Blog Posts – Page 2 – Victoria Firth

#2 of 3 – The Art Of Caring

21 May 20

This spring I cared for my mum in the last days of her illness. I wrote several times during that period as a way to comfort myself. Here is the second of 3 blogs taken from some of that material. In sharing them I am mindful that not everyone is able to care for, or even see, their loved ones, especially in these challenging times; that not all caring relationships and indeed family relationships are the same; and that some of these thoughts might be painful to read – but I have benefited from finding connectivity and community around loss and learnt how to be around it from the openness of others and so I wanted to make an offer in that spirit and with love for all of our experiences.

THE ART OF CARING

Caring is not
pictures of holding hands
doves
still ponds
Or soft woollens.

It is physical and sweaty.
Full of impossible heart hurdles that you have to make possible.
Holding your sadness whilst not compromising any bit of available joy
and finding small wins that are always smaller and less frequent than the last ones.

It is fierce – fierce like a lioness
Leaping over your reaction to repugnant smells and sounds so you can stay close
Protective and exposed
to a part of someone’s body that you’ve always been conditioned to not see
– to go beyond your modesty and theirs.

And it’s tough – tough like a thick rope that will not give way not matter how frayed.
Encouraging someone to push when they can
trying to accept when they can’t.
Sometimes you think you know better
Sometimes they know better
Sometimes no-one knows why what worked today won’t work again tomorrow.

Caring is an alternate time
Slow, as you measure mouthfuls… and sips….. and breaths.
Fast in panic –
I want to know all of your story
I want you to know all of my story.
Agonising over not enough, or too late.

No, caring is a bear.
Intimate – like a lover
Finding the familiar shapes of dances, embraces, touches that might make movements easier to

I want to give you the best chance at this experience and transition.
I want to give myself the best chance at this experience and transition.
We are both doing something we have no idea we can do
-or how to do it.

It’s the comfort of being of service at the time when someone must, willing or not, entrust themselves to you.
I’m glad it was me.
And I’m glad of the others
territorialism collapsing into gratitude.

Caring is total
Every part of me is occupied with every part of you.
I am writing my novel – an invisible tome of observations
of what you need and how you work.

Washing – there’s a lot of washing.
(One of us is often in a half state of undress).

We cannot be frightened together
And we don’t want to talk about
-but finding a balance.
Helping you to understand what is happening with honesty
in truth is independence…

Not wanting you to go
Not wanting you to be in pain
Not wanting you to lose consciousness because then you will lose me too

Caring is selfless
A shell full of patience
from the ocean floor.

We are in a bubble.
Of ever decreasing circumference

Moving a living space, then a limb, then a lip

There is something restful in being this present.
Our small world of basic needs
Microscopic details
Yet my heart so big it is pressing against the ceiling of your room.

I am heroic – I am big enough to hold this.
I am a lost child – I don’t know what to do.

I wanted to capture everything, take photos, make imprints.
I don’t think it was hanging on
more awe that we are doing this
crafting it between us.
Giving and receiving our completely separate journeys in complete symbiosis.
This is our blood.
This is our art.

We paint it together.

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#1 of 3 – All The Stars Are In The Sky

14 May 2020

This spring I cared for my mum in the last days of her illness. I wrote several times during that period as a way to comfort myself. Here is the first of three blogs taken from some of that material. In sharing them I am mindful that not everyone is able to care for, or even see, their loved ones – especially in these challenging times; that not all caring relationships and indeed family relationships are the same; and that some of these thoughts might be painful to read – but I have benefited from finding connectivity and community in loss and learnt how to be around it from the openness of others and so I wanted to make an offer in that spirit and with love for all of our experiences.

ALL THE STARS ARE IN THE SKY

I have only seen one person die.

Been with them at that moment – or series of moments.

It was the father of a previous girlfriend. He was called Tony. She is called Jen.

We hadn’t been together long and so it was a rather rushed intimacy and polite social dynamic to be with her family at such a personal time.

I was so frightened. Frightened of not being useful or being socially awkward, frightened of seeing death, frightened of death, frightened of not being able to cope, frightened of making it all about me. I coached myself on the journey into each visit – to remember what mattered, to try and be a vehicle, a vessel for whatever the circumstance required.

