Write on...

This week has seen Helen come round twice, in order to get some writing done before she jets off on another holiday. We'd started to beat ourselves up a bit about our perceived lack of progress. What we've ended up with, so far, is 25 pages, 4 scenes of the script.

We took some time to have a look at some of the things that other people had suggested they would like to see in characters, and worked on incorporating them. We were hardly deluged with suggestions, but the ones that we got from Liz and Rob we were able to weave into existing characters.

As much as the first scene, in Reception, is mad, daft and utterly inspired by stupidity and farce, scene three provides a return (as if we ever really left) that medium. Trina, the Australian staff trainer, is constantly holding the training session as if she has a room full of students, rather than just the one, rather tested Jamie Blunt. We had allocated 4 pages for this scene, but we ended up with 5 and a quarter, principally because the dialogue just went off in an entirely inspired direction exploring the madness of the situation.

Knowing that our shows are rather pacey, and we direct the lines to be right on top of one another, we're banking that will mean the show doesn't become the behemoth of content that 'What On Earth Is Happening' was. As it was we had to strip about ten pages out of that script no more than three days before the show opened, even then it was too long, and could have done with being about 20% shorter over all.

I am fairly certain (98.7%) that we now have a date for the week of the show, with our get-in being Sunday May 8th, and the show running May 11th-14th. I am awaiting final confirmation of the booking, but we'd provisionally agreed on that week, and were really just waiting on me to make sure that I could get the time off work that week. There's nothing worse than trying to have to organise a show, and having to go to work as well. This date does put us back about a month on our original schedule, giving us, if we decide to use it, another month of rehearsal time.

It may be that we decide the use the extra time in workshops, but I was rather hoping that we would be able to workship prior to Christmas, and then cast just as we break up. Allowing people some time off, in which - we hope - they would learn their lines, and then return refreshed, and ready in the new year to rehearse for the show.

That was the theory. That may all now be blown out of the water by the new date, but these things cannot be helped. The week we had originally asked for, was already taken, and the week prior to the one we have settled for wouldn't be suitable as there is a Salvation Army Concert on the Saturday evening in the church next door.

Not sure our audience will be able to follow the show if there's a brass band playing 20 feet away.

The work we've done so far, I have sent to one of our friends, and he has made some very favourable comments about the script. (Thank you Rob). I still need to figure out how to get properly formatted script onto my blog. It has also been suggested that Helen and I do a Video-Blog (Vlog) about the evolution of the play. DVD extras, if you like, before the play is even finished. It sounds like a fantastic idea, and something I'd really like us to do. The question is, can it be done without hassle and faff. Because I really hate faff.