Me & Philip Glass

We (Focal Point Theatre Company) had our first rehearsal for All in the Timing by David Ives this past week. The production consists of four ten minutes plays, one of which is called Philip Glass Buys a Loaf of Bread. People seem to be very excited that we're attempting to perform this piece. Basically, the dialogue is written in the same vain as Glass' music. It's chaotic, simultaneous, sparse, intense, lovely and difficult. Melissa, our director, decided that for our first night of rehearsal we would focus on just that piece and thank God she did! We broke the script up into 28 movements, figured out the tempos and timing and by the end of it we were all fried. Happily fried. Happily, confidently, satisfyingly fried. This is one of the most challenging pieces I've ever done. I can see why people don't perform it often. And I can't wait to show our audiences that we can pull it off. :)

I've discovered that there is a documentary on Philip Glass on Netflix (that I'm watching as I type this). Within the first 4 minutes I had a better understanding of how his mind works. The opening interview follows his wife as she describes the chaos that is his office. How she hopes there's never a fire in their house because (while the originals of all his scores are in archives) his entire library of all his music was sitting on one shelf in that room. How his desk is covered in papers until he finishes a piece at which time he cleans everything only to have it a complete mess three days later. His sense of humor really surprised me. Not sure why. He also makes his own pizza dough. How can you not love that? :)



*M*