I didn’t know at the time but I definitely did after, and every day since, what a gift and privilege it was. Such a sacred and precious life experience. I learnt things – all the small steps of someone slowing down. How looks change, how time changes. How a family can hold space for it. And that death can be peaceful and releasing.

After I felt euphoric – celebratory. So glad that I had made it through, that he had, that we had. He had taught us the last lesson a father can – how to die – and taught us well. It will forever be a blessing.

Now I sit with my mum as she slows.

Her eyes don’t open. Her mouth opens permanently but there are no words where I want them. But I am grateful for recognising the signals, having had an experience to give some familiarity to this unimaginable time in my life’s journey – and hers.

I think about Tony and ask that he will look after her if she needs it. Show her the way in ‘whatever next’ in the way he showed me on this side how to go. It is a comfort.

It reminds me of how much a gift that sharing was. That the thing I was terrified to be anywhere near – is actually so necessary to be a part of.

And even though Jen and I were only on the same path for a short time and have since found new relationships, I find a continuing connection from sharing that experience.

And even though they never met and knew nothing of each other, I now think of our parents being connected in this universal journey. Like the lights of lamposts running down a long curving road. The light of one, and then the light of another, shaping the darkness.

They say you meet someone for a reason, a season, or a lifetime. I always thought that maybe I met Jen to accompany her on her dad’s passing. Now I think perhaps it was so her father could accompany me and my mum on hers. Time isn’t how you think it is. Space is spacious.

And as I open my mind up to this possibility I know my friend Jo’s mum is on the cusp of her passing. And there will be more with us. And I think about how my mum might light a lamp for her, then her to light the way for the next. The spirits of all our parent’s connecting. Their light comforting each other so that in ‘wherever they are’ no one is lonely or lost – no matter how far apart the links in the chain.

And together the constellation of their lights hold us up

– and gives us the heart to hold more.

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Beltane – “I want…”

01 May 2020

‘No.
This is not about women and madness.

And I don’t want mind over matter
to keep things in mind
Be mindful
Mind my manners
Mind my own business.

I want to be embodied.

Be body positive
body beautiful
Full bodied
A body of water
A body of earth

I want to pee outside
Roll down hills
Swim naked
Make love potions
Bake magical cakes

Leave the curtains open.
Bark!’

(Some words in progress from what I hope will be my new theatre show – ‘Batty’.)

With Beltane love and blessings ❤ 🔥xxx

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Self Care Sound Bites

14 January 2020

This blog was first written for Camden People’s Theatre when I was producing and performing ‘How to be amazingly happy!’. You can see the original post here:

https://www.cptheatre.co.uk/blog/guest-blog-self-care-sound-bites-by-victoria-firth/

So, self-care is being talked about all over theatre town but what does it actually mean?

For me I think about snuggly blankets, eating greens, sleeping well and (probably) exercising – and all that definitely helps. But self-care is a very personal business. It’s about knowing what you need to do to take care of your physical, mental, emotional, spiritual and creative self – and taking that seriously is probably the first step.

Over the last two years, I’ve been writing, performing, producing and touring a one-woman autobiographical show and even though everyone told me how hard it would be it still took me by surprise. Here are a few things I’ve started to clock along my way which I hope might help you to think about what you need along your way…

1. You have to be shit. You can’t ever be good or get better at something without being rubbish first. All the brilliant artists have the same feelings about failing that you do. Making mistakes and figuring things out is an essential and inescapable bit of every process. So as hard as it might be, don’t let the earworm about being not good enough stop you doing anything. The doing it means you are already on the way to being better.

2. Set your own measures of success. It’s very easy to compare and think that other people get better reviews, sell more tickets, have more followers, have better hair etc.. Think about what you want to achieve in each particular project, what your creative goals are, what you want to say to an audience and use that as your compass.

3. Don’t be afraid to ask – for help, for favours, for information. All the artists I have asked have been extremely generous and encouraging. Venues are there to support you and they need interesting work. Research what you can first – there’s a wealth of information online and then knock on doors for what you need. Also don’t take it personally if people don’t reply. It isn’t any reflection on you. They are just having their own nightmare days.

4. What you can do is enough. When you are self-promoting you can always hand out more flyers, send more emails, do another tweet. But even if you’re the artist version of The Terminator there is always more you could do. Let yourself off the hook when you need a break or need to unplug for a while. You are the talent that you need to look after. Sometimes it’s good to change gear. Sometimes it’s productive to have a rest.

