After several false starts, it does seem at last that we are ready to go. Not ready to perform, you understand, not by a long way, but at last we can start proper rehearsals. And have done so.
Most importantly, we seem to have a full cast. Maybe even a full cast plus one, in that there are two possibilities for one of the roles, both of them, coincidentally, called Ali. One is the Ali who was one of our first members. I reached out to him, and he has attended two or three rehearsals… but not for the past three sessions, with no communication from him. The other Ali is someone who responded to WeRESTART’s appeal for actors; he arrived last week. He is another Iranian, which seemed to be a positive. While not being the most confident or fluent of actors, he did seem to enjoy himself, and promised to return the following week. Except that he didn’t – Hamed says he was ill. So we either have one Ali too many, or one too few; time will tell.
The final role (maybe) is that of Frank, a character who only appears in the final two scenes. Hamed turned up with a friend of his, a nice guy called Meraj (Iranian, of course) and he joined in, seemed to enjoy himself. But then we have not seen him since… though Hamed assures me he is keen to participate.
It does not appear, from these two examples, that we are entirely secure in our casting. But the positive aspect is that we have been able to move forward, to block some scenes, to feel that we are starting to put the play together. And most positive in terms of casting is Jadon, the young British guy. He is a very capable actor, and could have been asked to cover various roles (and for a week or two, did read in for various absentees.) But he is decidedly British, so does not so easily fit as one of the refugees. But it does mean we have a strong candidate as one of the smuggling gang. Actually, both parts of the smuggling gang. Roji has always been pencilled in as one of these two, but as he is unable to attend rehearsals, we have decided to give both speaking roles to Jadon, with Roji slotting in later as his mostly dumb associate.
We even have managed to start thinking about the mechanics, most particularly the boat that sets out to cross the Channel. We have decided to use the physical reality of ladders to indicate the structure of the boat, tied together using cloth snakes, and Chiara, our long-suffering admin assistant, popped out to buy what we needed from the Argos shop just a few yards away.
We have also had the opportunity to have a rehearsal with Roji. He has come down to London to attend a high-profiile photographic exhibition, centred on the Bibby Stockholm, the notorious asylum-seeker’s barge that the government moored just off Portland (and which Roji stayed on.) This did mean that he was busy pretty much throughout his time in London, but we were able to lure him to Ickford. With Hamed and Jesus, we were able to run through his scenes – unfortunately Connie, playing Ahmad, the other person in those scenes, was not able to be there, but at least we were able to reassure ourselves that these early scenes were still on track for performance.
We are starting to put the production together, but this is just as well, for time is slipping away. But it was ever thus, such being the precarious nature of theatre. It is as much an act of faith as anything else.
