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Editing in the soundbox
Mar. 25th, 2004 07:01 pmT minus less than twenty-four hours and I'm having a nervous breakdown!
That said, today was more or less a success. Once again (this seems to be happening more and more often lately) I couldn't face school at eight in the morning. So I slept in till nine and wandered in half an hour late to Politics, but it was totally worth it for the sleep. I shouldn't have bothered, really, as following that I had a free. I did some English (not enough) and and then sloped off to the soundbox with Becca's lunch. She was in the process of having a nervous breakdown. She and Julie both. They are the tech people for all seven Drama Festival plays, and so have to cope with seven scripts and seven sets of lighting/music cues. Also, Becca was taking the opportunity to check out the competition. Apparently all the plays up until lunch had been a shambles in rehearsal. I was slightly reassured. I handed over her lunch - two cheese-with-butter and two Penguins - and settled myself with a thump in the corner of the soundbox. I simply couldn't face our own rehearsal. Becca eventually persuaded me to shift, so I ambled unhappily down to L4G's formroom. We only rehearsed Act II, and they were all right. Not brilliant. But it was all okay, and we arranged for the people with afternoon frees (not me - Chemistry with Colvin) to finish painting scenery and drag the whole lot over to the centenary hall.
Again rather unhappily, I went to Chemistry and waited outside the lab for the others. I was perched on the brick bit at the top of the stairs when Rola arrived in a fine mood. Apparently Mrs Wigmore is throwing fits all over the place and demanding immediate cuts in Snow White's script. I ought to say that they wrote a new, remixed version of Snow White, so the story may be slightly different. For example, the prince does not end up with Snow White, but rather with the (male) hunter. (I said, "I love this play already!") Anyway, Mrs Wigmore has said the script is not to contain the words "shite" or "bloody" or (wait for it) "gay" or "lesbian." I just about flipped.
First of all, why is she telling us this now? She was supposed to go round and watch all the bloody (and shite! shiteshiteshite!) plays last week. She didn't turn up for any of them, as far as I know - four of the groups I spoke to said she didn't, and we know she didn't see Daisy. Our Day Out may well have to be completely rewritten - but as Sarah said, are these trackie-clad little scallies really going to say, "Oh, fiddlesticks!" when life is less than rosy? And here was me thinking plays by Willy Russell were frowned upon because their scripts are so sharp that they invariably win. But no... it's all about the fucking language. The school is in a Liverpool postcode. Willy Russell is probably the best Liverpool playwright, and everyone knows his plays (Educating Rita and Shirley Valentine are set English texts at GCSE). Name me one girl in the entire school (scratch that, the English-speaking world) who hasn't heard the word "bloody." Or "shite." Or "fuck", for fuck's sake!
Secondly, I really felt like marching off to the woman and yelling, "I'm fucking bisexual! D'you wanna purge me from fucking Daisy Pulls It Off?!"
Interrobang?!, etc. Gay and lesbian? The mind absolutely boggles. In any case, Daisy and Trixie, upon being caught by Clare in the middle of the night, are not going to say, "Oh, fiddlesticks." They are going to say, in unison, "Bugger." Ta-da.
After that lesson, in which I was mostly annoyed, I went down to the hall. Becca was just recovering from the technical rehearsal for Grease. She looked unhappy. "It was good," she said.
"Good how?" quoth I.
"As in, good enough to win. It's just not fair!"
"Why is not fair?" I asked.
"Because it's them!"
Them being Becky O, Becky Branton, Verena and Gemma. Gemma, scarily enough, carries a whistle round to shout at her kids with. I carry a whistle too, for whistle sound-effects. Note the significant, possibly-relevant-to-basic-human-rights difference there. And I totally agree - it will not be fair if they win.
Then came our technical rehearsal, the last of the bunch. We had from two-thirty to five, but we didn't get started until quarter past three, as it didn't start well. Firstly Sir Digby Beaumont's astronomy book (really a Physics textbook with silver stars stuck on) went missing, and then the narrator discovered she'd lost her script. I could have killed her. I needed desperately to edit it, and there wasn't time... in the end I grabbed Emma's with sincere apologies, and attacked it with a pencil. In the meantime, Becca and I had been up to the Physics lab and absconded with six stools. The set and scenery were in place. So were lights and sound, so was Emma at the piano, me perched on top of said piano with script, bell and whistle, the narrator in her wicker chair, and so we began.
It went like a dream. Can I say it went like a dream? They knew what to do. They went on at the right places and didn't forget their lines. They were loud enough. The lights were perfect. I blew whistles and rang bells. In fact, it would have been enough to convince me the actual performance was going to be awful (isn't a bad dress rehearsal indicative of a good first night?) when it dawned on me that we were halfway through and our allotted thirty-five minutes were up.
