Poor Unfortunate Me

So now that I have settled from my freak-out mode, I can tell a bit of my experience from the first rehearsal for the musical.
Poor Unfortunate Souls went pretty good. I didn't really have a handle on my time, so it seemed too short. I'll probably be better able to gauge one hour next rehearsal. The actors were very willing to try whatever and very supportive of and even excited about the choreography, but I just couldn't get out of Ursula what I wanted. I would demonstrate things with these over-the-top motions with energy through the roof and she would repeat them with about half the energy. That got a bit frustrating, because it just won't look right if she's not a little wacky. Right now the actress may be a bit shy and just not ready to own what I'm giving her to work with. I'm hoping as she rehearses it, she'll be less concerned with how she looks doing it and just go crazy with it.
I had also hoped that she would be really expressive with her hands and body all on her own, so I left quite a few parts with no choreography so she could just gesture and do what came naturally. Apparently, what comes naturally is just to stand there and sing. Now it just looks blank in the sections where I didn't choreograph. I mean, when I was belting it in my kitchen to get into the mood of the piece, I was making all sorts of motions and gestures... so I wanted to give her some space to do that too and not choreograph every single beat for her. Besides, that would be a heck of a lot to remember for a non-dancer. The director wasn't there for that rehearsal, so maybe she can help me pull some animation out of her next time.

Then it was on to Some Enchanted Evening. Ugh! It was pretty much all as bad as I thought it would be. The wings that I had hoped the actors could step from directly onto the stage were actually just curtains denoting the edge of the theatre space about 10 feet away from the raised plywood stage on three sides, so each couple must walk from the "wing" to the stage and go up about 3-4 steps. Not a good thing when I had planned entrances and exits where they dance right out of the wing onto the stage and again off into the wing. Thus, my first big fear was realized.
The stage itself has four different levels. It is a square, but the third closest to the audience is lower than the rest and a small square portion of the stage in the third furthest from the audience is raised higher than the rest. My plan was for couples to dance in a circular pattern around the stage. This is impossible with this configuration of levels! If I had been able to see the stage in advance, I would have never choreographed the piece the way I did... and I've choreographed every single beat, written it all down in counts of 8, gone over and over it in my kitchen so I wouldn't forget while I was teaching... you get the picture, right? When I saw the stage, all of that work pretty much went out the window. Second fear, realized.
My other concern was that the steps would just be too hard to pick up as fast as they need to be learned. I thought I had two hours with my group, but after the director's introduction of the concept of the piece, the stage manager stopping rehearsal to make some folks get shoes on, and my rehearsal getting cut short because another piece needed rehearsal that night, I got about one hour of time with them. NOT enough time to do a whole lot... which, I guess turns out to be fine, since I'll be reworking the choreography this week anyway.
I taught everyone two combinations of steps, which are just repeated in various ways for the entire piece. About three out of six couples got the steps with some level of proficiency and at least two couples are entirely lost. I have no idea if they'll practice them this week, but if I have exactly the same level of proficiency when I come in for rehearsal, or if (heaven forbid!) they've forgotten any of it, I really am not sure what I will do. I need a plan B for sure. I asked the director in that moment when I was watching them all try to do the right turn I'd taught if this was too ambitious for the amount of time we have. "No, no, they'll get it! It's fine!" she assured me. *sigh* ok! I'm taking her word for it and hoping against hope for the best. (and making the whole last half of the piece simpler than it had originally been.)

Needless to say, I was quite distraught about the whole thing when I got home. I drank a glass of wine and tried to tell myself not to worry about re-choreographing that night. I have a week. Just relax. Don't think about it. Showers are sometimes where I do my best work. I had several little epiphanies in the shower this morning about how I can use the space better, re-do some parts to make them easier to learn and dance and still make it look grand. I'm still frustrated about my experience because I feel like a lot of that could have been EASILY avoided if I had just been able to see the stage or at least have it described to me in detail since it was so different from the theater spaces I'd worked with in the past. Despite my frustration and self-pity party from last night, I am feeling more hopeful today.
The show must go on!