Let’s see - today is December 21st and we just ran the first act of Beard of Avon yesterday (well stumbled through is really the appropriate term at this point in the process).  I believe that 12th Night reviewed the entire first half yesterday as well.

 Last week we began by learning the songs in Beard (don’t think of it as a musical, which it’s not - but the ‘acting troupe’ does sing a couple of drinking tunes).  Our composer is Joshua Kohl from Seattle (the guy with the cap and guitar on his lap above).

We’ve been shifting rehearsals between the rehearsal space on the top floor of the Armory (seen above) and the Studio Theater (which is empty right now).  The Studio allows us to get a sense of the entire depth of the set (which will be just over 40 feet) - which is extremely helpful when we’re staging the big group scenes.

Barbara Casement (above) is our costume crafts genius (which means that she gets to create any specialty items that you might not quite classify as a piece of clothing).  For Beard one of the really fun items is this “bloody tongue” for the scene from Titus Andronicus that is enacted.  It looks pretty nasty, but Barbara seemed to enjoy showing off the tongue in action.

Another challenge in Beard is the superfast “transformation” that Cate Davis gets to make at the top of Act Two from “Ann Hathaway” to a “lady of the night”.  The change happens in full view of the audience as Cate is speaking - so it has to be pretty choreographed.  Cate and Deb Trout (our costume designer) spent several minutes talking through options ["well you could underdress it all" "yes, but then I'd have to wear an enormous pair of trousers over the skirt" "or you could not have the corset on until this speech" "yes, but how in the world is she going to fasten a corset onstage in 30 seconds?"]

Fun, fun, fun.