2 days to go!

It's Wednesday morning. In 48 hrs. I'll be warming up for my 'Put-In' rehearsal with the principal cast, sets, orchestra, and my costumes. Til then...

Today I'll spend a few hours with Jonny B. (a g-dsend) and possibly Bart and Adam continuing the work we did yesterday on deepening and layering Il Mondo, Passegiata, and Love to Me. Il Mondo is an intense piece (so intense that really into it yesterday I nearly fell into the trap as it was opening up in the middle of the song--not good).

But scarily enough, rehearsal today will be pretty light. Tomorrow is a full run with the understudies and then Friday we go! I'm taking off from watching the show from now on so as to give myself a few nights of getting to bed early and also to keep my head clear of what other actors are doing with choices, rhythms, and so forth. Wow! I'm getting butterflies just thinking about it.

I feel like I've started to find Fabrizio and the rest will just have to come on stage in front of an audience. There's not enough rehearsal time to really work things until they're completely in my body to give me the mental freedom to simply 'be' up there by Friday night. But that's ok. I will do my best between now and then to try and really solidify the foundation we've built so I can jump off the diving board Friday night and have fun--explore in the moment and see what happens. That's all i can do.

So it's off this morning to buy some last minute things i need for my dressing room, rent a few more Italian movies, and then get to the theater by 1pm to work with stage management and crew on the 'flying HAT' bit at the beginning of the show. (Clara's hat flies off and I catch it and give it back to her...there's a bit of stage craft that allows the hat to 'fly'--a nearly invisible string that once i catch the hat i'm responsible for undoing...shhhh! don't tell anyone :)

Onward!

Rehearsals--9 Days to go

A great day of 'trailing' Matt around backstage this afternoon...

The backstage set up for this production is fun and a bit complex at first:

Because the set consists of 6 towers that move on and off stage (3 on each side) the sight lines (where one can stand so as not to be seen by the audience) when standing off-stage vary greatly depending on the towers' location. So, unlike in most other shows, where once you're off-stage you are "in the wings" and sight lines are clearly marked on the floor, for The Light in the Piazza, there are no set sight lines. (The first time I trailed Matt I mistakenly walked backstage in clear view of the audience. AH!)

As such, the traffic of actors backstage is designed to keep everyone who's not supposed to be seen, not seen :) Sometimes this means walking from the dressing room underneath the house (where the audience sits) to the wings of the other side of the stage, behind an offstage curtain, & up and around to the upstage part of the wing (instead of simply walking into the wing and upstage). It's only confusing until it becomes habit.

So I prefer to get these moves in my body and my mind now, along with noting the quick changes (running off after a scene down under the house into a stairwell to meet my dresser for a 'quick-costume-change' into the next scene, for example) so as not to have to deal with them stressfully when i go on in 9 days!

Then this evening during the show, I rehearsed in a downstairs rehearsal room with our director Bart and actors Laura, Diane, and Chris (my soon to be Papa). It was a fantastic rehearsal focused on moving slowly throught the play and making things specific. Specificity is key for me. I feel happy I was able to get through the understudy rehearsal last Friday, but I also knew that my work was a bit general. Tonight, I was really able to start adding layers to the scenes by being specific moment to moment. So much is happening with Fabrizio early on that I want to build, that each moment has to be clear or the whole thing becomes a bit messy and general. I left feeling that things had clicked a bit. I am getting excited.

My concern is that time is waning, but that offen leads me to rush the process. I just can't help but think that this cast had 5 weeks of rehearsal together (some more in the Seattle and Chicago productions) and I'm getting a day or two total with the principal cast! So I do feel a slight pressure to make every moment of rehearsal count. But Bart reassured me we have time and we just need to take it slowly. Amen brother. We do have time and will continue to have time even after I go on. Who knows where i'll be in my process by next Friday, but I'm going to allow myself to continue to rehearse and explore this play and this character moment to moment for weeks and months to come. No pressure to get this right by next Friday night (well I feel it, but i have to keep telling myself there's not :)

Let's hope for a restful sleep tonight--shut the mind off.

