The final hours before Cilgwyn Theatre Company opens its inaugural production are ticking away. Everyone's a little jumpy, writes co-founder Bronwen Wilson and the last of her production diaries is written with fingers firmly crossed
You know what they say about actors being superstitious about certain things, giving you odd looks if you say "good luck" or running off crying if someone names a certain "Scottish play". Well, it's all true. And the last couple of days have left me thinking I need to brush up on my superstitions.
As I arrived for our technical rehearsal I contemplated parking in the space marked 13, then thought better of it. Luckily, nothing disastrous. Normally these affairs are as dull as anything, getting the lights set up correctly, adjusting sets and so on. Ours was remarkably painless, mainly because my stalwart lighting guys just came in and got on with it and the actors were all used as slave labour, painting, sewing and generally being made to feel useful.
After running all the cues for the lights and music I could see the show in all its technicolour glory. It's amazing how a play comes to life once you aim a couple of lights at it and play some music. The problems began when we went home.
I tried to turn on our computer to do some work and lo and behold not one of our files seemed to be there. Not one. For months, producer Becca and I have been saying that we really should back up all our files, but had we? Of course we hadn't because we're idiots and clearly the computer would crash/get a virus a day before the show opened. This stupid machine had all our box office and school information and... well, just everything about Cilgwyn Theatre Company. Luckily Becca's technically-minded boyfriend was there and managed to retrieve our files. A collective sigh of relief was breathed.
But the bad luck didn't stop there. Turning up today for our dress rehearsal one of our actors was obviously in distress and clutching her phone to her ear. The reason for this was that she'd left her violin on the tube and given that she uses it all the way through the show, and new violins aren't cheap, it was obviously a bit of a disaster. Miraculously, once she'd got through to the tube people it turned out they had it. Sigh of relief mark II.
Dress rehearsal over and done with, we now seem to have a show and it looks really quite good. I don't want to jinx anything and am now going to go out and buy a rabbit's foot, put on some lucky pants and not say "good" or "luck" in the same sentence ever again. I hope instead you'll allow me to say that I hope lots of body parts are broken.
Chekhov at the Chapel plays at the Union Chapel Studio Theatre in Islington, London, from September 19 - 30
