by Gary Garrison
American College Theatre Festival - Bellingham, WA
February 2002

I directed this play as part of a theatrical experiment at the American College Theatre Festival known as "Splash." Five universities each cast, rehearsed, and performed this play. During the festival, the five casts of five actors came together to perform this play. The catch is that none of the actors were allowed to know the identities of the other cast members until they walked onstage with each other. Literally, the actors had no idea who was about to walk onto the stage. The play was performed 25 times during the weeklong festival, and every performance had a different combination of actors. No two actors saw each other twice. The purpose was to try to find a way of making the play as real to life as possible.

For me, this process was more about actor coaching than directing. Once four other cast members from four other institutions stepped onstage with one of my cast members, the work of the directors went out the window. I was not able to work with stage pictures or rhythm, and any vision I might have had did not have any bearing whatsoever on what the audiences experienced. The only real directorial influence I had on the production was through coaching the actors. As with all plays, I worked with the cast to help them create well-rounded, believable characters. I also worked to get them used to really "being in the moment." With an experiment like "Splash," it is crucial for the actors to be ready for whatever is coming next. The actors each had to be ready and listening to each other more so than with any other play. No one had the luxury of falling into a rut.

Through this process, I thoroughly enjoyed the experience of focusing on actor coaching without allowing myself to focus on the visual or rhythmic elements of the production. The experiment itself turned out to be a fantastic acting exercise, but in the end, that's all it was. The theatrical event suffered without the careful eye of a single dedicated director. The actors melded nicely into a believable ensemble, but the performances only underscored the absolute necessity of a director in a production.