‘Oliver’ Diaries: Act 1 Rehearsal (21st March 2018)


It was my very first 3-5pm rehearsal! I knew that I wouldn’t be needed a lot, so I came prepared with Skittles, Party Rings, playing cards and homework.

I spent the majority of the first hour doing my R.E homework, getting distracted by the rehearsal of ‘Food, Glorious Food’ but bribing myself with Skittles in order to make sure I finished it. Once I’d completed my homework, we were starting scene 5 so I sat and ate my Skittles (which, as expected, everyone asked me for) at the bottom of the stage with Ellie.

I felt confident that I knew my lines for act one now, so I rehearsed the scene without my script; it was amazing to realise that I barely even had to think about what line came next! The scene we were rehearsing is the big one with four songs – two of which we still need to work on.

Nevertheless, we blocked act one in its entirety and ‘It’s A Fine Life’ seemed to come naturally to us all, which Mrs. Culkin liked. Though it’s one of the songs I’m most excited to perform, I never feel like the rehearsals of it go as well as they could, but Mrs. Culkin said that we did well today and I actually agree with her! However, I’ve realised that singing on stage is much harder than it seems… You always think you’re singing loudly but, in reality, people can just about hear you.

Before ‘I’d Do Anything,’ mine and Ben’s bit, in which we mock posh people, got a few laughs and we did well with the choreography in the song too! This is one of the songs that we still need to work on though, so we didn’t get through the full song perfectly today.

After that, we’d rehearsed all of act one so, with 25 minutes left, we aimed for another complete run through. This time, I was able to watch properly, which turned out to be a good thing for more than one reason; Mrs. Culkin said that she might have to ask some of us to sing along with ‘Food Glorious Food’ back stage during the show, so I needed to follow along as the orphans rehearsed it. I then watched the others rehearse their scenes in act one, waiting for us to get round to scene 6 again. As we were short on time, though, we had to finish around ‘Boy For Sale.’ I was hoping that we would run through ‘It’s A Fine Life,’ again, but I know there are more rehearsals coming up soon in which we will have more chances to do so.

As we left, Mrs. Culkin apologised to Summer and I that we have to wait around so much even though we’re not needed most of the time. We told her that we really don’t mind and were both productive in the times that we weren’t on stage anyway. Call me crazy, but I love all rehearsals – even the long ones!


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