Tips on how to recover after a show

In theory this topic should be at the end of my blogs on successful creativity but having just finished a run of Chekhov’s The Seagull last night I find myself completely brain dead. It is always when you finish a run or have done the big event you realise  how much energy you have expended, and it is even more so if you have been dealing with marketing and press as well (which luckily I haven’t this time 😉

Today I had to go to the first meeting with the director and writer of the next play I am doing, check up on emails, sort out some calendar changes plus start looking at all the things I have put off til ‘after we finish the run’. However whilst my list of things I must do is large, I am focusing only on the important ones I can do without it taking too much out of me. I have not much to give right now.

Wielding the dark magic of emotions on the stage, especially in the case of a character where she rages, loses it, gets hysterical night after night, you must have compassion for yourself and give yourself time to comedown.

Also the company ‘bubble’ (as Aletta Collins called it (podcast here) has burst and you need to go through that comedown too. Your fellow actors or musicians temporarily became your family, including their nightly standard behaviours and annoying habits, and you will, realistically, manage to only keep in touch with one of them as the play disappears from memory. However there is loss in the sudden shock of lack of regularity, of not needing to be in a dressing room at 6.45pm and the sudden gap of actors with their makeup and funny warmup exercises around you.

* Be gentle to yourself

* Put off everything you can til you have centred yourself

* Enjoy the fact that you have trashed your desk and probably your entire flat in the run up and  gently start tidying it up.

* Attempt to slowly put all your clothing, props, makeup, music away at the first opportunity even if you have to do it at a very slow speed.

* A hot long bath, twice a day of necessary

*Don’t party too hard at the wrap party or to celebrate the end, nor indeed rush and catch up with all your friends immediately, you need time with yourself.

*Don’t read any reviews or press

* Don’t worry re what the other cast members are doing next, give yourself a few days to recover completely and then you can get back on with the hunt for good work and being proactive

* Realise the more you can completely relax and cancel obligations the quicker ad more effective you will be when yo do start. Ideas for new projects, work needed to be done on the next one is all fine but allow yourself grace.

* Write a few pages on what you learnt about yourself, and what you want to do better next time. Not the acting persee but things like (I will wash up every night before I leave for the theatre so I don’t have to face it in the morning, I will ensure I get time before each show to settle in the character etc)

Want more info? I did a podcast with my coach Ryan Lock on recovering from a show and learning to pace myself : How to deal with ‘free’ work, learning to say NO & taking care of yourself”   Podcast

This is a series of blogs for you on how to dream up, build, market and sell a creative event, gig, festival, book launch, cabaret night, exhibition of rude plastic cupcakes or whatever creatively inspires you. It is time to create and put on that play about your family, a series of drawings about hedgehogs, the album you have talked about making or the short film you always wanted to write and make. You can read the series in order Part One or just pick and choose a topic that interests you.