Ahhhh...

Tonight was the first night of my new DSB -- Drastically Simplified Blocking -- system.

It worked.

"Go here -- say this page. Move there -- say that page." Pools of time appeared, the actors released, and we did two scenes in the time allotted for one. Plus, I stumbled on a great warm-up. After Check-Ins and Art Talk, I just played Enya softly singing for 12 peaceful minutes, while the actors moved around the space in silence, reviewing their blocking & lines on the set. It felt like we had hours. When they had calmly finished and we ran it the first time, we had saved easily 30 minutes.

These are the win-win techniques I like: Ones that make order-of-magnitude differences; that get way more accomplished, in far less time, with spilling peace.

Like Leonid Anisimov says -- "When we begin rehearsal, first we must slow down time."