"To Repeat Is Really Difficult."

Ugh! Feeling really rough today. I started getting sick a few days ago, and this morning I woke up all weak and snotty. Still, went to school of course!

~

Maria-Luisa and I presented our scene from Macbeth.

MACBETH

I have done the deed. Didst thou not hear a noise?

LADY MACBETH

I heard the owl scream and the crickets cry.

Did not you speak?

MACBETH

When?

LADY MACBETH

Now.

MACBETH

As I descended?

LADY MACBETH

Ay.

MACBETH

Hark! Who lies i' the second chamber?

LADY MACBETH

Donalbain.

MACBETH

This is a sorry sight.

We performed it one time, and Philippe said Maria-Luisa was boring, and said for me "we can see Macbeth but we don't see Guy". I was playing an idea but not showing myself. I think.

He worked with Maria-Luisa first. He got her to enter singing a sensual Cabaret song. This got her more in the zone of Lady Macbeth. And then to sing the text. And finally to keep the feeling she had whilst singing, but not singing.

For me, he got me to do the element of Fire like we had done in Greek Tragedy. I totally went for it, throwing my body and voice around (and totally exhausted myself). Then I he got me to do the scene keeping the fire alive inside. This helped me do a good panicky rhythm - without having to play scared. I just played fire. That was my game. Then he got me to do it as if I was seeing ghosts everywhere, and was fighting them off with my daggers. Still whilst doing fire.

This was really good for me. It engaged me physically, and gave me good fixed points. And the fire did the rhythm. This is what Philippe means by knowing what you play. Here, I'm playing 'fighting off ghosts', and 'fire'. So if it's bad, it's not me, it's what I'm playing ( = a good trick to save your ego).

Then Philippe got us to do the scene in the style of a Polanski film. To exaggerate "for the fun."

Unfortunately neither of us had a clear idea of what the style of Polanski is like (although I have seen his Macbeth a long time ago), and so what we did was pretty bad. I lost what I had before. But I'm not concerned about that. I did some good work today. At one point whilst working with us Philippe said to Maria-Luisa that he doesn't feel like she really wants to be on the stage - to have a life in the theatre - or at least currently she's not showing it.. But he said with me "I have no problems at all." Which is good to hear. I do want a life in the theatre.

~

Katy worked on Lady Macbeth's "Unsex me here" speech. Philippe got her to sing a feminist song (she sang Alanis Morrissette's You Oughta Know) and then do the text with a chorus of feminists singing the song behind her.

But this wasn't quite right. So instead he went the opposite way, and got her to sing a lullaby, and then for her to speak her text whilst the chorus sang behind her. Now a much lighter Katy emerged. Katy said this year he's mostly directed her towards this feminist thing (like her Punk she did back in Le Jeu I think) but he said now she should go this way. The Punk helped her discover some things. But now a new way.

~

David did Hamlet's "To be, or not to be" in Spanish ("Ser, o no ser").

This is very funny by the way.

David got me to help him start the scene by introducing him as if I were a TV game show host (of 'Acuse & Abuse') and Hamlet was the special guest contestant. I never really understood what he was going for, but did it to help him out. Philippe didn't understand it either. It was a really bad idea!

Philippe then got David to dress like a 'terrorist' - with a big Greek Tragedy cloak on and a turban around his head. He eventually got David to play a gay guy having an artistic crisis whilst dancing to music. It was fantastic! David is totally in his element like this. Very very playful.

Philippe encouraged David to work with a director to try and repeat what he had done today but warned that "to repeat is really difficult" and talked about how some days are fantastic and everything comes freely and then the next day 'poff!' it's gone, and where it's gone is a mystery.

~

Finally Ed worked on a monologue of Philip the Bastard from The Life and Death of King John (which I've never heard of!):

"Mad world! Mad Kings! Mad Composition!"

His first performance was actually really good. Good fixed point, sensitivity, timing and subtlety. But he underlined the fact that he was pissed off about being illegitimate. So Philippe got him to try playing it as if he is legitimate. "Have the fun to pretend he's normal...he's fine...to pretend there's no problem in your life." He got him to imitate somebody that loves Margaret Thatcher...

And even to imitate James Bond.

Philippe said what he plays doesn't change so much what we read of the performance, but it changes Ed's pleasure.