We reach the end of our final week of rehearsal-room exploration for “On An Average Day.” This has been a breakneck process built around a muscular piece of theatre. As always, the director wants another week of rehearsal, but that is a luxury that we (like so may other smallish companies who rent rehearsal and performance space) literally cannot afford. So here we are.
And as the week comes to a close, as I look out over the approaching onslaught of a whirlwind tech process, I feel charged by the lingering snaps of dramatic electricity that have slowly developed in that tiny room during these last few weeks. Despite a full-blown viral invasion that eventually compromised the health of both actors, forcing me to actually cancel an actual rehearsal (a first, ever) the story stands strong on its skeletal legs. The actors are pointed headlong into the arc of this comic near-tragedy with strong hearts and hungry instincts.
Kolvenbach’s play is a delectible challenge: a visceral two-hander about two decent, flawed men who are battling to hold together authentic lives in the shadow of a mysterious and distant father. It is a play about men written by a man concerned with the increasingly inarticulate nature of the male heart.
On a technical, structural level “On An Average Day” appears to be a back-to-basics excersize: Kolvenbach has placed two complicated characters in a claustrophobic room, loaded them with a volcanic set of given circumstances, and set them loose on each other. And yet, there is something else, something spooky and intangible that lurks around the edges of this seemingly conventional setup. Something like a strange face in an old photograph, or footsteps in an empty hallway, or a sourceless smell. Something haunted, and theatrical.
For the last three weeks, we’ve been thrashing out the story in our tiny flourescent room. In three short days, we take that story, step into the dark, and attempt to turn it into theatre.
