soup & widows

I'm directing two ten-minute plays for a local community theatre. It's a ten-minute play fest consisting of seven plays by seven different local authors. I was assigned two plays. One of them is about four friends meeting for soup in order to combat hangovers and fulfill destinical omens. Yes, I made that word up. The other play is about three generations of African-American women who have all lost their husbands to various military action.

The playwright of this latter play came to our rehearsal tonight, which was lovely. She hasn't been involved in the process at all, which has been fine-- she wrote a very good play and we have been content to work on it... but to have her there tonight added an element that was very important. And dear Lord, she is a gorgeous person.

The playwright of the soup play hasn't come to rehearsal yet. I think she's planning to come on Monday evening. I have been having problems with it because the four main characters are sitting at a table at a restaurant and some kind of theatrical convention needs to be employed in order for the audience to be able to see the people sitting around the table. If they all face the center of the table the energy just gets lost. It is a problem I'm currently wrestling with.