tickets available online or by calling the Box Office: 801.363.7522.