Rehearsals Day 10

Margaret: Slowly.
Signor Naccarelli: Ah!

And that's the way to sum up my journey finding Fabrizio...slow but wonderful. It's been nice to build layer upon layer. Over the last few days I've had some great experiences.

In a rehearsal Thursday night Jonathan Butterell walked in, fresh off a plane from London. I hadn't met him but had heard so many wonderful things...they're all true. He's a man with a calming, reassuring prescence and light behind his eyes. He seems to exist without tension...how does he do that??? Anyway, we got right into talking about Fabrizio the poet, his ideas and how they're essentially ways for Fabrizio to deduce his emotions.

Friday, an hour before the understudy rehearsal, Jonathan and I worked on physicalizing what we discussed the night before. Using the text of Il Mondo, we worked on moving through the space (on stage at the Beaumont) guided by emotion not thought. It's a small but very important difference between me and Fabrizio. And when things clicked, the song felt effortless.

Also, Jonathan showed me how Italians move from their bellies--not like Americans who move from their chests. It's an idea I explored in Alexander technique yesterday and was blown away. After getting into my legs I was able to put my awareness in my belly and radiate this limitless energy. I'll have to write about Alexander Technique in more detail.

Surprisingly, the understudy rehearsal went extremely well. I pretty much knew where to go and what to do/say. Of course there was a lot to deal with (i.e. other actors, people watching and taking notes, stage hands, sets, etc;), but I felt really good about things. All in all, the understudies in the cast were so kind and helpful. I feel like I've got a great platform to dive off from now.

So now it's about assimilating some things: the movement, the emotional life, the blocking, the dialect, the world of the play, and so on.

Alla bellezza della vita!

1st week

So tomorrow is day 5 of rehearsal. Only 12 to go?!

So far...I've watched the show 4 times--twice in the sound booth where it's dark but actors can watch the show while taking notes, etc; I've gotten to know some of the cast, I'm through 5 of the 8 Pimsleur beginner Italian lessons, "Molto bene no?", I've got most of the blocking for the show written down, and I've worked through Act I blocking for a few hours with Laura as Clara and Diane (swing for Margaret/Signora/a few other characters) in a rehearsal room downstairs.

I've also had a meeting with Bart to discuss Fabrizio. That was great. We talked about him being like Romeo...off balance, love sick, passionate, troubled...Italian!

One thing is though--I've yet to have much time to really live this character out. It's one thing to do the paperwork and work things out in my head, but it's getting this character in my body that's the most important thing. But with only one rehearsal with Laura and Thom before a 4 hour work through this Friday with the understudies (AH! that's 3 days away!) I'm worried...

I talked about it with Joan and she had a great idea...
When watching the show, watch it as Fabrizio. Don't worry so much about the staging but rather, try to find my emotional map for this character...start really FEELing the show in my heart and my body. That way I'll know what I'm feeling and what I'm having trouble with so I can go home and work on my emotional preparations for each scene, etc; GREAT IDEA JOAN!

So that's what I'm gonna do.

I've got a hair cut tomorrow for the publicity photo shoot (later this week) and my first session with Ralph our dialect coach tomorrow as well as my last chance to hop on stage and walk through some staging with Thom and Laura before Friday.

It's crazy. But I'm so excited to go work tomorrow. Another day closer to being a true Naccarelli :)

Rehearsals

And we're off!

With only three weeks and 1 day (which translates into 17 ish) days of rehearsal before I'm slated to go on as Fabrizio, there's no time to waste.

I showed up at the LCT Beaumont stage door and received my building pass, headed downstairs and met our stage manager Thom! What a great guy. After talking a bit and going through some paperwork, Thom handed me a tentative rehearsal schedule, introduced me to his team and showed me around.

Basically the first week of rehearsal was going to proceed as such: lots of watching the show, a few rehearsals on stage walking through Fabrizio's blocking (staging), some time with Laura the show's Dance Captain and u/s for Clara/Franca, some time with Ted to work on music, and a session or two with the show's dialect coach Ralph.

In the meantime i was off to the library. I wanted to try to learn to speak as much Italian as possible. I checked out some Italian movies and Pimsleur's audio CD's on Beginner Italian that I threw on my iPod.

