Friday, 31 August 2012

Robots of Death



My first directorial review, 4 Stars !!
"Kerry Ely’s direction is tight, and she has marshalled her actors to keep refining and polishing the final product... Ely and her team have achieved what many would have thought impossible in this fine re-creation of a classic." - Fiction Stoker for Manchester Fringe.
 
Considering we had one month to pull this epic piece together, I'm so happy and proud of the amazing cast! Tech which was provided by the amazing Ste Taylor was a major contribution to the professionalism of the show, every audio cue was perfect during the run. 

Rehearsal shot: Blaze and Iago
Adapting a SciFi TV show`s script to stage was a fun challenge. The set proved easier than I had first panicked about, by setting different areas of stage with minimal props and by having the actors miming walking through hydraulic doors with sound effects to get to different areas, we created for the audience the setting of the space craft. 
The TV script used alot of cut scenes and with an extremely large cast this could have become very messy to transfer to stage, to minimalise movement on stage and keep the audience's attention on the action we employed freezes to the actors not in the direct scenes.  This proved effective and allowed for smooth continuation of the different scenes, lending to a tv show paced performance. 

Of course there was one moment of near disaster as one night a main actresses had been held up by an accident on the motor way. Luckily we had professional stand up comedian Chris Tavern in the cast and with the help of Dan Thackery acting as robot V45 the two pulled off a short comedy sketch that kept the crowd laughing and entertained as the actress arrived.

    It's V45's standup debut from last week's Robots of Death, with a little help from his human pals   
   Daniel Thackeray and Chris Tavner ..... 
   http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10151304854538222

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