The weeks are long doing this, but now we are getting into the run and those of us without understudy commitments are suddenly looking at a stretch of time where we can land in Stratford and catch back the daytime.
Morning will be long tomorrow, heralding the darkness, and we will continue to tell this sad tale of male violence and misinformation. It’s great, it is totally to my taste, and I really actively challenge the people who are writing “I came to Othello because I want to watch a beautiful woman being strangled.” We are looking at the whole journey and trying to be relatable because if we push things to extreme places then the people who want to see the strangling don’t feel uncomfortable about themselves for that tendency. We are only doing what’s in the text, what the writer gave us. “Put out the light, and then put out the light,” but there’s been generations of violenceporn on this show and “I’ll take that job!” they cried, these shuffling clever men, only to be disappointed.
I’m downstairs in this little cottage. I needed a bite of haddock chowder. Lou is asleep and hopefully I’ll be able to creep in without waking her once I’ve finished this and necked my camomile tea. It’s wonderful having her here and now two whole days with no shows stretch before us. I’ll miss this show terribly when it’s gone, but right now I’m glad I don’t have to do it for the equivalent of a weekend. Sunday and Monday.
Tuesday they need some of us to help out with education with a Q&A and I’ve volunteered my services. It’s Birmingham uni – that’s where Min was before she trained – so maybe I’ll get to say something inspiring to a future Min… Either way I love meeting and working with young practitioners. There’s always something to learn and the learning always goes both ways.
I’m gonna settle down to sleep, take a leaf out of Lou’s playbook. Brush my fishy teeth and put myself out for the night. We even went to The Duck for a swift one after the show. Living on the edge.
AlBarclay 