Bovary Tech and Invited Dress

Monday night was tech for Madame Bovary. About 20 minutes into my 2 hour session our master director/playwright, Nagle Jackson, gave me the thumbs up and left. I was a bit concerned at the time, shouldn't he be here incase I mess something up?
The rest of tech went fine. We got a great lighting designer, Sarah Riffle, who really took care of all three pieces. After a long evening, we were ready for our invited dress last night.
Still wondering about Nagle's absence I was pleased as punch to receive a lovely email from him tuesday morning. I wanted to share the opening:

Katherine: I was so impressed with your work last evening; I left because I could see everything was in excellent hands. I admire your artistry coupled with a real professinal discipline. Listening to your conversation with Sara concerning lights I was delighted to hear you ask for "less is more', but was also pleased that you decided to use the window gobo which is very effective for Emma's monologue.
So pleased with the way you've orchestrated the Fair scene; brava! I like the way you choreograph when necessary....
All in all, a most impressive job. Congratulations. - Nagle

An encouraging email during this week of feedback.

Tuesday night was our invited dress both Roger Danforth and Joey Guastella were in attendance. While I was worrying about the details of the big picture it was encouraging that both Roger and Joey were following the story. Joey wrote to me last night with his thoughts, my personal favorite was the following:

Having the men stand about in the background is a good device-- I liked it a lot. To me, it signified how the men in Bovary's life just come and go. And what was also quite interesting, was that even though the men remained present the entire time, I had absolutely no trouble accepting this piece as Bovary's play. She remained a central character throughout, without any distractions.

Yeah! It worked! When I first conceived this adaptation the men as a constant presence on stage was extremely important to me. I cannot say how thrilled I am that it was received that way by an audience member.

For my part-the pacing was a bit slow and the cast, as a whole, were a bit off. That being said, I'll give them their notes via email today, and some encouraging words before the performance today and then let them go. I think tonight is going to be fabulous-a packed house of reservations and some of my favorite people in attendance.

Performances are Tonight and Tomorrow at 7pm at The Directors Company-311 West 43rd Street, Fourth Floor