This past week, we finished running through the script in a more detailed manner, picking up where we left off last week. Since we had some members who were not present the week before, we ended up running back through the beginning of the script as well. We focused on cleaning up the blocking, and the participants wrote notes about blocking on their scripts to remember for next time.

One somewhat frazzling part of our practice was the fight scene – we have not yet blocked the fight between Macbeth and Macduff, and the two actors improvised, but came dangerously close to whacking each other in the head or breaking the swords a few times. We will definitely need to work on this scene, and we reminded the actors to cut that part out until we work on it, for safety if nothing else!

A few members are beginning to memorize their lines, which is great. They do not necessarily have the lines down yet, and needed us to feed them lines every so often. I think if they continue to work on it, it will be very rewarding for them as actors.

Overall, the participants are getting very excited to act! They have even asked if we can organize a cast party for the week of the performance. I think this shows their enthusiasm and dedication to making the play a success, and I am excited to see what we all put together.