When I first pitched to co-produce A Dream Play eight months ago, I could not have imagined that the project would bring together such a large team – 70 creative minds, and counting. With just three weeks to go before we move in to Oxford Playhouse, preparations are accelerating rapidly as more and more people flock to join the ‘Dream Team’.
Last term, Emma Reay, who was chosen from more than a dozen applicants, wrote a beautiful new adaption of Strindberg’s script which the cast of 21 actors and dancers have been rehearsing intensively since -1st week. One of the many special aspects of this play is the way in which so many of the performing arts are brought to bear to create a fantastic dreamscape. 1st week has seen nine actors being put through their paces in an intensive waltz workshop where flat-footed and bendy elbowed awkwardness were transformed into confident travel lines and determined crotch-to-crotch contact in a mere two hours.
Cast and crew members alike have come to terms with seeing themselves on screen this week as our two ‘making of’ trailers have been broadcast to our website (http://www.adreamplay.com/trailers). Filming for our third trailer begins this week, for which all manner of storyboards will be deployed. And our Composer and Musical Director, Oxford alumnus David Allen (Murder in the Cathedral), is putting the final touches to his original score for the production which promises to bewitch the Playhouse auditorium from the depths of its orchestra pit.
In case you thought that producing a Playhouse show is all work and no play, then take note of our two launch events: A Dream Play does Sunday Roast in fourth week and a night in association with Poptarts at Babylove in fifth. It’ll be the night of your dreams.
