Fog Sculptor

What we're all really waiting for, though, is the inspired 5% or so of improvisations that can make a project start to sing. The first week of rehearsals in late October was full of such moments. A drought followed, then there was another splutter of inspiration. Last Wednesday was a good example. Looking back at the video – we film all our rehearsals in the studio – I see we're working very hard and yet, strangely, hardly working at all, as if the world we've sketched on stage were somehow doing its own thing. It's not, of course. When the action starts, what you see is 50 minutes of the performers gliding and stuttering through great decisions, inspired reactions and odd lunges, jumping from one fragment of material to another in ways that any amount of our talking could never have predicted. And if you watch closely, you'll see that I'm running in and out of the stage, too, whispering suggestions, waving yes or no to people who only sometimes notice, trying to sculpt the fog as it warps and weaves in front of me.