Dr Faustus: A week in pictures

A.H: It’s been a busy week at the old West Yorkshire Playhouse and everyone’s hard work culminated today when we ran the show for the first time in front of the representatives from Wardrobe, Sound, Lighting, our Designer Colin Richmond, our writer Colin Teevan and some of WYP’s young company who will be joining the production to help out in the party and group scene’s. It was exhausting but, by all accounts, a resounding success. There’s definitely still a lot of work to do when we begin the tech on Wednesday but, if it’s not too immodest to say, it feels like we’re in a very good place. Here’s how the past week went down in pictures:

Monday: In the foreground Dominic Hill directs, from left to right: John Kielty (Valdes), Kevin Trainor (Faustus), Ollie Williams (Evil Angel) and Chris Keegan (Cornelius). Far right is our assistant director Andy.

 

Tuesday: The cast assembles to run the second half of the play. 

Wednesday: When I woke up lovely Leeds was covered in Snow and after a long day of rehearsals we left the playhouse to discover that the cast's John Kielty had snuck out to build a Dr Faustus devil snowman which soon became the talk of the Playhouse. Since John's a Scot he built this snowman entirely with his bare hands....no, seriously!

Thursday: Chris Keegan and I were made aware Wednesday evening that the local bar 'The Wardrobe' was testing its new menu this week and so the first 10 customers who arrived at 12pm each day would receive a free meal. We instantly resolved to put our morning off to good use with a free Lamb Hotpot: AND IT WAS AMAZING!

Friday/ Saturday: Towards the end of the week more and more of the costumes started to arrive. The dressing room table photo with all the female paraphernalia on it actually belongs to a male member of the company whilst directly above we have a headdress that belongs to the Las Vegas section of the play.

 

Sunday: After an exhausting week of rehearsals I mostly spent my day off here doing absolutely nothing. Which is just as well because...

 

Today (Monday 18th): First full run through of the show. In the background you can see the audience we assembled: The youth group on the left, the directing team in the middle and the production team on the right. Meanwhile, in the foreground, the actors remain undaunted.

 

So, what now? Well, tomorrow morning (Tuesday) we'll run the show again incorporating all the notes from today's run in the hope that it will be slicker and more detailed. Then on Wednesday we move into the Quarry Theatre to begin the technical rehearsal where Dominic will begin to marry the work we've been doing in the rehearsal room with that of the technical world of lights, soundscapes and smoke. Then on Saturday we have our first preview and it'll be time to show this wee project we've all been working on to the public and see what they make of our very modern version of this age old story.

 

‘Dr Faustus’ is on at the West Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds, from 23 Feb to16 March, and at the Citizens Theatre, Glasgow, from 5 Apr to 27 Apr. For all tickets please contact the respective box office or book online at www.wyp.org.uk or  www.citz.co.uk.