Went over to Von's for turkey breast, ham, and Swiss cheese and made sandwiches for lunch. I added some applesauce, fresh out of the slow cooker, and naturally, wine and beer. Jim came a bit early, as he wanted to read over some scripts before we "performed" them, so he'd know more about the characters. Good grief, these are little six-minute jokey skits, not Macbeth, so why.... But no prob, he read them over and we even discussed the characters a bit.
We had lunch, including the cake Vickie had brought me for dessert, then settled down on the couch. Whether or not Jim has improved on his delivery is debatable, but I'm not conducting a private acting lesson here, and I don't intend to. I did give him a few pointers here and there. He has a tendency to sound exactly the same, no matter the circumstances of the piece or the character, so I tried to get him to be a bit more expressive. We did When Cooks Confer; The Truth, The Embellished Truth, and Nothing Like The Truth; If Guys Were Gals; and Help Wanted--Not!
I was a bit annoyed when Jim told me--didn't ask me--I should type the stage directions in red. They are now, as is customary, in parenthesis, which is standard. He said it confused him that they were in the same font as the characters' dialogue and "other scripts are in red." I told him I had never seen a script with red stage directions and he said he couldn't remember where he had seen it. Anyway, I have no intention of going over the damn things and putting them in red.
I suggested that, next time, we do one of my more serious plays (all one-acters) and he thought that was a good idea. I also suggested he might want to apply now to Silver Crest, as a possible place to live after he retires. I described Diane's place and thought I'd ask her if we could come see it next Saturday, if she's available; I'd bring lunch.
Jim stayed until after 4:00 and, as ever, I talked and talked while he contributed little to the conversation. Ellen called later just to say hello and we had a good chat.
Am I prepared for Dudley House today? Not too firmly, so if I have a problem with the spiel, I'll just have to wing it.
2 comments:
Rosemary,
I find here when folks read a script the first time they often read the stage directions as part of the script. They don't know what the italics mean. In time they get it.
True, Pat. When I run my acting classes, I point this out, along with other information, such as what "beat" means.
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