A few years ago I was in a long run of a regional production of "Titanic, the Musical". When I say "long run", I mean that we did the same show 104 times. Using the words, "same show" is not accurate, though, as there are always slight unavoidable variations in staging, pacing and delivery of lines, and technical details.
An alarming variation began to exhibit itself about 2/3's of the way through our run. It was all my fault.
Before I tell you what I did, I should make sure you know a bit more about the show. "Titanic" was made into a musical shortly before the mania that was created by the movie "Titanic" and which immortalized [beat it into your eardrums until there was no possibility you could ever, ever be free of it] Celene Dion's belting of "WHERRRRRE EEEEEEEEHHHHHHVEEERRRR YOU AAHHRREE!" I would like a tally of the people that came to see "Titanic, the Musical" and left bitterly dissappointed because that song was missing or because there was no scene where Leonardo DiCaprio turns blue and Kate Winslet says she'll never let him go and then lets him go anyway.
Our production was done "in the round", which is where the seats are arranged about the stage like those in a boxing arena. The director did a good job of handling this challenge and used lighting, movable set pieces, and many, many costume changes to give the impression of thousands of people on a mammoth ship. At the beginning of the show, he scattered the cast facing different directions all over the stage in a dreamy sequence, where each one of us took separate lines of narration and gave the introduction to the show. Since each line was uttered by a different actor, at first you had to make sure you were listening carefully so you didn't forget to speak yours at the exact moment you should. As the run progressed this section felt like it was on auto-pilot.
My problem occurred during a matinee performance, when, during this section I was supposed to say something like, "Over 2,000 souls sailed upon that storied ship." I had never thought of this as a difficult line. I had many more challenging scenes to which I had devoted much more preparation; this was just a bit of narration which I simply had to quote clearly. But that day, as I started that line, I could feel that something was very wrong. My mind was turning slowly and was trailing a split second behind my mouth. Before I could get control of the runaway lips I heard myself say, "Over 2,000 souls sailed up that shoried stip!"
That seems like a pretty mundane punchline, especially seeing it in print like that, but I can assure you that to my fellow narrators on stage, nothing could have been funnier. After we left the stage I heard about it from all of them.
The odd thing about this is, I did this again. And again. And again. I don't remember how many performances I did it and thank goodness they weren't all in a row. But I wore a groove in my brain so deep that the line felt like a slot car. When I did succeed in getting through that line it was due to extreme concentration. And even those times everyone was spastic with mirth as they watched my entire body tense and my lips and tongue struggle. It wasn't about character or intent or pacing at this point. I was struggling with intelligibility.
After a few weeks the trauma subsided, and I eventually gained mastery over myself again. But I have to say, I don't miss saying that line.
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