5. Know your cheerleaders. Who can you ask to tell you you are brilliant on the days you feel wobbly? Or for feedback in the way you want it? I don’t think I have ever been more vulnerable than when trying to make work that matters to me. Being freelance can feel solitary – so you need back up and lots of affirmation. Keep all the nice things people have ever said about you and your work on your phone, in a notebook, on your fridge door – wherever you can see it when you need it.

That’s my top five but it’s just the start of the story. Why not give yourself the gift of time to think about, and action, yours.

I know you’re worth it x

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Happiness, reinvention and childlessness

01 October 2019

This interview was first written with FELICITAS SOPHIE VAN LAAK for DIVA magazine online when I was touring my autobiographical solo show ‘How to be amazingly happy!’. You can see the original posting here:

https://divamag.co.uk/2019/10/01/how-to-be-amazingly-happy/

DIVA: Why is our society obsessed with being “amazingly happy” and what does that sentiment mean for you?

VICTORIA FIRTH: I think everyone is looking for happiness or fulfilment and we’re also being sold ideas of it all the time. What it means or really looks like is a million-dollar question, but I’m pretty sure it’s not as advertised. When I thought about it, for me, I decided that identity, purpose and belonging were all things that I wanted to develop. I nearly put love on the list, but it felt too problematic at the time. Someone said to me at my last show that, “Happiness is being in the present moment,” and I think there’s also probably a lot to be said for that.

Your solo show also talks about women who don’t have children. Why do you think there’s still so little social validation for those women?

Generally, we’re not as good with difference and complexity as we ought to be – or like to think we are. Motherhood is still such an established archetype for women and is embedded in gender ideas, education, working culture, social expectations, conversational conventions and so on. For “The Patriarchy”, a single or childless woman is still a threatening idea but, to be honest, I think a lot of it is just ignorance and a failure to adapt to something that is becoming more and more common.

In your experience, are voluntary and involuntary childlessness perceived differently?

Some people choose not to have children for personal, social, political, environmental or other reasons and may celebrate and empower that choice with terms like “child-free.” That’s great. The right to choose is paramount.

However, some people want children and either find that they can’t or don’t. People tend to think of infertility as the primary cause – a physical or medical issue – but social infertility is becoming more and more common. By this, I mean people whose desire to have children is negatively affected by their life circumstances, for example they haven’t met the right partner, or they’re waiting longer because of work responsibilities, economic pressures or lack of support. For those who do want children, not having them or trying to have them and failing is heartbreaking. It’s not spoken of much because it’s a very personal experience that can involve shame and vulnerability, so instead it’s an often invisible grief.

What makes the lesbian experience of childlessness unique?

I think the lesbian experience of both trying to have children and not having them has particular challenges. When I first started thinking about children, I was struck by the internalised homophobia that came up. Could I be a mother, should I be? I also realised how hetero-normative my ideas of family were. That my circumstances didn’t match those pictures but, in a perverse way, I was almost waiting until they did. I also struggled with a lack of role models, although that’s starting to change now.

For childless lesbians then, I think it’s easy to assume that they were never going to have children or never wanted to – which may not be the case. For those who want to parent, there’s the challenge of being self-determining. Then, more choices about how to go about it, who to involve, the cost and so on. Access to NHS support is more difficult for lesbian couples, as it often is for single women.

Yours is a “story of reinvention.” What things have you reinvented about yourself?

People have to reinvent themselves for all kinds of reasons – relationships that don’t work out, job changes, health issues – so it’s something everyone can relate to. For me, I started to put a different value on my own happiness. I decided to take more risks. I made some conscious choices about how I wanted to spend my time. I committed to trying out some things I’d always wanted to do and, if I wasn’t sure what they were, then I had a go to find out. I also wanted to have more fun and take myself more lightly. I still have to work on that, but it’s why I wanted to make a show that was funny as well as thought-provoking.

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Gamekeeper turned Poacher (or maybe vice versa)

August 2018

This blog was first published in The Stage during the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. It refers to my time as Director of the Lawrence Batley Theatre (LBT) and returning to performing in middle age with my solo show ‘How to be amazingly happy!’.

