Dress rehearsal

Today's photo day at Bolton Hill Nursery, and  so I spent a few enjoyable minutes last evening pretending to be the photographer as Cleo hammed it up. Last year, the guy who shot the Bluebirds was a real pro; aware that some of the 2-year-olds might find the process daunting, he kept up a friendly patter of comments, and regularly placed a stuffed animal on his head, allowing it to slip off in an apparently unplanned way that drew a number of giggles.

Why practice for such a thing? Why, indeed - especially when rehearsals can be more upsetting than the actual thing? In Stanislavski on Opera, for instance, you can read the harrowing story of a 1926 rehearsal for The Tsar's Bride, during which "a large chunk of plaster fell from the ceiling over the orchestra, followed by a cloud of dust." The members of the orchestra scrambled, he says, under the stage, and the cast ran offstage. Stanislavski covered his head with his hands, and slowly retreated, as sawdust fell on the footlights. "To top it all," remembered one individual, "we now saw a pair of legs encased in boots dangling from the gaping black hole overhead." Soon enough, though, things stabilized. Cool heads took over, and within a few minutes a ladder was erected - and a fireman, who had been inspecting the upper zones of the building, rescued from his precarious place above the stage.

Happily, our rehearsal went rather more smoothly. No sawdust, no unexpected crashes. And, as you can see above, some truly warm smiles. But of course the rehearsal is rarely exactly like the performance itself. And so we'll see, at 10 a.m. today, if the slipping stuffed animal can retain its lively appeal for a second year.