Monday, August 10, 2009

Back in workshop

We've gathered the Trilogy cast together again for the next round of workshopping on Re-Orientations. Many reunions of old friends from Shanghai, plus one or two new faces. Mahesh's friend Spatica has joined us from India, and Lianne Tucker has taken over as Alex and Linda. There's also the new stage management team, and even an American intern called Mica. Lots of people in the room.

I always find it difficult to start something. Maybe a re-start is even harder. I spent the morning playing devising games with the cast - as much as anything to get people in touch with their creativity, and with one another, after six months' gap. In the afternoon I talked them through the new ideas for the structure. It took quite a bit of time, so that at one point Jue asked how long I thought the play would be (!), but there seemed to be a general sense that things were moving forward very positively.

Jet-lag hit the Chinese actors from about mid-afternoon, so I sent them home and worked in some detail with Lianne, Spatica, Sarah and Radhakrishna on the tsunami and the background to the Indian story. Some very interesting possibilities starting to show. Brian's coming in tomorrow - we'll check out some possible approaches to key scenes which I'm hoping he may script. Really exciting to be mixing the written with the improvised like this.

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