Road to Opening Week 9: Cynthia Dale On Rehearsals for A Little Night Music

It's almost like a Polar Bear plunge - standing in the wings getting ready to make your first entrance.

Even though we have been rehearsing for weeks, priming our bodies for this moment, it still feels like a shock to the system.

Your heart is racing, you remind yourself to breathe, you go over what is needed to keep it safe and successful. You are suddenly aware your mouth is as dry as the Sahara. You have no time to get a drink of water so you bite the sides of your tongue trying to get your mouth moist, trying desperately to swallow so that you can speak and sing. There is nothing worse than being on stage and having your lips stick to your teeth causing you to display the maniacal grin of The Shining.

You feel like the blood is rushing away from your vital organs and you desperately try to channel the energy to where it is needed, your legs, they will help you make the journey forward.

Your brain crackles, going through the list of possible other professions you could have chosen. You come up with none. Fight or flight reigns supreme and you realize your cue is approaching.

Just as you think about mortality more often as you get older, you so often think about why it is that at this age, at this stage of your career, being onstage is a more vulnerable experience, and harder than it has ever been before.

You do your ritual prayer, try to swallow, try to take a deep breath, try to trust and you begin your first steps in what will become a brave jump.

I don't ever need to try skydiving - I go onstage.

I don't ever need to do an outward bound challenge - I go onstage.

I don't ever need to swim with sharks - I go onstage.

All of them, and so many more, would be part of an incredible bucket list, but I know that standing in the wings preparing to perform our first tech/dress rehearsal of "A Little Night Music" here at the Stratford Festival is a pretty awesome thing too!

This week was the first time we had all the elements - orchestra, sets, sound, and even a bit of smoke. Full costumes of coats and corsets, trains on our skirts, hats, gloves and parasols. Wigs, quick changes, lights...and lashes (once a show girl always a show girl.)

And there were even a few extra people watching in the audience.

It was an exciting roller coaster ride that took us one giant step closer to our first preview in one week.

It's still up for debate as to whether plunging yourself into cold water is actually good for you, if the pros of the adrenaline rush outweigh the cons of the constricted blood vessels.

But I know with every fibre of my being that the positive chemical reactions in my brain and open joy in my heart of being onstage far outweigh any jitters that may be a silent scene partner. The transformation of fear to fantastic is subtle and mighty all at the same time.

"Taking the steps to get on stage...again."

Yup, check that one off the bucket list!

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