Diary: Meet And Greet

It is St David’s Day, and bitterly cold and bright. A company of actors are waiting with varying degrees of nervousness for the start of their rehearsals on a new production at the Bristol Old Vic theatre. As more than one of the actors remarked, the first time a company gather is like the first day of school. Most of them joke and swap reminiscences of mutual friends and acquaintances; at stressful times like this, you realise just how big an extended family the acting profession is. They are waiting to begin work on Beasts and Beauties, a production of eight European folk tales, retold by Carol Ann Duffy and adapted by Melly Still and Tim Supple. Melly is also the director and designer, and she joins the company in the coffee bar at the Old Vic just at the moment when the theatre’s two joint artistic directors, Simon Reade and David Farr, enter with at least thirty other people. These are the women and men who play the unseen but necessary supporting roles in theatre; front of house, back stage, over the stage and even under it. Their work underpins that of the actors. The space feels crowded; there is a “buzz” like the interval noise you get at a successful performance. This is the start of the “meet and greet”, that ritual event held in most theatres on the first day of a new production, at which all those who work for the theatre introduce themselves before the artistic director (Simon Reade in this case) bids everyone welcome, wishes the company good luck, and launches them into the relative privacy of their rehearsals.

“Sharper, sharper shiny knife cut the throat of whiny wife!”

Bluebeard’s icy words cut through the warm atmosphere as another first day ritual begins: reading through the play. The actors are eager; they speak quickly and with energy, glad at last to be doing their job. The rehearsal room is lined with some of the many props to be used in the production, including a 1950s carriage pram, a small but heavy iron-bound wooden chest (in which an unfortunate child will lose his head), a broomstick, pots, pans, a butcher’s block and knives, a thick coarse braided rope, and a grotesque small child-like wooden mannequin.

Melly Still shows the cast the model of the set and explains how the setting will work and what it will look like. The floor of the stage is covered by what looks like a giant white kite, and flying above it are blue clouds and cages, shiny steel mesh cages containing the petrified, semi-clothed remains of Bluebeard’s former brides. Part of the flooring will be covered in bark, which as Melly explains, when it gets wet (as it will) will give off a “lovely smell”. There will also be a wind machine (in one of the tales, a character is the North Wind), and when it is working, the audience should see its effects on the front cloth!