‘Faust’ Final Rehearsal

Today is the Final Rehearsal for Faust, and it will be performed in front of an audience of staff members. Company tickets, which are like gold dust, are rationed out at the beginning of the season and it’s a lottery as to which shows you will get tickets for. The private Facebook group for Company Members is jammed full of pleading posts, each piling in with increasingly grandiose offers of recompense in return for one (or several) of the coveted paper slips. Every time I agree to try and scrounge Company tickets for friends, I regret it. The politics of swapping or exchanging gifts for tickets can get stressful - and this, combined with the fact that most people don’t give up available tickets until the night before or even on the actual morning of the performance, means I have shut up shop on this one. However, I’ll do it for my parents, which is why I am waiting for someone I don’t know to leave tickets for me at the Box Office half an hour before curtain-up, and I have the heebie-jeebies. It’s only on my third illicit trip across the elegant courtyard to the Box Office, hot-footing it past the Long Bar and feeling conspicuous in my backstage blacks, that I find an envelope with my name on it has been left for me. Accustomed to dealing with the public, the Box Office staff are the epitome of efficient charm - all glamorous hair and warm, lipstick-drenched smiles - and I can heave an inward sigh of relief, safe in the knowledge that my parents will be able to see the show. 

Back in the ladies’ chorus dressing room, all is bubbling along nicely. We’re now familiar with the costumes, and a routine is beginning to establish itself. I learn which girls are slower, which are messier, which like to get into costume early and which prefer to leave it until the last possible minute. I hate to badger people, invade their space or faff about unnecessarily, but I have to balance this against the goal of getting everyone up to stage on time, with all laces, buckles, neckties and buttons correctly fastened, and no forgotten watches sneaking out from beneath cuffs or personal jewellery glinting in the lights. I’m standing in the wings, my eyes razoring over the costumes for one final check when Suzi, another dresser, approaches me. Her charge, Ashley Riches, has forty seconds to get out of one entire outfit and into another, and last time he didn’t make it back onto stage in time. ‘Could you help me?’ She asks. 

In the half-light of one of the changing booths in the wings, Suzi tries to prep me. ‘We’ll have to take his boots off and then put them back on again,’ she says, ‘so he can change his trousers. Then he goes into this shirt - don’t forget the braces - then this coat. Check the fastenings. I’ll try and do his gaiters.’ 

‘OK,’ I nod. ‘Which side of the booth will he come in from?’ 

‘Could be either,’ says Suzi. And so, when the moment is approaching, we wait for his arrival, poised with sleeves rolled, like football goalies. Minutes later, Riches comes flying in with makeup artist Annabelle in tow, and I am on the floor ripping open his boot-laces in the light of my head-torch. He’s not in his underpants for long, and about thirty-five seconds later, he is dressed again. ‘Wow,’ he’s saying, surprised relief in his eyes, ‘thanks so much! That was fast!’ And then he is gone again, and the three of us left behind in the booth are laughing from the adrenaline and high-fiving each other. 

I take my place by the tread unit, and as the show progresses, snatches of conversation float past me. 

‘I got to change a devil in a minute.’

‘It’s stuck to my eyebrow.’

‘Oh my God, my codpiece!’

‘Well, I hope you can get the blood out of that.’

‘When this energy drops off of me, I’m gonna be dead.’ 

‘My face was really itching and I was wondering if anyone would notice if I scratched it.’

And at the end of the show I hear, ‘They’re all really happy, well done everyone.’ 

Later that night, I’m standing in a field, the sky above me aflame with a beautiful sunset, when I receive a call from my parents. They’ve had a fantastic evening, full of magic and wonder and soul-journeying. Mum has fallen in love with Berlioz’s music, and Dad has been taken back to a time in his life when he was teaching at RADA, and his days were jam-packed with energy, creativity and excitement. He tells me that he took it upon himself to personally thank the director for all of his hard work in creating such a brilliant show. At the end of the conversation, I hang up with a happy sigh. THIS is what art is for.