The voices in my head

We had rehearsal this evening - an off-book run of Act I which was less painful than it might have been - so I've been listening to Andrea, Andy, Craig, Doug, and Jason this evening and for the past few weeks. And their voices have imprinted on me.

I find that this is a pretty common thing to have happen. When I did more G&S than just Sing-Outs and Sing-Ins I would end up with the G&S tape loop in my head. I would be trying to fall asleep or in the shower or whatever and, say, the men's chorus would fill my head with 15 1/2 bars of "We sail the ocean blue." That's right 15 *and a half bars*. So no resolution before we're back at the top of whatever section the men felt that I needed to hear right then.

This morning in the shower it was "Welcome, Gentry," in, I am very grateful to say, its entirety. The whole song. But at least it was the whole song. Of course, we got through the whole song several times before the shower was over and many more times on the walk to work.

Normally, one can get rid of brain-gum songs by replacing them with other songs. Worse songs always work the best, of course. But the only music I could come up with right now is other G&S and as "Welcome, Gentry" was playing to completion it seemed the better idea not to rock the boat. I could have had something from The Grand Duke stuck in my head after all.

Anyway.

We were dismissed reasonably early and I was at home, sitting on my sofa, petting my cat, and reading Kitchen Confidential** when I noticed that instead of reading neutrally, the words were in Andrea's voice. Andrea looks nothing like Anthony Bourdain. And she's tons nicer. So I banished her voice from the book.

This was only moderately successful, as Andy replaced her briefly and then Doug. And, in fact, as I was reading an interview at the back of the book, Doug was covering Bourdain and Andy was covering Daniel Halpern. This got to be kind of amusing, especially as I have no idea what Bourdain actually sounds like, so we kept Doug in that role and I started swapping out folks for the interviewer, first Andy, then Craig, then Jason.

I was least successful with Jason because I haven't been listening to him as intently or as long. As either actor or director, I spend a lot of time listening to people talking, saying lines, kidding around. I listen to pace and timbre and rhythm. Eventually the voice imprints on me for the next few weeks. It always starts as I'm reading the script and hear it in the voices of the cast. Eventually they just take over all printed matter and my e-mails are "read" to me by Lorraine or Angie or Cassie or Lori or whomever. Incorruptible had a cast of eight and all eight of them battled for the chance to read Time magazine to me.

It should only take me until about Sunday morning to get the current crowd out of my head. And, naturally, we have rehearsal on Sunday afternoon.....


*"Welcome, Gentry" has my favorite suggestive lyric in all of G&S: "Welcome, gentry / for your entry / sets our tender hearts a-beating." Yeah, don't it just.

**A book that I am finding strangely addictive. I've gulped it down like corn chips, even though Bourdain is pretty much like wasabi peas in terms of his rhetoric.