rehearsals

before the rehearsal on saturday we really were not moving forward at all, in fact, all that we learnt one day i found myself to be practicing with the group the days after because they had not learned anything at all. I keep having to tell these girls to put the elbows touching the waist or bending their knees, etc. something i should not be doing had they learned, most importantly had i taught them well: have i failed to some extent? whose to blame when actors don't do things correctly? actors or the director? when do we know when it is enough and we should just let the actors perform? how could i get through to them enough so that they learn?

i honestly think they did learn but they just didn't want to perform well, they're tired, annoyed and bored of the same movements every rehearsal BUT come on, kabuki actors train since they're four, these girls have been training for no more than 2 weeks and 2-3 months away from the play being bored is NOT an option. Thank God that las rehearsal things moved forward a whole lot. Knowing their characters and a sequence of every general movement women make during a kabuki play (I figured teaching them all the basics and then start teaching them separately depending on their characters' needs) i explained a little bit of our concept (not really, i just told them to be inspired and try to evoke something from the forest, which they all understood pretty well - i wasn't going to try to explain to the little ones something they don't need to know really, but i know i have to someday during rehearsals so that the actors are fully integrated into this process of making our play happen. fml) and then asked for them to, basing their work on the movement sequence we learnt, perform that same sequence but being inspired and influenced by their characters. turns out they really did know the sequence, in fact, some who were not able to perform it say perfectly actually shone when implementing their characters' body language to it (props to the cocineras, witches and spiders) HOWEVER i was thoroughly disappointed when the geishas didn't know the sequence, in fact, they didn't know how to stand as a geisha (something we had been working on and improving for the past rehearsals).

so, to conclude. the feeling of failure perhaps, disappeared upon seeing some of the girls performances but really took over me upon seeing those that, well, kinda sucked. I felt as if my job wasn't done correctly or maybe it was my fault being the director, however i quickly realized that not everything is my fault, in fact, it stops being about the director when it comes to performing and some weird thing in the mind and body of the actors just does not want to work properly, this is why we as directors must detach ourselves and become spectators when watching the performance so that we can analyze every detail (still keeping in mind the creative process) and then give our actors feedback upon it, so that hopefully, the next day of performing, they will take it into consideration and transform it into an enhanced action and a better performnace.

i still have many questions about directing and have even thought: what's the point if during the actual performance the actors might just throw it all away? how can we, as directors, ensure a good performance from the actors? how do we know the product of our and their hardwork will be properly presented to an audience?