The Pillowman: Acts 2&3

The capstone project consists of a forty-five minute to hour-long play of any style. This project is structured to allow each director to explore their individual interests and improve on the style of theatre that they see fit, while also learning how to direct the complete arc of a story.

I chose to direct an hour long cutting from The Pillowman by Martin McDonagh. McDonagh’s almost poetic writing style accompanied with the sheer dark hilarity of the play originally intrigued me and I chose it for the opportunity to tell a wonderful multi-themed story. I challenged myself to work as an acting coach, while treating the actors as collaborators, rather than just as the director, which allowed me to really work and focus on my weaknesses while bringing my strengths as a director into the light.  

The play calls for eight characters, but my cutting only called for five; Katurian, Michal, Ariel, Tupolski and the Little Mute Girl. While working on casting I held readings where I invited a number of my undergraduate peers to read for both a role I wanted to see them in and one of their choosing. I was given a stage manager at the beginning of the rehearsal process that only came to the first rehearsal and after two and a half weeks of trying to work with them, I was forced to find another volunteer in our department as a replacment. We are also given a lighting designer. This left me to design the set, props, sound, and costumes myself.

We were given five weeks to rehearse, which included a five-day break for thanksgiving the week before the show went up. Each rehearsal could be no more than two hours long and we were given three technical rehearsals that were also two hours long. There was no budget for this project and we were allowed a limited supply of set pieces, props and costumes, from which I pulled most of my pieces. The pieces that I could not find I had to pay for out of pocket.

The first week of rehearsal was spent allowing the cast to become familiar with the text and their characters. I allowed them to play and make decisions as their characters before blocking and setting anything in stone. It was not until the second week that I stepped in to work through and block the entire script. From then until our tech rehearsals we focused on character journeys and choices, while making them coincide with the over arching story of the play. Our run crew of three volunteer undergraduate students was added the night of our first tech rehearsal.

The Pillowman was performed in a black box theatre with the audience in thrust seating. I used a minimal set, allowing the focus to be on the actors and the story, but used all the props we needed to ensure the actors did not become stagnant.

The Pillowman was performed on December 7 for the Baylor Theatre Department and those of the public that were invited. I believe that the performance that day was the best run we had and I think that the final product was a smashing success. I cast the play wonderfully, while taking a chance with a freshman in the role of Michal. The lighting, sound, props and set all worked to further the atmosphere created by the actors. If I would have had more time to prepare for this piece, I would have looked into each individual story more and tried to bring forth even more depth to the script.