The Winter's Tale 2009: Rehearsals finished

in situ:'s Winter's Tale group reassembled on Saturday to put the performance back together in a weekend. One actor not returning had been replaced with another member of the group who was unavailable for Saturday, so we spent most of the day revising the order of scenes and remembering the transitions.

Having spent two weeks revising lines, it was pleasing to note how well they were embedded in long-term memory, returning with a little coaxing, though many of the cast did two weeks of Twelfth Night a couple of weeks back and are finding another two weeks of performance more taxing.

On Sunday our new actor joins us, proving to have learned her lines to perfection, resulting in a collective sigh of relief which boosts the cast's confidence measurably. We run through the whole performance twice and there now is a definite collective sense that we can do this. I make several annoying mistakes, but console myself with the knowledge it's better to make them now than later. It gives me a sense what I still need to do to get my performance up - mainly relax, take my time and speak more clearly, not race through the lines.

On Monday evening there is time for a final dress rehearsal which goes well, boosting confidence further. We've done our best and must now open the doors and let the crowd in, but there is a strange lack of any sense of quanitifiable improvement. Last year's revival of Oedipus was very different, though we began with several specific improvements we wanted to make, resulting in a more cohesive production.

We'll just have to see what the public think..!

Bookmap: The Writer's Journey by Christopher Vogler

Legend has it this book originated as a seven-page memo outlining mythic structure for Hollywood studios.

In the memo, Christopher Vogler interpreted Joseph Cambpell's "The Hero with a Thousand Faces", the book in which "Campbell explores the theory that important myths from around the world which have survived for thousands of years all share a fundamental structure, which Campbell called the monomyth."

Vogler simplifies Campbell's more scholarly work into a practical handbook for writers. In a new preface to the second edition he answers critics who called The Hero's Journey formularic by saying it is a form, not a forumula. He goes on to make some interesting contextual points about its reception in "herophobic" cultures such as Australia and Germany. "Australians," he says, "distrust appeals to heroic virtue because such concepts have been used to lure generations of young Australian males into fighting Britain's battles..." while "...the legacy of Hitler and the Nazis has tainted the concept... distorted the powerful symbols to enslave, dehumanize and destroy."

A new section looking at several modern films in heroic context includes "Titanic", "The Full Monty" and oddly "Pulp Fiction". The latter doesn't naturally fit the form, so instead it's used to view the individual journeys of the three characters Jules, Vincent and Butch.

Why we must take risks: success from uncertainty

The article most recommended by Harvard Business Review readers last year was an interview with Ed Catmull of Pixar, the animation company behind Toy Story, A Bug's Life, Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Cars, Ratatouille and WALL-E.

Catmull talks about a studio head who thinks his problem is not in finding people, but ideas. Catmull disagrees, calling this "...a misguided view of creativity that exaggerates the importance of the initial idea in creating an original product."

His conclusion has a lot of resonance for business:

"...we as executives have to resist our natural tendency to avoid or minimize risks, which, of course, is much easier said than done. In the movie business and plenty of others, this instinct leads executives to choose to copy successes rather than try to create something brand-new. That's why you see so many movies that are so much alike. It also explains why a lot of films aren't very good. If you want to be original, you have to accept the uncertainty, even when it's uncomfortable, and have the capability to recover when your organization takes a big risk and fails. What's the key to being able to recover? Talented people! Contrary to what the studio head asserted at lunch that day, such people are not so easy to find."

Success comes from taking risks - avoiding them leads to mediocrity.