Deliverance R&D: Beginning with Text

Today was our first day of R&D at The Garage Theatre in Norwich. We walked into a fabulous studio eager to dive into the work. After a long break apart, we began with a physical warmup that focused on finding our connection again as a four. Prior to this meeting, we each read the text individually and collectively a few times and all felt that each character was well suited to each of us and felt inspired to begin the process by working closely with the text; then once we have a deeper understanding of the characters and their relationships to one another we will explore the spaces in the script for us to expand and explore the imagery and mise-en-scene. So, we began by analysing the script in terms of each character's objectives per scene, to grasp an overall understanding of the play's dynamics. We then began to 'walk through' the script from the very beginning, discussing how each character should behave along the way, followed by a discussion around the potential for imagery and props with the piece - creating a long list of physical materials to bring to our next rehearsal. Tomorrow, we bring a new friend to the rehearsal room - a vacuum cleaner...