Sometimes, you just get tired

Rehearsal today was long and taxing. We're in tech, which is, as anyone with experience will tell you, a difficult part of the process. Everyone managed to keep their composure and trundle through with a minimum of fuss. I lost a couple pounds sweating, and I'm sure I'll lose a few more tomorrow when we tech act two. We're a little over a week away from being "on the road" proper, and I think I speak for everybody when I say we're ready to go. Is the play ready? Well, I think most of us are ready....

One of the things I'm really proud of in the way that I approach theatre is my work ethic. I like to think of myself as patient, easy to get along with, hard-working, and ready to pitch in. One of the things I do not tend to think of myself as is a particularly stellar actor. I can be quite good, acting-wise. I can even inch into moments of quite-excellentness, but I've never thought of myself as being "great". This may sound like self-pity, but there it is. I make up for what I lack in sheer "talent" with hard work and a knack for smoothing out the rough edges in the people around me.

There are a couple of moments in one of the plays where I have a good-sized part that are simply not working. These aren't moments with other actors - this is just me, doing a bit, and knowing that it's really not working. I'm sure that a better actor (or, perhaps, someone who didn't have to try so hard) would be able to figure out a way to make it work, but frankly, I'm just not nailing it. There's a timing issue, or a movement issue, or it might even be just a simple acting thing, but whatever it is, it's not happening, and I'm...

I'm tired. I get like this when I'm tired. They're going to reblock some of the bits in a couple of days, and I'm sure they'll be fine, but I wasn't able to make it work on my own with what they gave me. And that makes me a little sad.

I definitely don't want to make it sound like there's any other problems, because, truthfully, there aren't. I'm totally in love with the people around me, and they are doing a great job. I'm just a little dissatisfied with my progress. I was hoping that this process, with its intensity and total emersion, would facilitate a breakthrough of some kind. But here I am, still dealing with the same problems I've been dealing with since I started... Ah, well. Here's hoping that tomorrow goes better (and, honestly, today went pretty well).