Still catching up. These are from Sat 9.8.07.

Camille recorded the script this morning for 2 hours, so she could have a CD version to listen to, and ran lines for an hour. Then they broke, and Aaron and I joined at 2 pm.

The accent samples which I got for Camille from The International Dialects of English Archive were not very helpful. Rather than downloading more of them, they want me to focus on finding video and audio clips of the real people involved.

We went through what was staged so far and kept moving forward. It’s our second blocking day. Aaron took a moment to describe what his process was, which I think they both understood better from having…tried it the day before. Sometimes it’s no good talking about what you intend to do until you do it. Anyway, he said that he wants to lay out the architecture and then go back and refine further – ask detailed questions on the next round.

Aaron works from actor improvisation very naturally, as Bill does, but Aaron still manages to keep a fast pace the first go-round. Deeper questions are being, often, tabled for Round II. It’s good for me to see that working from actor improvisation can be consonant with a variety of approaches in blocking pace.

“Let’s not get too comfy too quick.” (Avoiding sitting down)

Aaron and Camille confront the problem of the other speakers in the text (Morris, Mother, Ben-Gurion, etc…) and try a number of different things with where Camille’s face is pointing for each speaker. They discover, remarkably quickly and easily, that the other speakers who are not Golda should face directly out to the audience. It works very well. So well, in fact, that the epistemology of the whole thing is confusing.

Aaron and I talk about this on a break, because I’m so flabbergasted that he’s figured the key out so quickly. He says he’s used front-facing presentational direct address before. (He said it in a shorter and more meaningful way, but you know what I mean.) But he didn’t plan it coming in as the key. He just found it, naturally, from watching her.

When two characters, neither one of whom is Golda, speak to each other, Aaron tries having the dominant one out front. But when that doesn’t work, he quickly modifies it – so quickly, with no attachment – I really hope to be like this some day – so that both of them are out front. And it works.

Aaron watches Camille improvise, then he jumps up and takes a move she’s just done and modifies it slightly. He riffs off of her. I wrote down, “Aaron is giving blocking readings,” at one point, but it’s not really like that – it’s more like she begins to draw a line and he guides her hand in drawing it. Whatever it is, it’s impressive. He’s a very active director. Music stand. On and off the stage.

Another convention we build, playing into the theme of everything being in Golda’s mind, is the idea of her evoking these characters before they speak. Seeing them before they are announced.