Return on Investment...

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Yesterday saw us reach another annual landmark in the Yew Tree Youth Theatre calendar, as it was the day we went back into rehearsals with our Connections play to get it ready for Kendal.  I always approach this rehearsal with a significant amount of trepidation and not without good cause; there have been some years when it was a nightmare.  Happily yesterday wasn’t one of them; in fact it was an absolute pleasure. 

I was actually bowled over by the standard of work the cast produced yesterday after over a month of not looking at the play, at least not in a rehearsal situation.  Since the rehearsal I’ve been thinking about how the play has managed to stay in such a good state and I’ve decided it’s a lot to do with the hard work that happened early in the year.  The nature of “Tomorrow I’ll Be Happy,” was such that it demanded hard work, by everyone…and it appears the hard work put in has built the firmest of foundations.  This means that even after a gap where it got no attention whatsoever the quality of the production has remained intact.

This experience speaks to me of the return on investment.  That even when we think that something is transient…in the absence of the resources to put on runs of any more than a couple of days…in actual fact we are recouping so much of the energy and talent we put it.  The connections cast could pretty much go on stage tomorrow and do a good show and that’s testament to the graft that they’ve put in throughout the project.  However we have three more weeks…three more weeks of being able to invest even more and see what rewards that brings us…I’m excited at the prospect…at the prospect of discovery, of working hard and of sharing what we make and find with others…

We’ll keep you posted…

PS  If you want to hear the actors perspective on this read Tom’s blog for this week!

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