Sweeney Todd - Journey with Integrity

Saturday, September 8^th kicked off rehearsals for Hope’s production of Sweeney Todd: Demon Barber of Fleet Street. Why am I just posting now? Well, these past few weeks have definitely been busy ones. But we are currently taking a short break from rehearsal and I am using this hiatus to crank out all my thoughts on this process so far. This is a time to rest, recharge. But it also is a time to begin, and prepare myself for new challenges. Auditions filled with nerves, callbacks sparked with excitement, and a casting process that seemed to last for an eternity have all passed and the date is set. We open on November 9^th.

But this is still a ways off. Now is the time to rehearse.

On the first morning of rehearsal, I arrived at the choral room early (as every good assistant stage manager should) with a fellow ASM, my dear friend Emily Svendson, and our stage manager – a Hope theatre professor – Perry Landes. I shook hands with the choral directors working on the show: Dr. Brad Richmond, our vocal director and a professor here at Hope who was wearing an eye patch and a Grateful Dead T-shirt; and Joseph Byrd, our guest accompanist and vocal coach, a very smiley bald man in an outfit looked like tribal garb.  Did you have to reread that last sentence? I kid you not, I did not imagine these two men – they are real people. They are also really brilliant people.

We got down to business right away. Brad launched right into the “Ballad of Sweeney Todd.” Because solos had not been assigned at that point, he began the song himself in a deep baritone voice: “Attend the tale of Sweeney Todd…” Then the ensemble joined in at the chorus, singing, “Swing your razor wide, Sweeney, hold it to the skies!” and the room rang with my peers’ voices. Their blend was incredible. No wonder it took so long to select the cast; they seemed to have picked each member knowing that they would complement each other’s voice. Listening from my spot in the back of the room, I could also tell Joseph’s fingers were flying across the piano keys as the song picked up speed and intensity; each note ran so fluidly into the next.

For the next couple hours, they ran through “Pirelli’s Miracle Elixir” and “God, That’s Good,” along with “The Ballad…” Of course, since it was the first time the cast had come together, there were trip-ups and stumbles, but Brad and Joseph took it in stride. They would stop, make corrections, answer questions, repeat sections of music, and give demonstrations of difficult sequences (Brad would even attempt reach up into his falsetto to “sing in the stratosphere,” as he would say to the lovely ladies who sometimes have to reach all the way up to a high D). These two men were so refreshing to watch. They worked together perfectly, taking each other’s cues and bouncing off each other’s ideas. And they had amazing energy.

I was so impressed with the whole process. This was SWEENEY TODD we were working with – arguably Stephen Sondheim’s most difficult piece. But these musicians attacked these first songs with so much gusto that Emily and I couldn’t help bouncing up and down in our seats and smiling from ear to ear. We knew then: this show was going to be fantastic! We couldn’t wait to hear what the ensemble would sound like in a month and a half.

                Our director Curt Tofteland joined us towards the end of the music rehearsal. Curt is a guest at Hope this semester and has very impressive credentials: he has been in the professional theatre world for over 30 years and is a Shakespeare master and aficionado. He is the founder of Shakespeare Behind Bars, a fascinating program that has been running for 17 years with a mission statement proclaiming, “theatrical encounters with personal and social issues to the incarcerated, allowing them to develop life skills that will ensure their successful reintegration into society,” (read more about Curt and SBB at www.shakespearebehindbars.org). With an occupation like that, it was quite clear that Curt was a master when it came to the unpredictable and bizarre. Therefore, we were all incredibly excited to work with him on a project like Sweeney Todd! 

