The Early Hand-off for Better Flow and Cohesion

Welcome to this week’s edition of Summit Stages News! I’m Rebecca Burnham and this is where you get weekly updates about musical theatre that promotes wholeness and belonging; learn about visionary creators, producers and others; and discover some mighty stories that need to be turned into musicals.

I’m on a collaborative mission to give cynics reason to become connectors, drifters hope to become builders, and enemies understanding to become friends, all through musical theatre. It’s a task that’s way bigger than I am and this newsletter is my effort to gather with people of vision, heart, and skills so we can do that work together.

This week, we’re returning to the Seven Steps of Organic Acting, with Step 6: Run Throughs with No-Interruption. I’m writing this post in collaboration with Manuel (Manny) Leybas, a veteran organic director and educator in Utah, who has taught theatre arts in every educational setting from homeschool to university.

Often, in traditional acting, directors will interrupt rehearsals until the final dress rehearsal, continuing to craft the show toward their vision for the production. Not so in organic acting, where an early handover to the cast and crew aligns with a more collaborative philosophy. An organic production fully belongs to everyone, not just the artistic director. Manny explains, “The heart and soul of organic theatre is expressed most clearly in Aristotle’s idea that “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” This principle emphasizes that meaning, purpose, and function emerge from unity, not from isolated elements acting alone.”

The artistic director’s vision is vital in both organic and traditional theatre. But in an organic production, it tends to be more profoundly influenced by the insights and discoveries of the cast and crew. These have been unearthed and explored throughout the four types of rehearsal that make up organic acting’s first four steps: reading, communion, walk-and-talk , and scene combing rehearsals. The director’s guidance became most pronounced during Step 5: optimizing for an audience. Now, it’s time to stand back and let the cast and crew practice taking full responsibility for the show, from the opening to the closing curtain. These rehearsals allow them to establish fluidity and to build their trust in each other.

Stage managers are now the ones primarily responsible for keeping the show running smoothly, communicating backstage with both the cast and technical crew. Directors are watching from the audience, taking notes but saying nothing until the final curtain has come down.

There will be glitches. This expectation needs to be established ahead of time, possibly in a Circle Of Truth before the first no-interruption run through. Glitches are part of the process. They may reveal where additional, single-intention rehearsal is needed for a particular part of a scene or a sound cue, etc. That’s expected and best to discover now, rather than during a final dress rehearsal in front of a preview audience (which is the beginning of Step 7). “If an actor, fully in character, is meant to hear a phone ring and the sound technician fails to execute the cue, the show can devolve from serious drama into unintentional farce,” Manny warns. “The audience is shocked, and the production staff may never fully regain the audience’s trust.” The no-interruption run-throughs help prevent such disasters.

These will be conducted in costume, with lights, sound and special effects. “The only thing missing from these run-throughs is the audience” Manny explains. A minimum of five such rehearsals is ideal. That’s about the number of run-throughs necessary for stage management to fully rise to their role while cast and crew solidify their reliance on each other, and establish flow and rhythm.

For me, having just finished one production, and currently deep in the middle of two more, the concept of five no-interruption run-throughs strikes me as both profoundly appealing and alien to anything I’ve ever experienced. Normally, when I’m directing, we’re racing to be ready by opening night. But I wonder what would be the impact of turning the show over to the cast and crew a little earlier. Would it help the production feel “real” sooner, before they’re in front of an audience? Would it deepen their connection with their part, in a way that isn’t possible while somebody else is taking responsibility for the show?

Directors, actors and technical crew, what do you think?