shavasana

Okay so Katie, by the way- if theater doesn't work out, let's build a business around selling podcasts of this recording to insomniacs who can listen to it as they go to bed. I'm two for two on sleeping through the night.

So thursday we began rehearsal with a discussion about the below-posted Beckett on Film performance and why we do not like it very much. We were both surprised/irritated by its macabre, horror movie feel. And surprised by how manic it seemed, both the zippy rocking and the tense, abrasive performance. This woman was terrified, angry, fighting death all the way through. In connection with this, there was little regard shown for the soothing rhythms that we've been working to bring out. So it didn't feel like she's singing a lullaby to herself at all, more like she's shaking her fist at the universe.

But we realized that though most of what we're doing has been all about following Beckett's instructions as precisely as we can, there's a way we've already gone pretty far away from what he probably would have wanted. And we felt good about this pretty different version we were coming up with. Noted that since I'm twenty, not fifty, though "prematurely old" doesn't feel like the biggest stretch of my illustrious career, it's bound to be a very different piece than the one imagined with Billie. And some of the differences were kind of surprising, we realized while taking stock.

As mentioned before, our Woman's attitude towards death feels so much gentler because we've really been thinking about it as an embrace. Katie pointed out after one run that the development of my "more"s seemed to be about coming closer and closer to be able to taste something the woman anticipates to be the most exquisitely ecstatic experience she'll ever have. There's a little fear at first, but I think of it more as little by little coaxing your dumb body to stop having these reflexes, survival instincts, that puts it in conflict with what your mind wants to do. Katie also pointed out that there was something kind of cocky about saying yes, this is the right choice, everybody else is wrong, but they just keep hanging around because they're too weak, about saying okay, so this is life, this is the world, alright seen it, not quite worth sticking around for. I'm out of here. if there's arrogance in that choice, it's really underscored when you have a younger actress. Almost like saying "I'm too good for this. See ya." This tone, we decided, was probably quite different from what Beckett had in mind, but we think we might keep going in that direction anyway and see what's yielded. Death as an existential "correction" of the mistake that is being alive. She gets it. Everyone else is just wrong.

Being directed by Katie is great. Was learning all about little unconscious physical habits I have that one needs to have pointed out by somebody else. I was the one, surprisingly, that introduced the shavasana metaphor, the corpse pose that comes at the end of a yoga class. Just letting yourself be fully supported by the floor, totally relaxed like you might just sink in. As the mind is sharpening, becoming more and more focused, ready, resolute, the body needs to be going correspondingly slack. That's how we show that/what she is able to achieve. I had a tendency to tense up my face in anticipation or concentration or dreamy wonder to correspond with an inner state. Working to notice and be aware of holding or showing tension so I can let it go. Still trying to find a soft gaze that doesn't feel like I'm peering at something in particular, one that I can comfortably sustain for twelve minutes. But I feel like getting control of my face at the place it needs to be by next week I'd need to have been doing something analogous to the crazy mandible-strengthening excercises Billie did to build her jaws up for NOT I. We'll see how far we get.