Prior to beginning at LBT I had a career as an artist both directing and performing. It was why I got into theatre and the bedrock of my passion for it. I also think it’s why I’m good at my job. I think venues should be artist (or art) led and although I am known for being a ‘safe pair of hands’, when it comes to developing an organisation’s fortunes, I absolutely know this is because I manage the business end of things in tandem with my artistic sensibility. So although the role at LBT didn’t initially call for directing or producing it was important for me to find ways to hang on to my identity as an artist and to exercise my creativity.

First I did an MA in Ensemble Physical Theatre at the University of Huddersfield. Then I did a residency with Pacitti Company and went on to make some small live art pieces which included an appearance in the National Platform at the SPILL Festival – but over time the ability to hold back the tide of emails, policy demands, fundraising issues, local strategy group meetings and personnel needs, whilst trying to keep a work/life balance, becomes impossible to hold back. Now I basically have a desk job.

After 10 years in post it seemed important to claw back my sense of self as an artist and the pleasure and inspiration it gives me. But how? Where are the resources, the time to do it? What about conflict of interest, What about risk management? Solo work, self-produced with the support of other venues seemed the only way to go. The thought of stepping out as an unknown, emerging artist in middle age, whilst being a reasonably well known programmer, was terrifying – but I have had nothing but support and it’s important to say here it would also not have been possible without the commitment and vision of the LBT Board.

And so here I am in Edinburgh with my show. I don’t know yet how it will go, whether anyone will book it, but on some levels it doesn’t matter. I have already had a compelling insight into some of the challenges that artists are facing now, seen first-hand how the producing ecology and self-producing in particular, is working and have a much stronger idea of how LBT can help. I‘ve met countless new artists who have been generous with their time and I’ve remembered why I do this and that’s made me more playful, less tired and much clearer.

In short, it’s now more important than ever, that everyone working in the arts has opportunities to nourish their creativity, explore their passions and take risks. It has value and if we need to find new ways of working and shift perceptions in order to do it all the better – it’s the goose that lays the golden eggs.

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Inside Rehearsals…Week 5 of ‘Happy Days’

30 May 2018

This blog was first written for The Royal Exchange where I was participating in their ‘Observer Mondays’ scheme with Sarah Frankcom directing Samuel Beckett’s ‘Happy Days’. You can see the original post here:

https://www.royalexchange.co.uk/inside-rehearsals-week-5-of-happy-days

OBSERVATION ON REHEARSAL WEEK 5 OF 21 MAY 2018

HEAR WE ARE

I didn’t know that the name the company use for the theatre auditorium is the ‘module’ but it is and this week we are in it.

It’s exciting to see the set in situ inside the module but also, outside it in the royal exchange rear foyer, to see the workings of set and technical build exposed as things flow in and out of the space.

The technical time feels spacious and I learn that extra time was given for a diary commitment of one of the team which was then no longer needed – so now there is more time than usual, not just to work ‘cue to cue’ – going from one technical change to another but, to run whole sections of the piece and work on them in detail.

Despite the relaxed timings there is a palpable increase in tension as the first performance looms. Changes which might affect the delivery of the performance, queries about the workings of props feel more impactful than before and Sarah takes a reassuring and adaptive tone whilst solving practical problems.

The session works much like a rehearsal except now the actors are in full hair, make up and costume, on the real set and with the lighting and sound effects that will accompany their performance. It feels like everything has taken a big step forward since I was last here but it’s probably more the cumulative effect of everything Sarah has been planning all along coming together. The full creative team is here and Sarah confers with them between sections on how the vision is being realised.

THE SOUND OF SILENCE

I have never worked with a sound designer and it’s not something I would have thought about. I realise now my assumptions about sound were limited to music tracks and sound effects which are suggested by the text. Claire Windsor, the sound designer, appeared quietly in the rehearsal room last week and has been experimenting with sound during rehearsal. The result are injections of noise which form part of the design – creating an audio as well as visual landscape for the actors to inhabit. The set offers ‘maximum symmetry and simplicity’ as per Beckett’s notes and although there are no notes about sound, Claire has taken a similar approach. Atri, the Assistant Director, comments that, in this case, the sound does not prompt the audience what to feel but underscores the rhythm of the piece and offers punctuation to the text. I take this note into my directing toolkit. Sound can be story but it can also be dramaturgy and is part of the triangle of design – with setting and lighting. Chatting with Atri he also notes that Sarah works with good people who she trusts and I can see this in the way that she gives space for their talents to interpret her vision before crafting all the elements together.

