Over the past few months, I have been the assistant director for Harper Joy’s production of David Ives’ The Liar. I first joined the production team back in May. When I asked Nancy what point of view she was taking with the show, she replied that she did not want the audience to be able to stop laughing. I thought this was a grand idea! I have loved being a part of this version of 17th century Paris, and I hope everyone gets the chance to see The Liar this weekend, October 22-25th.

What does an assistant director do?

It really depends on the needs of the individual show. For most of the process, I am an observer. I attend every rehearsal and production meeting and watched how Nancy interacts with the actors and design team. I am also a second pair of eyes. Sometimes I am asked to take notes on big picture things, or concentrate on a certain background detail. We also had the opportunity to split up rehearsals into two spaces, with me working on one scene and Nancy or Mike Mahaffey working on another. I also did quite a bit of dialogue coaching.

On Dialogue Coaching

The Liar is a language heavy play. I helped the actors on pronunciation as well as teasing the most out of the imagery and sound. I really loved this task! During the week of fight choreography rehearsals, I got the chance to do this a lot with the actors not in the fight scene.

What I Learned

One of the joys of working with Nancy Simon is that she has been making theatre for so long and is extraordinarily knowledgable. I picked up many nuggets of wisdom such as “don’t push pronouns” and how supporting a line with more breath changes the delivery for the better. I also had a chance to think about how a rehearsal process can find a balance between efficiency and creating space for in-the-moment discovery.

Erin Kirkpatrick is a Junior theatre major at Whitman College. This semester she is taking an independent study course in directing. In addition to studying directing, she learning more about dance, costume design, and stage management.