Cherry Jones Blanks Out! — Page 4

I'm sorry, but I think it is inexcusable. Yes, all actors flub their lines here and there, but you do not "leave" the world of the play and bring your lines on stage with you--you just don't! Otherwise, once you leave the world of the play, you are forcing the audience to leave as well, and therefore you are breaking their experience of the play as a whole. Now, I'm sure that if Ms. Jones had gone off stage for a few minutes and read her lines there, she would have jogged her memory enough to return and finish out the scene. Also, wasn't there a post a few months back about her losing her place at another performance?

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yes, but LAM, it would have been even more awkward to "pause" the show for a few moments while she went off and read the script. this way, she kept the momentum going like a professional the best way that she could. also, earlier in the thread, it said that the audience applauded her decision to choose to read the script. she is such an engaging actress, that I'm sure the audience was with her all the way.

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Blair Brown called for a line when she was in the New York run of Humble Boy when it was in previews. There are numerous instances when an actor is replaced very late in rehearsal or in previews and they have to go on with a script in their hand for the WHOLE performance. Everyone cuts them some slack.

In almost 300 performances, Cherry has flubbed twice. Both times she was under the weather. I saw her on the Thursday night last week and she said she was feeling weary and when I commented that she had a 9 show week to get through, she was like "Lord, I know." I'm sure other actors who never miss (Chita, Harvey, etc) have gone on when they haven't been feeling great and have had a screwy performance or two in their time. Quite as to why this has to be such a big deal is beyond me.

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For the love of (insert higher power here)! This is ridiculous. It's live theatre people. It's life! Sh!t happens and you do what you have to do at that moment to make the best of the situation. So, she called for line and got a script. Yes, I would prefer that not happen but it did. She did what she had to do to get through that moment in time. Anyone who has been on stage before knows that you can go up and that feeling of complete despair that succumbs you as you desperately search for the right words and try to figure out what is going on. I say more power to her.

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isn't it true that she has no understudy? i'm sure the stage manager consulted with the company on what to do if that situation arose again.
god knows i've seen all sorts of things happen onstage but as long as the actor maintains his/her focus and intention even if they leave the stage-- the audience stays right with them.
for my part, i wish i had seen it just to see how she handled it. it's everyone's nightmare. it can be unnerving and scary for the audience to see an actor at a loss and floundering. i'm glad cherry took the matter in hand and kept her command--just as sister aloysius would do.

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You know what kills me...the fact that everyone is like, 'Well...I would have preferred if she...'

You know who would have 'preferred' more than you? Cherry Jones. I'm sure she hates the fact that that happened.

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I absolutely agree, Robbilicious. I would HATE to know what she felt like through that experience - much less afterwards. She obviously is a very dedicated performer, and she must have been positively mortified. I'd want to run up onstage and give her a hug at curtain!

She has an understudy, but she was cast very late and wasn't in the initial print run of the playbills. But she does have one.

And yes, Cherry hates that she went up on her lines and couldn't recover it. What actor wouldn't?

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I think it's perfectly understandable that an actor may forget a line or blank out onstage, as many have posted. But I do think that actually stopping the show and getting the book in order to read through a scene is a bit of a stretch. To me, it's the equivalent of having an actor in a musical flubbing a lyric and asking the audience if he can lip synch hust that one song!!

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I didn't know that, magruder. I heard the late casting version of the story.

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I DID flub in FLEET WEEK! Totally sang a wrong verse all the while looking like Cindy Brady on that quiz show.

It's a terrible, TERRIBLE feeling. I've never experienced something as drastic as Ms. Jones' ordeal...so I really don't know how I would handle it.

But I know I did a show recently where the lead, who spoke A LOT and had very little time to learn the show (as did we all) went up...and none of us knew quite what to do. I think as an entire case, we had NO IDEA what was going on. It's horrifying. We all laughed about it afterwards, but it is a brutal thing to experience.

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And it's easy for others to criticize who ALSO weren't there. For the record--I was there.

Middie--that's the problem. Acting school doesn't truly teach people how to handle everything. You can learn the "rules" and they still not apply. Most of what an actor learns takes place in doing shows.

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jrb, how many times have you seen doubt? Is that your first time?