This reminds me of advice from another director friend of mine who encouraged me to not always think I had to start small when wanting to make work. When the opportunity affords it – more creatives on a project give an emerging director more cover while they learn – delivering a frame of solid production values in which they can experiment.

TIME TO SING THE SONG NOW

My next visit will be to see the show. I can’t wait. Being able to see whole sections of it run means I know how arresting it will be. The shift between Act 1 and Act 2 is so striking I am moved to tears.

This would be called a ‘stripped back’ production except that was always how the writer intended it to be staged. It looks simple but there is so much artistry here. The sparseness of the action and design means that you live in all the small places of the actor’s performance. The detail is compelling and to watch these characters so intimately feels almost like an act of witnessing.

I think people will talk about this production for a long time. I encourage you to come and see it.

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Inside Rehearsals…Week 4 of ‘Happy Days’

23rd May 2018

https://www.royalexchange.co.uk/inside-rehearsals-week-4-of-happy-days

OBSERVATION ON REHEARSAL WEEK 4 OF 14 MAY 2018

ONE-ON-ONE CHAT WITH SARAH FRANKCOM

I’m fortunate to have a one to one chat with Sarah Frankcom where I can follow my curiosity about what is going on for her when she is directing and how she manages the process whilst leading a major regional theatre. It wasn’t an interview so these aren’t quotes from her but more what I took away from a very interesting chat.

Sarah manages her schedule by bookending her time with the actors. Either side they work with other members of the creative team working – the Assistant Director, Movement Director, line work, sometimes wardrobe fittings etc. This means that the production is progressing for a full day but she joins them from about 11am till 4pm. This allows her to take Royal Exchange meetings and deal with other business at the beginning and end of the day. She also sometimes takes meetings over the lunch break. This stops in the last week of rehearsal when Sarah brings her full focus to working on the production.

I asked Sarah how much research she does in preparation for a rehearsal. It seemed on day one a tremendous amount of thinking and working on the text had been done. Surprisingly Sarah says she does less now than ever before after consciously changing her practice a few years ago. She now has more confidence and trust about following what happens in the rehearsal room and making the work there rather than coming in to make a pre-set vision. As a result Sarah has the Assistant Director and the DSM follow the text so that she doesn’t have to look at the script and so can watch the actors and see what they are offering. Although she approaches working with actors differently, depending on the type of play, she generally works more with what the actors are discovering than with research.

She gives time to working with actors on their characters ‘back story’ but she is less interested in finding a clean through line and more interested in the human contradictions that come up – although back story does give the actors something emotional to draw on as does playing in rehearsal. The early work in rehearsal exploring imaginary scenes and interactions between the characters, physicalizing memories is an important building block for the ‘liveness’ of the final performance. Dress up and play gives the actors something physical they can reference. Experiences that are only made for this piece. She says you can feel it in the performance when the actors have been able to be free in the rehearsal room.

Surely on a play like this which is so well documented she must have seen other versions or looked at other videos and designs? No Sarah doesn’t really reference what has gone before. She sees it as imperative that the design and vision for a production reflects why it has been chosen to be done now and in this theatre, in this place. Why are we doing it? is the most important thing to inform the process.

This rationale is a lynch pin in the programme at the Royal Exchange and therefore in which plays Sarah chooses to stage. The time of a single Artistic Director directing the old repertoire, the classic canon of texts, is coming to an end, to be replaced by an increase in new writing and new theatre forms. Younger audiences are highly culturally literate but perhaps not as literally literate or interested and this will drive change. There needs to be a real clarity now about when to stage one of these plays and why.

I find this an exciting vision of the future which will crack open a lot of the norms of who gets to make work, what stories are told and who theatre is for.

A commercial reality remains though, Sarah reflects that the challenge for regional theatre now is to discover truly extraordinary artists. Those whose productions have a ‘game changing’ impact that then enables the work to transfer to other theatres. Theatres need the commercial return from the transfer of productions.

The scale of both that challenge and the opportunity it might present stays with me for some time.

