Last night (Monday, February 6) was the first official rehearsal for "It Adds Up". I use the term rehearsal lightly; there's still not a full script. So instead we did some improv games, character work, and Meisner.
The warm-up consisted of stretching and everyone telling one good thing about their day, and one bad thing about their day (shamelessly stolen from Dylan's "Robocalypse").
We all told Alex, the actor who couldn't make the last meeting, about his character.
To a nice musical playlist I had them walk around the room, explore the geography, fill the space. I then asked them to walk around the room as their character, and asked them to think about how their character would regard the room, what draws their attention, what choices they make, etc. I asked them to begin interacting with other characters: say hello, shake hands. Do you know this person? Is this your first time meeting them? What's the situation?
I then had them stop, get back into themselves, and told them about Meisner technique and why I liked it. I asked Julie to be my lovely assistant. We proceeded to bring them through the basic steps to get into the technique, then had them do it. They caught on really quick, so I decided to hit step 4, which I had originally planned to wait till next week to do.
Naturally, as is the case with Meisner technique, as soon as I stopped them and tried to move onto the next one, they began to repeat me...
The next bit was to do improv scenes with the lead, Duffy. Each character had a go with her. Some amazing material was gathered, both for my scripting ideas as well as their personal character development.
I asked them what they'd learned about their character from these exercises. More good stuff.
They inspired me once again. An amazing group they are! Very helpful and supportive of me in the writing process. We'll meet again next Monday, and I've given myself a deadline of the following week to finish the script.
Resources.
Wikipedia's entry on Meisner technique
Wikipedia's entry on Sanford Meisner
Photos. Click on the thumbnail for the full image. (Thanks to Julie for the camera!)
They all wanted me to tell you that this is their blog debut- all of them, except for Julie, that is.
