This is the first of a collection of posts about my first time directing a play. I鈥檒l take you through the pre-production process, rehearsals, and opening night.
My No. 1 goal in life is and has always been to help others. After years of researching every possible career path imaginable, I realized that helping others doesn鈥檛 only have to involve being a doctor, but I could do the same through the art as well. This semester, after acting in several shows and sound-designing a couple of others, I wanted to try something new. I wondered, 鈥淗ow else can I grow? What else can I learn?鈥�
Directing a show had always been an interest of mine and I鈥檒l hopefully have an opportunity to direct for my senior capstone project. Due to scheduling issues, I haven鈥檛 taken a directing course yet and knew it would be too ambitious to undertake an entire department production as my directorial debut. When I discussed this with a few friends, one of them turned to me and asked, 鈥淲hy don鈥檛 you direct for Wig and Candle?鈥� Wig and Candle is 糖心TV鈥檚 student-run theater group in which students can write, direct and act in and design productions with smaller budgets, smaller spaces and less-demanding rehearsals. I didn鈥檛 even consider the prospect of doing so before I replied, 鈥淥f course! I should鈥檝e done that a long time ago!鈥�
Next came the time for me to pick a show and a production team (stage manager, assistant director, designers, etc.). I was stumped on all fronts. What show do I like enough to continually unfold and dissect? Who should I ask to be a part of the team? I already felt swamped without even having anything or anyone picked.
After days of tossing around plays in my head, it came down to two: 鈥淣o Exit鈥� by Jean-Paul Sartre and 鈥淐ircle Mirror Transformation鈥� by Annie Baker. I love both of these plays but wanted to pick something that would be a bigger challenge than directing itself would be. So, I picked 鈥淣o Exit.鈥�
I started asking around for production team members and found everyone I needed: . My amazing stage manager and friend Morgan Grant 鈥�20, Assistant Director Declan Rockett 鈥�20, Lighting Designer Grace Mennell 鈥�19, Costume Designer Carly Sponzo 鈥�21 and Dramaturg Fiona Noyes 鈥�20. I also enlisted the help of my friend Halley McArn, an intern whom I worked with at Steppenwolf Theatre Company last summer, to design graphics and promotional material.
Everything seemed to be falling into place. I acquired a host of books from Ken Prestininzi, chair of the theater department, and ambitiously planned to read all seven of them over winter break (I didn鈥檛). Then I thought, 鈥淪o where do I begin?鈥