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Inside Rehearsals…Week 3 of ‘Happy Days’

16 May 2018

https://www.royalexchange.co.uk/inside-rehearsals-week-3-of-happy-days

OBSERVATION ON REHEARSAL WEEK 3 OF 7 MAY 2018

THE POWER OF 3

It strikes me that this play is about a 3 way relationship – a woman, a man and the landscape. The environment is unforgettably present and unusually it’s not about us making marks on the earth but beyond a tipping point to where the earth now makes, marks on us. The consequences and interdependence of this situation is the body of the drama and the relationship. Who is keeping who alive and in place? Who is witnessing who? Her body is part gone – she wants to keep moving and be seen. He has freedoms but doesn’t leave and is out of sight and reach. She wears the earth, the earth wears him. The world rotates.

It’s interesting how your perspective re-calibrates. Initially it appears that nothing much happens in this play but once you find its orbit, when your world closes down into the time and space of the play there is so much drama, so much emotion.

THE ACTOR, THE DIRECTOR AND THE TEXT

In going through the play Sarah is working with the actors on the interpretation and delivery of their lines, the development of their characters, the physicality of their performance and movements and their interactions with each other. This is a very detailed process. She may work with the actors on a paragraph of text several times before moving on. Each time asking them to try expressing it in a slightly different tone, mood or emotion or with different timing. Sometimes she tells anecdotes of people she knows or situations she’s seen to illustrate and relate the piece to real lives. Do you know anyone like that? My neighbour sometimes does this etc.

After all the options are explored a shared approach is agreed and then the process is repeated for the next section. It is a mining of the text. This is a particularly dense piece but I would imagine the essence of her approach translates to other works.

I am particularly struck by how the director and actors are able to reverse engineer the world of the characters from the text on the page. By interrogating the phrases, pauses and repetitions they are able to deduce elements of personality and plot.

In this case they are often exploring the mental health distortions caused by characters coping with the unimaginable: magical thinking, superstitions, filling up time, distracting oneself, avoiding triggers, remembering things that help and trying not to remember those that don’t, controlling daily routines – all are uncovered.

Sometimes Sarah explores a symbolic interpretation – what bigger resonance does this phrase or situation have? The writer has chosen everything for a reason.

Image of HAPPY DAYS, Royal Exchange Theatre

THE DIRECTOR, THE ASSISTANT DIRECTOR AND THE MOVEMENT DIRECTOR

Atri Banerjee, the Assistant Director, is very active in rehearsals. Often working with the actors alone at the beginning or end of the session. He is reinforcing the decisions of the day and walking with the actors over the paths the characters take to tread a deeper imprint. He is also helping with the mammoth task of learning the lines. He finds balance between letting them run sections and find their flow and stopping them where there is an error. He is catching significant deviations so that the actors don’t need to unlearn any mistakes. When they are running text he works with the DSM to mark any bits of text that are ‘sticky’ so that the actors know the sections that they need to give more attention to.

I also get to observe Movement Director, Vicki Manderson, working with the company. At first I am not sure what the role of a movement director will be, as the actors can’t move very much, but her work is extraordinary in it’s detail. She asks questions of how living in compact situations would affect the movements of a character -how repetition would. She brings their attention to the specifics of everyday tasks often taken for granted and interrogates them – if you’re reading the paper does your head move as you read – or your eyes?

She also has an approach to gently sculpting the performance which echoes Sarah’s. When the actors make a suggestion it is completely acknowledged with ‘that’s one option- let’s try this way as well’. I have often wondered how, when working with professional actors, their opinion and the director’s come together but in this atmosphere of experimenting it seems easy. The actor’s first ideas and instincts are incorporated in an exploration where the director – whichever one it is – can then add their suggestion and then after embodying the options the director calls it and the shared direction is found.

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Inside Rehearsals…Week 2 of ‘Happy Days’

09 May 2018

https://www.royalexchange.co.uk/inside-rehearsals-week-2-of-happy-days

OBSERVATION ON REHEARSAL WEEK 2 OF 30 APRIL 2018

Rehearsals are progressing and becoming more focused on moving through the text. Sarah comments that as a general rule of thumb she gets twice as much done in week 2 as week 1, 3 times as much in week 3 and 4 times as much in week 4. This would account for the spaciousness and playfulness I observed last week.

In the rehearsal room ‘mock up’ structures, informed by the set, have now appeared and the actors are using these to get used to the physical confines they will experience in performance. At the end of the week we all go over to visit the workshop where the set is being built. It’s an inspiring opportunity to see the set part way through its build. For the actors it’s a chance to try out how they will physically fit into the spaces assigned to them and take that knowledge back into the rehearsal room. Some movements are tried out on the set to inform the build and some small adjustments are made to ensure the actions described in the text are feasible in/on what will be a giant structure.

