Monday, January 18, 2010

Unexpected Sadness

As I walked into our theatre this morning to prepare the space for company auditions I found myself walking down the aisle to the stage and being overcome with a strong feeling of emptiness and sadness. Not for myself but for the space. It struck me as odd that a feeling like that could come from a building, from an empty stage and yet it was very powerful. Perhaps I'm a bit of a romantic and it had something to do with the dimly lit stage and the ominous rain clouds outside, but to me as I walked through it felt like the building, the stage, even the seats were sad and lonely this morning. As I gathered chairs and swept the floor I tried to figure it out. What occurred to me was maybe it wasn't sadness, maybe it was a mourning over the loss of the packed house from the night before, two shows back to back both nearly sold out. Maybe the theatre was sad, cold and empty not knowing when that excitement and energy would return to it's space. I wanted to reassure it somehow, tell it that we'll all be back next weekend, different crowds, but the bright lights, the voices, the audience, the cast we'll all be back to perform again, to make the space come to life and be happy again. I'm not sure how to convey that to the four walls and 36 empty seats, it's not really a conversation you can actually have. I hope our auditions today helped cheer it up a bit, make it feel useful and alive again.

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