Rennie Court
The tensions ease subtly. That means they come and hold subtly. You know there’s too much work to do. You feel there isn’t enough time, so you use more time. There is no time you are actually off. Maybe a little, when you go to a play. But during the performance I kept saying the lines in my mind—on the street, too, in the market, across the bridge, in bed, pacing the living room, while making coffee, along the river, awake briefly in the middle of the night, and the first thing after arising in the morning.
We’ve given two performances. The first was charged—by fear and the rushing relief of getting under way—and the audience seemed appreciative and happy. The second run, on Tuesday, was a typical sluggish aftermath of the first night let down. But we were not bad. If my mind strays even a little, I can be blank when my cue comes, because the first word of the response isn’t on my tongue, so that I stare and strain inside, as if running frantically back and forth across the room in my brain searching for the line. I must anticipate many responses, have them ready by having gone on ahead to get hold of the words, ready to fling them out. But I dare not wander off sideways, out of the path. The brain speaks and hears itself, so when I said “I feel Madame De Tourvel is right as usual. . .” I mean Madame de Valanges a trip around the grounds, perhaps. . . my tongue knew to go back and correct a disastrous bit of illogicality.
So, you want to be on automatic pilot with your hands near the controls to adjust (manually) if need be. Through this week the words become more familiar. The tenson eases, and you know it only because it all comes out more easily. You don’t feel you have to practice the lives off stage—which I still do because they’re comfortably encoded and come quickly and accurately, on command or just, best of all, smoothly correct as logical responses to the other character’s question or statement. But the only way to get to this point is to repeat and repeat and repeat. We haven’t had enough run throughs. We’ve getting them now, under fire. The relaxation comes, soothing your mind, massaging your strained body. The words follow one another in patterns, flowing and skipping, sometimes tumbling out. There are confident sentences like two year old children reaching out and falling forward propelled by glee toward a bright butterfly, giggling and flailing chubby little paws toward the preppy prey. You experience the same pleasure as the child’s. You are the child, playing the play. And the grown-ups are smiling, laughing, chuckling, gasping, approving. Or they’re just watching, but intently, while you careen from moment to moment, sometimes touching briefly the other character’s words or looks, sometimes perching for a while, sometimes zig-zagging across the stage and up and down.
In this play, Valmont is a childlike hunter. He pursues women. He stalks victims. He captures hearts and the bodies follow. He is childishly selfish. Like a child, he hasn’t the capacity to see certain harsh consequences. He seems immune, without conscience or regret. He is rich enough to afford all the toys money can buy, so he craves [the] (butterflies) exotic elusive creatures. Like the child who grabs at a big beautiful free bit of prey—and surprises himself by getting it—he is suddenly shocked and filled with remorse when he finds he’s crushed it. He opens his fist again, fast, but it’s too late. His vengeful, even more selfish partner goads him into returning to his quarry and crushing her altogether. Valmont is Merteuil’s creature, so he does as she strongly suggests.
Saturday, 11:15am June 23, 1990
[bread in the oven, oatmeal, coffee]