Panic. Panicpanicpanic. When they reached the end (they were fab, they were) Becca, Emma and I shut ourselves in the soundbox with three copies of the script and a red pen. We just cut everything we could get our hands on. Extraneous dialogue, an entire subplot related to the treasure, loads of it has gone. And it's my script, my little magnum opus, so I can't help but regret what's gone, but there's nothing else to be done. Becca came across me in a foetal position clutching my red pen, and gave me a hug. Apparently, from what she's seen, our play is the best. I just hope we don't screw up what we've got with so much chopping the night before.
While we were sitting up there in the soundbox, Emma said, "Can you smell vinegar?"
"Yes," I said, and seconds later Izzy appeared with one of those instantly recognisable greaseproof packages from the chippy. I've never been happier to see one in my life. I've been trying to eat less crap, but to no avail. I ate chips entirely by reflex while editing; it must be a nervous compulsion.
Tomorrow, I need to talk Mrs Colvin into letting me out of Chemistry one and two. If she doesn't, I am so, so screwed it won't be funny. I'll just have to get down on my knees and beg. Screw dignity, I have none left. Then, we need a readthrough to make sure they've got the hang of the cuts. Hopefully Rice-Oxley will let me off - if she doesn't I'll have to go to Biology - and then we have lunch to sort last-minute stuff out. We are period 6. Period 5 is Grease, and I'm worried we may seem a bit of a comedown after that, but nothing we can do about that. Anyway, while Grease is on we can make last minute adjustments, and then we're on.
If it doesn't fit in, I will cry. Thirty-five bloody minutes and we need an hour.
Following that I have to go to Politics (although I'm tempted to just not, as Miss Hathaway will never chase after me) and then comes the adjudication.
I need to take in a whistle, a rubber rat, an old Beano comic, and a digital camera. The camera's not essential but will be nice, so I'll borrow Pedar's. He's out tonight, as is my mother. I got in, watched Stargate (The Other Guys, would have probably been better if Daniel had been in it, but not a bad ep) and met my new pupil, Tara. She is more of a challenge to teach than Kate, as she finds maths even more difficult. I get the feeling her mother is a bit overwhelming.
Anyway. I earned ten pounds for one hour's work. The money I get for tution is absolutely obscene. I mean it. Pedar always says, "Charging for education? Have we abandoned all our principles?" and while I know he's kidding (Merchants', lest we forget, is a public school) I can't help but feel he's right. Ten pounds for something I would do for free? Urgh. Guilt.
Did I mention the Drama Festival is tomorrow? The Drama Festival is tomorrow.
Eek.
That said, today was more or less a success. Once again (this seems to be happening more and more often lately) I couldn't face school at eight in the morning. So I slept in till nine and wandered in half an hour late to Politics, but it was totally worth it for the sleep. I shouldn't have bothered, really, as following that I had a free. I did some English (not enough) and and then sloped off to the soundbox with Becca's lunch. She was in the process of having a nervous breakdown. She and Julie both. They are the tech people for all seven Drama Festival plays, and so have to cope with seven scripts and seven sets of lighting/music cues. Also, Becca was taking the opportunity to check out the competition. Apparently all the plays up until lunch had been a shambles in rehearsal. I was slightly reassured. I handed over her lunch - two cheese-with-butter and two Penguins - and settled myself with a thump in the corner of the soundbox. I simply couldn't face our own rehearsal. Becca eventually persuaded me to shift, so I ambled unhappily down to L4G's formroom. We only rehearsed Act II, and they were all right. Not brilliant. But it was all okay, and we arranged for the people with afternoon frees (not me - Chemistry with Colvin) to finish painting scenery and drag the whole lot over to the centenary hall.
Again rather unhappily, I went to Chemistry and waited outside the lab for the others. I was perched on the brick bit at the top of the stairs when Rola arrived in a fine mood. Apparently Mrs Wigmore is throwing fits all over the place and demanding immediate cuts in Snow White's script. I ought to say that they wrote a new, remixed version of Snow White, so the story may be slightly different. For example, the prince does not end up with Snow White, but rather with the (male) hunter. (I said, "I love this play already!") Anyway, Mrs Wigmore has said the script is not to contain the words "shite" or "bloody" or (wait for it) "gay" or "lesbian." I just about flipped.
First of all, why is she telling us this now? She was supposed to go round and watch all the bloody (and shite! shiteshiteshite!) plays last week. She didn't turn up for any of them, as far as I know - four of the groups I spoke to said she didn't, and we know she didn't see Daisy. Our Day Out may well have to be completely rewritten - but as Sarah said, are these trackie-clad little scallies really going to say, "Oh, fiddlesticks!" when life is less than rosy? And here was me thinking plays by Willy Russell were frowned upon because their scripts are so sharp that they invariably win. But no... it's all about the fucking language. The school is in a Liverpool postcode. Willy Russell is probably the best Liverpool playwright, and everyone knows his plays (Educating Rita and Shirley Valentine are set English texts at GCSE). Name me one girl in the entire school (scratch that, the English-speaking world) who hasn't heard the word "bloody." Or "shite." Or "fuck", for fuck's sake!
