Here we are approaching the opening of VAINGLORIOUS. Since February, we’ve been meeting in groups large and small, in rehearsal spaces all over Philadelphia, from west of the Schuykill to far-flung northern corners. In the Fidget space in north Philly, we’ve practiced marching across Russia, imprisoning famous writers, drowning soldiers, building mansions, writing symphonies… everything from assassinations to coronations. The Fidget space is homey because it is a home; a 7 year old pokes his head through a window into the performance space and watches us from time to time, a toddler makes delighted noises in the other room, smells of good food come from the kitchen. Every time we meet, we sit down and eat together, delicious food from our fearless leader Becky, who cooks for 10 to 30 people for every rehearsal. It’s a sea of beautiful young faces, all of whom have agreed to this absurd project of re-creating almost 20 years of history in one hour.
It has been a great joy to revisit this material, and to have a batch of new actors as well (half of our original cast of 26 could not join us for the remount). The cast is divided into 5 teams: Team Tallyrand, Team Josephine, Team Germaine de Stael, Team Napoleon, Team Beethoven. Each of the teams meet individually or in pairs every week, and at the end of the week, the entire group meets to try and assemble all the story lines into one. Every team has its own culture as well — Team Napoleon functions like an army, with a lot of synchronized movement and speech. Team Josephine exists in a nightmarish dollhouse, where everyone transforms from beautiful to ugly, from man to woman to animal to flower in a dark game of pretend. Team Germaine belongs to the Glitterati — they have lots of parties, lots of emotions, a lot of pithy things to say. Since everyone in Team Tallyrand is playing Tallyrand, they operate as a hive mind, creeping across the space like a virus and silently influencing events as they unfold. Finally, there’s Team Beethoven, which is like an Ibsen play-within-our-play — drugs, family rivalries, dance fights, and MUSIC.
Applied Mechanics owes a lot to the 21 performers and 2 assistant stage managers who have agreed to step into this ridiculously ambitious spectacle with us. The show is about fame in a lot of ways — a particular kind of celebrity that came into being in the early 19th century, along with the proliferation of newspapers and climbing literacy rates. People like Stael, Josephine and Napoleon reinvented themselves in mythic proportions, were able to become mirrors for the imaginations of their contemporaries. The public helped invent them and then tore them down; they became avatars for the wild dreams of the era. Since the revolution, France was in untraveled territory. Because glory was no longer the birthright of kings, ANY ONE could have it. And people like Napoleon (ne Napoleone Buonaparte, a Corsican boy of no consequence) was the ultimate example of “any one of us”. Theatricalizing the collective public faith that made gods of men required us to amass a huge cast for this show, on a shoestring budget. So in a way, the participation of these excellent performers is as magical and absurd as the history itself — as crazy as an awkward Italian runt growing up to be the emperor of France. This show runs on faith and imagination, and we are blessed to have some of the best imaginations in the city work on Vainglorious with us.
We are also thinking a lot about Reuben Mitchell, who played a massive role in the creation of the last version of Vainglorious. This remount is, in fact, dedicated to him. His faith and imagination made the whole thing possible; he was the type of person who believed in people before they’d ever asked him to, the type of person that doesn’t ask permission to be your friend. One day, he just is. He made everyone feel better than they were, and as a result, we are better than we were. He was more than we deserved and we aspire to deserve more for his sake. To be open and free, to have faith, not to take ourselves too seriously while taking art and friendship as seriously as possible. Let’s hope that feeling continues through our last few days of Vainglorious rehearsal, and moves through our audiences like the quick smile we used to know.