So Here We Are Then...

One thing today's venue, Carterton, has in common with the JR is that it's a venue OTC haven't visited before, and last week it was reported that it wasn't selling very well. Which strikes fear into you for a last night - I mean, a bang not a whimper, not the other way around, right?
But Vertigo isn't destined to close under a cloud. Despite many potential drawbacks (including the news that there won't be any booze on sale - which is mistakenly announced just as someone starts uncorking wine in the bar...?) a good crowd gathers and we set about doing everything for the last time.
Of course it's emotional. It's an age since we first landed the parts back in May, and we have all been gently considering how to play them - making decisions from the limitless number of possibilities - up to and during the rehearsals and run. There were certainly moments, scenes, which could have been played differently, possibly better. Over the next few days I, for one, will be seized by the fear that I was inadequate, that more research, more enquiry might have improved the performance.
Tonight, though, we relish what's left. Act II is a dream, everything is high stakes. The laughs are better, the silences more electric, the emotions more raw. At the end, when I look down at the twisted curtains on the stage and beg Ballard "May I kiss her?", I completely break down - experiencing, perhaps, a tiny shadow of what the loss feels like.

My friend Ali once wondered whether ending a play was like a mini-bereavement, and I've always thought it too trivial for that, but today it seems to qualify on such terms. There's talk afterwards about whether "Vertigo" will have another life - and yes, it feels as though we barely started - but experience and reason suggest it's unlikely. Thank God it happened at all, I say.