After Brad and Joseph had completed their rehearsal, Curt introduced the entire cast to the production we were about to begin. There was no cutting corners or sugar-coating with Curt; he got straight to the point. He opened his speech by saying that we had been selected because he wanted the elite in his production. In a slightly intimidating, yet fascinating “Godfather-esque” gesture, he said that we had officially been invited into his circle of trust. He continued by affirming that, yes, Sweeney Todd was one of the most challenging pieces ever written in musical theatre, but we were there because he believed we could take on that challenge; we were expected to take on that challenge. There was a lot to discover as we continued on this journey, but the only way we could discover the full potential of this production was to have integrity. As individuals, we needed to be accountable for ourselves and reliable in our actions. As an ensemble, we needed to be honest and genuine, supporting one another and not dragging each other down. This was how we were to uphold the trust Curt called us to establish. We then spent the next twenty minutes deciding the core values we needed to hold true to in order to make this the best experience it could be. Together, we came up with values such as discipline, communication, respect, and (Curt’s favorite) wonder. After confirming our unity as an ensemble, Curt closed his speech by saying, “when one learns, we all learn.”

This is what Sweeney Todd is to be. It is to be a time of wonder, a time of discovery, a time for togetherness. For we are colleagues, we are classmates, we are friends, we are family, we are an ensemble. We are here to learn. And as learners, we must venture forward on this journey with integrity.

More Than a Bookworm

With the beginning of a new semester comes the shaking off of the summer slack. New classes, potential internships, and a completed major declaration form will set me on my way (pause to do a little happy dance, as I can now say I am officially a theatre major!). I am ready to start. I’m ready to get rolling. I’m ready to see how far I can go. So many questions are swimming through my head: Where can I improve? How will I push my limits? What can I accomplish? Will I succeed? But these are good questions. They get me motivated, they make me want to learn, and they encourage me to challenge myself.

The best way to improve and excel in a skill is experience. You can study all you want, but you won’t be able to come anywhere near expertise unless you actually practice what you set out to learn. That goes for any field of study. And my field of study is theatre. To make it in the theatre business –as in any other business – you can’t just know theatre; you have to know how to do theatre. You can rattle off every major playwright in the world, you can devour all the method books that Constantin Stanislavski and Uta Hagen and Sanford Meisner wrote, you can trace theatre history from Oedipus Rex to Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind; but unless you know how to execute a play – take it from page to stage – you won’t make it very far in your career. If facts and history was all you knew, you’d seem more like a bookworm than an artist – and after all, theatre is an art. As thespians, we are our tools and the stage is our canvas.

As artists, we need to be more than bookworms to succeed. The production process is where theatre majors learn the tricks of the trade: it is where we learn how to use our tools and how to apply them to our canvas. It is our “hands-on”, our “on site”, our “field work” – whatever you like to call it. A theatre student designing, building, rehearsing, and performing a play is like an education student going to a field placement in a local school or a medical student going to residency to get first-hand practice at work life in a hospital. During a production, actors get their best training, and technicians master their craft. After all, how are you supposed to die a heart-wrenching death on stage if you don’t get a director’s criticism and practice it? How are you supposed to know how to hang a stage light safely if you don’t go up to the catwalk with your Master Electrician and a wrench and hang it? How are you supposed to know how to call a cue yourself if you don’t sit down with an experienced stage manager, put on a headset, and call it?

That is the mindset I am adopting this year. Experience. This semester, I landed the position of assistant stage manager for Hope’s musical, Sweeney Todd (how cool is that?!?!), and the rehearsal process is underway as we speak! On top of that amazing opportunity, I will be talking to my theatre department adviser about possible internships for the next two summers (one in Holland and one in Chicago), a potential semester workshop in New York City, future stage managing opportunities, and even a chance to participate in the American College Theatre Festival. Possibilities, possibilities, possibilities! They seem endless. And I’m up for the challenge. I’m going to do all I can to learn my trade: use my resources, enlist the help and wisdom of my professors and advisers, look for new opportunities and challenges, and say “Yes!” to each one I can. I want to go through every open door that life puts in front of me. I’m going to dream, but that’s not all I’m going to do – I’m going to work to make my dreams a reality. You may call it ambition, but I call it learning. Success doesn’t come instantly. I have to learn from someone who has already succeeded in order to succeed on my own. I can’t realize my dreams until I’ve worked for them.

I can’t just sit and study. No matter how often I crack open my textbooks, I can’t just absorb everything on the pages and expect them to get me to where I want to go. I need to work. I need to put down my books and be more than a bookworm.