Saturday, July 10, 2010

Midsummer's Night Madness

.

I’ve just rediscovered an old script for Midsummer’s Night Dream in my bookcase. Yes, I’ve done a bit of acting in my time, but what a disaster that production was.

I played the part of Lysander, and I remember being onstage with Demetrius, Hermia and Helena when I completely screwed things up by repeating a line that I had previously delivered in the earlier part of our conversation.

The conversational sequence was Lys: Dem: Herm: Helena: - at which point I repeated my earlier line Lys.

The funny thing was that none of us noticed my mistake. The other three actors had all learned their lines by rote, and so Demetrius responded to my cue by repeating his earlier line, and then Hermia responded on that cue, as did Helena, after which I repeated my mistake. We were trapped in a closed conversational loop, in which everybody repeated their earlier lines.

It took us about five minutes of repeating ourselves before it gradually dawned on us that our conversation was going nowhere. I still shudder now when I remember the growing sense of bewilderment, confusion, and sheer panic that beset us. We were caught in a conversational time-warp, and none of us could figure out who was to blame (me) or how to break out of our predicament.

I think it took another 5 minutes of us repeating ourselves, and our audience dissolving into laughter, before our director had the good sense to temporarily lower the curtain.

At which point the audience started to cheer – and demand an encore….

:-)

8 comments:

Canary Islander said...

I think I told this story recently in a comment on one of JW's blogs. But I'm trying to get back into doing some blogging again, so maybe this is as good a restart as any.

After all, it is a story about restarts!
:-)

Expat said...

I was going to say "Deja vu all over again...all over again."

Dolores Doolittle said...

A twinkly tale, CI, and well worth repeating - splendid to see you back!

Jon said...

A fine post to come back with. And on my most favourite of plays. I am deeply impressed that you had the courage to get up and perform.

As the actress said to the bishop.

Dolores Doolittle said...

He he ho Jon - I certainly didn't see That coming!

Canary Islander said...

I've come across a limerick about repetition that might appeal to the ladies here...

For the tenth time, dull Daphnis, said Chloë,
You have told me my body is snowy;
You've made much verse on
Each part of my person,
Now DO something - there's a good boy!

Dolores Doolittle said...

Oh Merry Snort, CI!

(I wish there were sound effects on here - for that snortle , and also for the Guffaw I guffaw'd at Jon's actress/bishop. T'would avoid the risk of sounding snide, perhaps)...

JW10 said...

Hello C.I

Good to see you back blogging with your breaky leggy story. The Show must go on!