From the 22nd to the 24th of November, the year ten and eleven students at Kingston Grammar School put on an excellent performance of Nick Payne’s constellations, and I was lucky enough to be a part of the cast. The play, which explores string theory and tells the story of the same couple in different universes, was a challenging one to perform.
As the storyline follows the couple through separate universes as they experience different things, we performed the play in a unique way to the traditional performance. Instead of having one pair of actors portray the couple throughout the entire play, the different scenarios the couple experience were performed by different sets of two actors, as well as there being a chorus of actors who would speak and unison, very effectively displaying string theory and the complicated physics behind the play. My experience of performing in the play was an incredibly positive one: the play was unlike one I have performed in before for several reasons.
Firstly, the play was performed In the Round, meaning the stage was set up in the centre of the theatre surrounded by the audience, and so I had to practice entering from underneath the stage, something I had never done before. As well as this, the repetitive nature of the script meant I had to learn my lines extremely well as there were light changes in lines from scene to scene, and these could not be mixed up.
Overall, Constellations was an incredibly interesting and exciting play to perform, and I am incredibly lucky and grateful to have had the opportunity to perform it.
