Day 14: Enter Jonty

Boys oh boys, I am not gonna lie: I am one tired little actor tonight. We didn't do anything especially strenuous or active today and I spent most of it sat in my bath, but this acting lark can certainly drain you. It's a good tired though. It's the tired of people who are deep into a rehearsal process, who are slowly but surely investing more and more in their characters, who are dying for the show to be good and putting every bead of sweat into making it so. That goes for the creative team as much as the cast, a fact emphasised by the arrival of a fantastic little finger puppet for Simonne a mere day after Mike had casually remarked that it would be great if she could have "something" during the National Assembly. What arrived was more than just something and was promptly christened Jonty. Maybe my favourite moment of the whole day was looking over to Helen after running the scene and seeing that, in Marat's absence, Simonne had bandaged up Jonty instead.

Aside from the tiredness, the other thing about being so deep into rehearsals is how they all begin to blend into one another. There are things that have happened that could have been this morning or last week for all my memory seems to be able to deduce. I know the bath reappeared today, pared down and painted, and placards with revolutionary slogans were painted during the afternoon. We managed to tighten up act two, putting the finale song on its feet and then returning to act one to revisit old ground. The extra lunatics and Madame and Mademoiselle Coulmier joined us for a stagger through this evening, with the ladies discovering some nasty surprises lie in store for them during the show.

In the midst of it all, a copy of The Sun newspaper had found its way into the rehearsal room, a fact which most of us were less than thrilled about. However, it gave us all a good laugh when we saw that the page 3 girl had apparently, according to the caption, been fretting about Non-EU immigration and she even used the phrase "as my favourite poet, TS Eliot, opined...". She certainly looked very fretful, with her hand in her hair and no clothes on - she'd clearly been so worried that she forgot to dress for the photo-shoot to accompany her little opinion piece. Maybe I've misjudged The Sun and it is in fact a fine bastion of journalistic integrity which gives a voice to the silent and naked minority who express their clearly refined and researched views in a succinct manner. That, or some sub-editor was really taking the piss with that TS Eliot line.

QUOTE OF THE DAY: "That doesn't look like a cock - not to be vulgar" AND "Are we going at it semi?" - Stuart remarking on what is in fact Duperret's codpiece and then asking a perfectly innocent question about how full-on we should act but in the sort of language which set everyone else's lavatorial minds racing.