I also went to Barnes and Noble and bought some books on Florence, some Italian work books, and the short story of The Light in the Piazza by Elizabeth Spencer.

The Callback

So I went home and worked on the music for a few hours...listening to Matt on the cast album, trying to absorb Adam's music in my body, working on all three scenes, and making sure to feel prepared but not over prepared. I wanted to show them me exploring my take on Fabrizio--in the world of the play but not an imitation of Matt. He and I are so different I knew it was important for me to find my own truth in this character.

The callback itself was great fun:

Before going in the room I saw Chris Sarandon waiting to go in as well. I'm so excited to work with him!

Anyway, I went in and Kelli and Victoria were in the room! It was so wonderful to have them there to work with--a true gift. I sang 'Il Mondo' and then read an early scene with Fabrizio, Clara, and Margaret. Bart gave me a bunch of direction providing me with an underbelly for the scene--really mixing things up and playing a bit. With Victoria and Kelli to play with it was a rush! Then I sang 'Love to Me' (to Kelli) and then the team wanted to see/hear the scene leading into 'Say It Somehow' and the song. So Kelli and I worked through it...I am so grateful to have had her to work with in there! Most of the time actors audition to an invisible muse somewhere in the back of the room. Having Kelli reallky made things electrifying.

Anyway, that was that. I left feeling pretty good. I was in my body, loose and open. I thought I took Bart's direction well and that Adam was pleased with the vocal adjustment I made. It was nerve wracking (sp?) and so emotionally charging I kind of felt a little buzzed. I knew I'd be finding out by the end of the day because I was headed out of town early the next morning on a trip that, were I to get the job, I might have to cancel.

So I found my way out of the basement of LCT's Beaumont Theater and soaked in the sun walking out on 65th street. Whoever they chose, I was just happy I did good work--proud to have had the chance to work on such great material with 2 great actresses and a brilliant creative team. It's an audition i won't soon forget.

And the Beauty Is...

My G-d...

I saw TLITPiazza for the first time a few days before my audition. Then & in the many times I've seen it since (watching the show is a big part of rehearsal right now), I still find it stunning. I am so excited and honored to be a member of this fantastic company and a part of what I believe to be the most beautiful show on Broadway.

Let's talk about the audition for the show...

I was given a packet of material with 4 of Fabrizio's songs, the script, and 3 scenes to work on.
In the room were Craig Lucas (book), Adam Guettel (music/lyrics), Janet Foster (casting), Bartlett Sher (director), Dan Riddle (assoc. MD on piano!), Ira Weitzman (Assoc. Prod'r LCT), and a few other people I was too nervous to remember.

Thankfully, I was familiar with some of the material having sung 2 of the songs at LCT's American Songbook Series The Music of Adam Guettel 2 1/2 years ago. I also met Craig, Adam, Kelli O'Hara, Ira, and Ted Sperling (MD) then...so at least I wasn't going in completely cold.

I was so excited after seeing the show just to work on this material. Fabrizio is a guy with such a passionate, open heart...I knew preparing the material would be challenging but if I could really open my heart--it would be thrilling. Thank g-d for Joan Rosenfels, my friend and long time acting coach. We worked the day before just really getting me in my body and getting younger and open open open!...working to slow down my mind and find love in my body and my heart.

So going into the room, I felt good--nervous but excited/prepared.

I sang 'Il Mondo' and read the first scene and then Bart said he'd be bringing me back the next day for a callback. He wanted me to really work on the material. Adam gave me a new song (well new to me sort of) 'Love to Me' and some notes on my singing: he wanted me to sing even less. I had worked hard to NOT over-sing the material as I felt I had 2 1/2 years ago, and Adam wanted even less for the callback.

That was it. Everyone was really supportive and offered great notes for me to work on.

On to the callback!

'Fabrizio' Lazar

I'm thrilled to announce I will be playing Fabrizio Naccarelli in Lincoln Center Theater's production of The Light in the Piazza. I'm taking over for my buddy Matt Morrison when he leaves at the end of the month to work in a new play on Broadway.

More details to follow...