Secondly, I really felt like marching off to the woman and yelling, "I'm fucking bisexual! D'you wanna purge me from fucking Daisy Pulls It Off?!"
Interrobang?!, etc. Gay and lesbian? The mind absolutely boggles. In any case, Daisy and Trixie, upon being caught by Clare in the middle of the night, are not going to say, "Oh, fiddlesticks." They are going to say, in unison, "Bugger." Ta-da.
After that lesson, in which I was mostly annoyed, I went down to the hall. Becca was just recovering from the technical rehearsal for Grease. She looked unhappy. "It was good," she said.
"Good how?" quoth I.
"As in, good enough to win. It's just not fair!"
"Why is not fair?" I asked.
"Because it's them!"
Them being Becky O, Becky Branton, Verena and Gemma. Gemma, scarily enough, carries a whistle round to shout at her kids with. I carry a whistle too, for whistle sound-effects. Note the significant, possibly-relevant-to-basic-human-rights difference there. And I totally agree - it will not be fair if they win.
Then came our technical rehearsal, the last of the bunch. We had from two-thirty to five, but we didn't get started until quarter past three, as it didn't start well. Firstly Sir Digby Beaumont's astronomy book (really a Physics textbook with silver stars stuck on) went missing, and then the narrator discovered she'd lost her script. I could have killed her. I needed desperately to edit it, and there wasn't time... in the end I grabbed Emma's with sincere apologies, and attacked it with a pencil. In the meantime, Becca and I had been up to the Physics lab and absconded with six stools. The set and scenery were in place. So were lights and sound, so was Emma at the piano, me perched on top of said piano with script, bell and whistle, the narrator in her wicker chair, and so we began.
It went like a dream. Can I say it went like a dream? They knew what to do. They went on at the right places and didn't forget their lines. They were loud enough. The lights were perfect. I blew whistles and rang bells. In fact, it would have been enough to convince me the actual performance was going to be awful (isn't a bad dress rehearsal indicative of a good first night?) when it dawned on me that we were halfway through and our allotted thirty-five minutes were up.
Panic. Panicpanicpanic. When they reached the end (they were fab, they were) Becca, Emma and I shut ourselves in the soundbox with three copies of the script and a red pen. We just cut everything we could get our hands on. Extraneous dialogue, an entire subplot related to the treasure, loads of it has gone. And it's my script, my little magnum opus, so I can't help but regret what's gone, but there's nothing else to be done. Becca came across me in a foetal position clutching my red pen, and gave me a hug. Apparently, from what she's seen, our play is the best. I just hope we don't screw up what we've got with so much chopping the night before.
While we were sitting up there in the soundbox, Emma said, "Can you smell vinegar?"
"Yes," I said, and seconds later Izzy appeared with one of those instantly recognisable greaseproof packages from the chippy. I've never been happier to see one in my life. I've been trying to eat less crap, but to no avail. I ate chips entirely by reflex while editing; it must be a nervous compulsion.
Tomorrow, I need to talk Mrs Colvin into letting me out of Chemistry one and two. If she doesn't, I am so, so screwed it won't be funny. I'll just have to get down on my knees and beg. Screw dignity, I have none left. Then, we need a readthrough to make sure they've got the hang of the cuts. Hopefully Rice-Oxley will let me off - if she doesn't I'll have to go to Biology - and then we have lunch to sort last-minute stuff out. We are period 6. Period 5 is Grease, and I'm worried we may seem a bit of a comedown after that, but nothing we can do about that. Anyway, while Grease is on we can make last minute adjustments, and then we're on.
If it doesn't fit in, I will cry. Thirty-five bloody minutes and we need an hour.
Following that I have to go to Politics (although I'm tempted to just not, as Miss Hathaway will never chase after me) and then comes the adjudication.
I need to take in a whistle, a rubber rat, an old Beano comic, and a digital camera. The camera's not essential but will be nice, so I'll borrow Pedar's. He's out tonight, as is my mother. I got in, watched Stargate (The Other Guys, would have probably been better if Daniel had been in it, but not a bad ep) and met my new pupil, Tara. She is more of a challenge to teach than Kate, as she finds maths even more difficult. I get the feeling her mother is a bit overwhelming.
Anyway. I earned ten pounds for one hour's work. The money I get for tution is absolutely obscene. I mean it. Pedar always says, "Charging for education? Have we abandoned all our principles?" and while I know he's kidding (Merchants', lest we forget, is a public school) I can't help but feel he's right. Ten pounds for something I would do for free? Urgh. Guilt.
Did I mention the Drama Festival is tomorrow? The Drama Festival is tomorrow.
Eek.
