Globe Education Online

This is Alex's seventh blog entry for the 2005 production of The Tempest, where he talks about the first performance, previews, making changes, and the challenges of the Globe space.

First performance

We got through our first performance and the audience really seemed to enjoy it. No disasters, although I nearly came in with the wrong Gonzalo speech! I just said to myself ‘Please don’t make that mistake again!’ I’m still amazed that the three of us manage to get through it. There were some great bits too: when I got to Gonzalo's speech about the utopian commonwealth, a very well-timed plane flew over our heads. The speech starts:

I’th’ commonwealth I would by contraries
Execute all things; for no kind of traffic
Would I admit
[II.i]

Just as I said ‘no kind of traffic would I admit,’ the plane appeared – it didn’t really occur to me, I just looked up and the whole audience laughed and applauded. Then I realised ‘Yeah, that's funny isn’t it?!’ It was an amazing piece of timing – as if I’d paid the pilot to fly right over. Unfortunately it hasn't happened since!

Changes: Previews

Since the first preview, we’ve refined the show a lot. We’ve found that some things we worked on in the rehearsal space don’t really transfer into the theatre – they don’t have the same effect or something else would have a greater effect. Other changes happen because we’re on a learning curve as we perform – when you do a play in front of an audience for the first time, you realise halfway through a line that it could actually refer to the audience… next time you might try to redirect that line.

Banquet [III.iii]

We’ve made big changes to the staging of the banquet [III.iii]. Instead of the three dancers being the creatures or ‘strange shapes’ who bring the food, we suddenly see the whole audience watching us: there are one thousand five hundred people in front of us! As Gonzalo, I shake their hands and touch them (which pays off very well for the ‘who though they are of monstrous shape’ line – the audience really seem to appreciate that). When I talk about their manners ‘Yet note/ Their manners are more gentle’, I pick up the tubs of fruit that you can get on the piazza (we plant them on the stage so that they’re always there) and people seem to think that I’m stealing them from someone in the audience. It really gets them involved.

Other little glances have occurred to us whilst we perform. There's the line when Mark as Prospero says to Miranda of me (as Ferdinand) ‘Thou think’st there is no more such shapes as he, / Having seen but him and Caliban’ [I.ii] – the audience laugh because obviously I’m playing Caliban as well. Now, as Ferdinand, I look puzzled at the audience as to why they’re laughing at that reference; I don’t even know who Caliban is so the glance sort of asks ‘What does that mean?!’ When Caliban is mentioned again a couple of lines later, they all laugh again, and I sometimes give them a more annoyed look ‘What? What are you laughing at?’ I think it's important to distinguish between moments when it's helpful to use the audience and moments when it distracts from what's happening on stage. I’m realising that so much can go out to the audience without losing anything in terms of the action.

Other Changes

There's been some redirection in the first storm scene. Mark has started to play that with more ‘wave noise’ and shrieking, to enact with the chess pieces what it would be like in this tempest – one piece is sick over the side of the chess board. That's helpful because audience immediately feel that they can laugh, and that they’re with us in the play. At another point, Ed and I pretend that he's made me corpse in the Lovers’ scene. I ask him his name and he says ‘Miranda’ for the first time in a really deep, manly voice whilst flexing his muscles (Miranda's just insisted on carrying some logs). I pretend that I’m corpsing, whilst being half in character as Ferdinand. Ed introduced that in the dress rehearsal – I thought he would never do it on stage, but he does it every night! The play's become much more alive with the audience.

Following Character Transitions

I’ve spoken to a couple of people who didn’t really know what to make of all the changes, but overall the response from the audience has been great. I’ve never been in something that the audience seem to enjoy quite as much. I don’t read reviews but I’ve talked with my dad and Ed (who read some); the critics’ response seems mixed. For me, the main thing is whether the audience love it – and they do come to stand for two hours to watch us. I think they understand the character changes too. The audience really laughs at Miranda's line ‘How many goodly creatures are there here!’ [V.i] which I think confirms that they understand the idea of us playing all the different characters – that's why they laugh at the question ‘So how many people?’

Challenges in the Space

Vocally, the Globe can be quite challenging. We have to make sure that we warm up properly; the three of us talk an awful lot and some of my lines as Caliban are particularly loud and vicious, so I’ve got to keep on top of that. My voice feels very tired today but I think that's because I’ve got a bit of a cold. Also, we’ve just had a few days off, and it can be a bit hard getting back into the swing of things – it's almost easier to do a performance every day. In terms of a physical warm-up, we do yoga every day before the performance – the dancers and I always do it, and Mark sometimes joins us. Then everybody plays Yardball (with a football in the yard of the theatre), which is a brilliant game that Mark invented for the Globe. We all do our own vocal exercises.

Something else that can be difficult at the Globe is resisting the temptation to encourage the audience to laugh – making them laugh in that space is very, very seductive but you have to remember that the thrust of the story is the most important thing.

These comments are the actor's thoughts or ideas about the part as s/he goes through the rehearsal process – they are simply his/her own interpretations and frequently change as the rehearsal process progresses.

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