a different approach

 Tonight was rehearsal number two and we spent the time blocking.  In other plays I have been in we spent the first week or so going over and over the words but this director took a different approach.  We can't actually be on stage yet because there is another play in the final weeks of rehearsal on stage.  So we arranged tables and chairs in our meeting room to approximate where furniture, doorways, and props will be located.  Then we went through the first two scenes line by line, learning the actions that go with every line.  I think this is an interesting approach because we're memorizing the actions along with the lines.  I think that seeing how everything fits together will make it easier to learn my lines and should make everything flow more naturally.  We are supposed to have all our lines memorized (be off book) in three weeks.  I am in two scenes and have 46 lines, just the size role I like.  I attended Lutheran elementary school and we were required to do memory work, memorizing hymns or Bible verses, every day so I can memorize.  My eighth grade teacher used to tell us that we should have memorized our assignment so thoroughly that if we fell out of bed in the middle of the night, we could recite it backwards.  Since I don't fall out of bed I will never know if I'm that good.