With rehearsals getting up ahead of steam and more practicalities creeping in, I am interested to get a better grip on the world the rehearsal room lives within and in particular the different stage management roles and processes that support the production and the director.

SOME TERMINOLOGY AND NOTES…

The Stage Management team often start 3 days before a rehearsal to prepare. This may involve ’marking up’ the rehearsal space – laying tape on the floor to denote where the set and entrances and exits will be and assembling draft props used for initial rehearsals.

‘The Book’ is a master copy of the script which becomes a record of the production by the addition of notes made in rehearsal. Facing each page of script is another page on which any props used during that section of text are noted. Notes are also made of ‘blocking’ (any significant actions or movements made by the performers). Finally, as the production moves into tech week and beyond, notes are added to denote where any lighting or sound cues or special effects happen. Along with a video taken of a live performance of the piece, the book becomes part of the documentation and archiving of the finished production. Production meetings are essentially planning meetings for which all personnel relevant to that point in the production process gather.

Production meetings start way ahead of rehearsals and get more frequent as the production approaches. Initially they may be for just the Director, designer and producer or production manager, later the whole production team and creative team meet and, closer to opening, front of house and other venue staff may join.

On Friday I am able to sit in on a production meeting. The production meeting is a working lunch while the actors are on their lunch break. It is informally chaired by the Company Manager. In turn lighting, sound, stage management and set/workshop, and wardrobe talk through where they are at in their process and share queries or issues with both the director and designer. The level of detail and accuracy is extraordinary e.g. there is a discussion about a newspaper used as a prop – what paper should it be, from what date, with what headline? The meeting both informs the process and is informed by it as decisions and discoveries made in rehearsal are communicated and what’s possible in the time and budget are identified.

STAGE MANAGEMENT WHO’S WHO

Disclaimer: this is based on snatched chats with people being very generous with their time and so this is my crib sheet rather than a perfect or exhaustive guide.

Assistant Stage Manager (ASM) The ASM manages and updates required paperwork during rehearsals and works on, or with, props and costume sourcing. In some theatres, props may all be done by the ASM, in others the ASM may focus on perishable purchases e.g. food and sundry items like paper products and smoking whilst other buyers / makers source larger props like furniture.

Deputy Stage Manager (DSM) The DSM deals with everything in rehearsals. They set up the room, take the rehearsal notes, track props and communicate needs to other departments like wardrobe. They are the keeper of the book. When the show goes into performance the DSM ‘calls’ the show i.e. indicates moments in the performance when technical cues should happen.

Stage Manager (SM) The Stage Manager oversees the process and in particular works closely with the Director on the call schedule. ‘Call’ here refers to the times actors and the creative team are asked to come into rehearsal. For actors, the call schedule indicates when they will be in the rehearsal room, when they may be working on lines or songs, when they may be in wardrobe fittings and so on. It’s like an appointment calendar and is a big logistical jigsaw. When the show goes into performance the SM and ASM work the show backstage i.e. scene changes, moving props from one exit to another, opening entrance doors, doing quick changes (fast costume changes) etc.

An aside – the convention of stage management coming on stage visible to the audience in ’blacks’ (black clothes) tends to be being substituted for one in which either the actors move items to transform a scene themselves or the stage management are costumed so when visible they are in keeping with the production.

Company Manager (CM) The Company Manager manages the team and deals with contracts and recruitment. This includes looking after any personal needs that may arise for artists or the wider team. When multiple companies are working at the same time or in the same building the CM works across all of them. They are ‘on call’ and the ‘go to’ person for company needs that can’t be solved elsewhere. They may also support specialist needs for a production such as the recruitment of community or children’s cast members. In production the CM runs the tech.

In unionised companies all 3 stage management roles – ASM, DSM and SM are recommended but this may not be the case for smaller shows or smaller companies. Sometimes roles will be amalgamated and there may be a Company Stage Manager (CSM) or Technical Stage Manager (TSM).

A final thought – Stage management involves a lot of initials but if, like me, you are a ’West Wing’ fan you might like to remember it as – the ASM is Donna, the DSM is Josh, the SM is Toby and the CM is Leo!

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