Wow, I haven’t blogged in agesssss…. this is mainly to do with War and Peace. Well what can I say about War and Peace…. it was stressful and shattering but it was epic and soooo worth everything I went through. I honestly couldn’t have had a better time. Not only did I learn a hell of a lot about stage management but I learned a great deal about myself.
I realise that I haven’t blogged about War and Peace so I probably couldn’t even begin to start writing down details. It was one of those experiences that I would change a thing about even although we went through good and bad times.
Rehearsals
I must say I enjoyed being in rehearsals a great deal. Having a huge cast (75) made rehearsals fun. You have to be on the ball all the time. As the stage manager I would be in all chorus sessions as I had to be propping all the other times. I would run these sessions which allowed me to be in control at all times. Being in the rehearsal room, was good because all the singers knew exactly who I was and what my job was. When we made the transfer to stage, the singers already knew who was in charge and would listen straight away. I didn’t really have to fight for control. I think was I decided to run the rehearsal room from the very beginning of rehearsals which gave me a lot more control. I must say that the singers we were working with were a great bunch of people. Obviously everyone has their moments where they are stressed and can speak to you in a certain way which can be upsetting (which I am not going to lie happened a few times) but for some reason myself and the cast seemed to have an understanding of each other and we managed to work through those situations. I felt that I really became friends with a lot of members of my cast which was great; however we still had the cast to stage manager respect. I found that they understood why I had to say the things I did and I understood when they were upset and we were able to work together to come up with the solutions.
Overall, I found my director quite hard to deal with at times because I felt she didn’t trust me. However, even my professional mentor found it difficult dealing with her and told me it was just the kind of person she was, she didn’t trust anyone and was a very slow worker. Due to this I did find it difficult to speak with her although I feel that I did do my best not to let my feeling effect my work which I feel I was able to do although it was very hard. She would work very slow or go over sections a great deal of times. Due to this the cast found it difficult to work with her also as they were very uneasy about what they had to do in each scene. It got to the point that the first and only run before stage and pianos, and many of the cast members still had no idea what they were doing as they may have only ever done the scene once. This did create a great deal of tension, however I feel that it worked in the stage management teams favour as the cast would look to us for advice and they seemed to use us a lot more than I have ever seen in other productions. Therefore we all seemed too bound. I did feel the cats trusted us which I feel is a lovely thing to say and they respected the hard work we did for them. I felt the stage management team had a good relationship with the cast.
Stage and Pianos
At the beginning of stage and pianos I felt that I was a bit unsure of myself. I felt that this was because; although I had been in some rehearsals for the smaller scenes I didn’t know them as well as the big chorus scenes. Therefore the first day was hard for me to take full control. I did have control but I felt myself looking to my mentor at times for help. It was very difficult working with my director at this point as tension was high and many people had ill feelings for others. Cast were very uneasy about what they were doing as things were getting changed over and over again. However we battled through as a team. It was difficult as our director used a great deal of our sessions of stage and pianos mainly for blocking. I understand fully that things will change however; whole scenes seemed to be changing fully. As a result of this we were running slightly behind after the first three sessions so when it came to the huge chorus scenes we had less time. We really had to raise the bar.
After the first day of stage and pianos I had a think of exactly what I had to do and decided to step up my game. The chorus session was amazing. They were so much fun and we were starting to make good progress. I genuinely believe it was because I had gained control in the rehearsal room so all I had to do was transfer it to stage. I knew exactly what was happening on stage and I felt so much more confident. The cast listened to everything the stage management team asked of them and did it straight away. It was a totally different experience altogether. I really enjoyed every minute and I seemed to be back in control.
Stage and Orchestra
Stage and Orchestras were also fine for us. I had meeting with our conductor before the sessions to find out exactly what he wanted to do and I then briefed the rest of the stage management team so they all knew exactly what was going on and so they could pre-empt tasks. I felt we done well. Due to our experience in the rehearsal room he was used to me being in charge so knew exactly what to expect and I felt he trusted to get everything ready for him which was great.
Show
By the time it came to the shows everything seemed to have fallen into place. Although we never had a fully clean show throughout the run, it was mainly small things. I really enjoyed my experience overall on this production. I learned so much about myself and about myself as a stage manager. I learned even more between the differences between being on a stage management team for drama and opera. E.g. I learned that the stage manager does the show reports instead of the DSM which although doesnt seem like a big thing to learn, but if it wasnt for this experience I wouldnt know thins.
Edinburgh
I felt that going to Edinburgh was great. It would have been nice to get to go to some other theatres although I understand it was for budget reasons we couldn’t do this. For the first couple of days I felt that my team were bored as there was not a lot for them to do as we were waiting on other people finishing on their tasks. In the end I ended up giving each person some time off so they were not just hanging around and making sure there were enough of us there to get the work done. Unfortunately I think because of this time hanging around my team started to lose focus as they were comfortable with what they had to do. As a result it was difficult getting the work done in Edinburgh before the show. We had to wait till last minute to get our things done so it was difficult getting my team motivated to get things done quickly. I had to keep asking them to do things which I found this quite draining.
Stage Management team
I had a great time overall with my team although of course we had our ups and downs. Sometimes late coming would bring me to upset. Although lateness always upsets me. Especially when we have a lot to do. If it was just now and again I think that I can understand because of course there are times when it can’t be helped but when it happens repeatedly without a good excuse I find it hard to deal with. I would have a chat with them but it seemed to make no difference. It eventually worked but it took a long time. I don’t really know of any other way of dealing with this…
Also there were a few days where my DSM would be off. I definitely found this very difficult. It was very stressful because not only did I have to deal with my team but also with rehearsals. It was really difficult to deal with. There was nothing I could do though apart from battle through with my ASAM’s. When he was off the first week, one of my ASM’s was off as well, so I and one ASM had to deal a full chorus rehearsal. When we survived that I knew we could do it again, but it was still really stressful and as we got into rehearsals and we were all getting shattered and pushed to the limit it was harder and harder to deal with.
Overall, I found the experience of War and Peace to be amazing and worth every bad experience I went through. It was hard mentally and physically shattering but the success of the production was worth it and hopefully I can take on everything I have learned from this and use it on future productions.