{"id":2270,"date":"2026-01-13T11:52:45","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T16:52:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/?p=2270"},"modified":"2026-01-13T11:52:45","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T16:52:45","slug":"spring-2026-as-you-like-it-entry-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/spring-2026-as-you-like-it-entry-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Spring 2026 “As You Like It” Entry #2"},"content":{"rendered":"\n


\u201cWell, Time is the old justice that examines all such offenders, and let Time try.\u201d <\/em>Everyone told us it would feel real after Christmas. Everyone I spoke to who had done the job before, especially the winter tours, was keen to share the spooky story of how quickly reality would set in once we were back from the festive break. Don\u2019t get me wrong, we\u2019ve always been aware that we\u2019re somewhat against the clock, however this week has felt like something of a crash-landing into the minutiae of everything that goes into putting a play on. I\u2019m suddenly a dance captain, a set dresser, an aficionado of scrolling every possible clothing website to find the exact right cut of long sleeve white blouse for the best possible price. And somewhere in the middle of that, I need to figure out how to be an actor, too. No pressure or anything. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We began a truncated week last week with a day and a half of finishing and consolidating the first two acts of the play – the approach we\u2019re taking right now is to paint the scenes in broad strokes until we have a serviceable version of the whole play, then dive back in with our magnifying glasses and see where we can really get our teeth into the details. That being said, for a first pass at things, I really think we\u2019re doing the play and ourselves justice with the diamonds we\u2019re beginning to mine. Stakes are beginning to come to the surface, character mannerisms beginning to cement and develop, humour and tension and chemistry certainly beginning to make themselves ever more available to us. We work 10am-5pm, which is certainly not the most grueling rehearsal hours I\u2019ve ever worked, but by the end of it I think we all feel the exhaustion of giving our whole, undivided focus to whatever might be in front of us that day. I may be speaking for myself on that, but when we went for drinks after rehearsal last Monday, I managed one 0% Guinness before I had to go home or risk falling asleep on the train. Reader, I am suffering for my art. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For all it was close to Christmas, that day and a half was certainly not spent winding down. By the end of Tuesday morning we\u2019d had, essentially, six full days of rehearsal, and with two acts, five songs, and a jig (we have a jig!) to recap we made use of every possible minute available to us until we all ran off for respective trains to loved ones. And we managed it! Yes, that time pressure was there far in the background, but to have a few days off to enjoy the festive period and to not worry about the state we were leaving the show in felt like a real luxury, and one I\u2019m grateful for. Barring a Zoom line-run to keep things fresh and indicate what might need a refresh before coming back into the room, our focus was off the room and firmly on our families, blood-related or chosen. And then back to London for that post-festive break reality check. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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By the way, I\u2019m making it sound like some horrible, crushing, all-consuming fear of what we are about to embark on, and that is far from the case. It\u2019s a wonderful kind of fear, anticipation of the adventure of it all more than anything – there is an overwhelming amount to do but I have no doubt that it will all get done in time, and done to a hell of a high standard at that. Dribs and drabs of costume and set are starting to creep in, like tree roots and vines in Arden – from the internet, from the treasure trove that is Brixton market, from the Mary-Poppins\u2019-bag-esque cupboard at the back of our rehearsal room that houses a veritable museum of past AFTLS productions. Our confidence in our music is growing exponentially, both in instrumentation and vocals – Benjy and Al are taking on the mammoth tasks of not only learning Shakespearean lines and vocal parts, but will be providing the underscoring for the show as well. Jo has also learned several accordion chords so she can accompany when it wouldn\u2019t make sense for Al\u2019s character to play. I\u2019m in awe of them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019ve had a group outing to scout hat possibilities for character signifiers, and to purchase material for our boundary – the 20ft x 20ft playing space we mark out and then build our world inside of. This has posed its own challenge, given that the world of the play begins in the oppressive court of Duke Frederick and transitions into the forest, with a few flashes back and forth between the two. A problem to solve for sure, but an opportunity to make a little big of magic too. We certainly ain\u2019t the type to pass that up. The word that keeps popping up for us is \u2018ambitious\u2019. It\u2019s been a recurring theme so far, and driven again by our determination to beat that pesky clock. This week we\u2019re aiming to finish the entire show and get a run in of our second half. Ambitious, considering we\u2019re down a day for New Year\u2019s Day, but it all feels quite doable. It\u2019s a hefty schedule, that kicked off on Monday with us crashing right into the 15-page behemoth of Act 3, Scene 3 – Corin and Touchstone arguing! Celia telling Rosalind that Orlando is in the forest! Orlando meeting \u2018Ganymede\u2019 and setting up the game of wooing! It\u2019s all kicking off! But I love the way the room works, each of us excited for an opportunity to jump out of a scene to see it from a different angle, or being inside it all and charting a path through. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One challenge I\u2019ve been trying to personally tackle is sitting in the discomfort of trying to figure things out; Al pointed out to me that I have a tendency to try and exorcise tension if my characters are in a bit of a pickle, by moving away or overcompensating with gestures, and he wanted to see what happened to the scene and the character if I held onto that tension. Yes, it can be uncomfortable or vulnerable, but I trust the company and the room and the attention we give each other in it, and for all I know I still have a long way to go, the work we\u2019ve done has already developed beautifully. Seeing Al and Sam being as polite as possible whilst resenting each other under the surface in the scene between Jaques and Orlando had me beaming, and watching Jo and Benjy as Celia and Oliver immediately fall in love the second they clap eyes on each other has had us all giggling like kids. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For all our ambition, we\u2019re sailing through our schedule and we\u2019re largely on track with where we want to be – the thing I keep saying in response to our scheduling is \u201cit\u2019s ambitious, but ambition\u2019s gotten us this far\u201d, and so far \u2018this far\u2019 is a pretty great place to be. I\u2019m writing this on New Year\u2019s Day, sitting on my sofa with my partner next to me, one eye on the Middlesbrough game and the other on the scenes we\u2019re looking at when we get back in the room tomorrow. It\u2019s the time of year for taking stock, for assessing where we are and what we want – for making resolutions, famously. Mine is to be kinder to myself, to give myself the grace to not worry about failing as we explore deeper into this beautiful play, to open up and see what possibilities might appear. The conditions are perfect to do it, and there\u2019s no time like the present. From our rehearsal room to wherever you may be, wishing you a very Happy New Year from the five of us, and may your 2026 be filled with as much love, humour, and new opportunities as our characters face in this crazy thing we\u2019re making together.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cWell, Time is the old justice that examines all such offenders, and let Time try.\u201d Everyone told us it would feel real after Christmas. Everyone I spoke to who had done the job before, especially the winter tours, was keen … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5137,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47487],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-shakespeare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5137"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2270"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2270\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2274,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2270\/revisions\/2274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}