Right. I’m home. It’s solstice! And I have to go to bed before ten. It’ll still be light.
Last night I got pulled from deep sleep at half 1 because there’s someone staying at mine and she couldn’t work out how to open the door with the key.
Today was very much not an ordinary Sunday. We were back in the scratched black box, the six of us and a very lovely dog.
The Meisner stuff is growing on me as I start to internalise what its for. My initial concern was that we were going into “rinse your own life and beat the shit out of yourself in the process” territory, but actually it is about safely creating genuine experiences that you can subsequently channel. They put me through my paces today after going easy on me yesterday, and I was looking forward to that in my masochistic way. I like these guys so I’m happy to go there with them. So I opened a few doors. Lots of crying and rage, creepiness and manipulation. All the best bits. It’s like shadow work.
I’ve got to play Banquo on Tuesday though. I really hope the lines are in there somewhere because this overlapping week is a category-A headfuck. The two projects couldn’t be more different. Tomorrow I’ll wake up and record a tape in a third world, a telly world. Then I’ll drive across town and dig into the dark bits of my psyche with some really connected and exciting actors. Then I’ll drive three and a half hours, put up a tent, fall asleep in it, wake up and before long I’ll be running around in tights remembering verse with a very different bunch of delightful committed clever actors. Then I’ll probably have to drive back to London Tuesday night so I can dig in again on Wednesday before driving back to Salisbury. It could have been more inconvenient perhaps. But there’s a joy in having made it all work. I love this stuff, the variety, the exploration. I’ve been pretty wobbly this summer but this is a reminder of the sheer joy I can find in the communities and the crafty bits and the difficult things. My middle class guilt means I’m always more fulfilled when it feels like hard work.
I’m gonna turn in. Kinda wanna sleep naked in this heat but our guest is a young woman and my prostate is a cannon ball. At least she’s home tonight and not going out so I won’t get pulled out of dreamland by frantic late night knocking. I need to be tip top for the next few days.
