The last rehearsal before the performance is called the "dress rehearsal, or sometimes simply the “dress.”
I don’t understand the “dress” part. Do any TMs?
Because the costumes, etc. are worn for a dress rehearsal.
Dress rehearsal is any rehearsal in which everyone is in costume. By the time the costuming si all ready, everyone should know their lines and blocking close to perfectly, and the action shouldn’t need to be stopped for any reason.
Final Dress is always a complete runthrough just as though there was an audience, and the action doesn’t stop unless someone dies on stage or something.
To elaborate, the costumes for the show are usually one of the last details added. So most rehearsals are done in the actors’ regular clothing while the wardrobe designer takes their measurements and begins making or finding the clothes. Then, usually less than a week from opening night, they’ll add the costumes to the rehearsal process, including any quick-changes (having to change clothes offstage in 20 seconds or so) there may be.
The “final dress” just means it’s the final rehearsal before opening night (usually the night before). It’s a way of saying, “This is it, suckas. After this you’ll have an audience, so don’t slack off.”
ETA: I was elaborating on OldGuy’s post, btw.
Thanks guys. I was a straight-up solo/occasional chamber musician, so I understood the part about the “don’t screw it up,” but could do a dress in my underwear (nice oxymoron, that) if I felt like it.
Barcelona’s Liceo has an audience for Final Dress, sometimes. Entrance is either by invitation (usually obtained via a member of the cast) or low-price, and it’s at an earlier time than the regular shows. The audience may consist of such dangerous individuals as students from next-door Universitat Pompeu Fabra, who will be wearing the same clothes they’ve just worn to class and armed with throwable items (there hasn’t been an incident of something actually been thrown since before UPF was founded, though); basically, you have in the good seats the kind of riff-raff who normally wouldn’t even be sitting in nosebleed seats. If they’re happy, they bring the house down; if they’re not, the boos can be heard from outside.
But presumedly you were wearing the same clothes throughout your performance. Plays are different because they’ll often have costume changes going on during the play and these have to be planned out and rehearsed just like the onstage performances.
Many theaters allow audiences in the final dress rehearsal. They often set these as “pay what you will” and ask for (but don’t require) donations (if they charged an actual admission, they would have to pay for the rights for an additional performance; leaving it as a donation is a loophole that is not objected to). This allows them to have a real audience to see what the reactions might be.
Did quite a lot of amateur theater in my late teens and early twenties. Nothing messes the whole sequence up like costume changes. You suddenly realize that
i) You are on at the end of one scene and at start of the next scene and there is a major costume change in between.
ii) And it takes about 5 minutes.
Well thats not good, need to adjust. You have one minute tops. So you rehearse with costumes, in fact many productions I was in actually did one or two rehearsals just getting the costume changes right. In one play I was in had a girl in bra and panties in one scene and in a corset dress the next scene which began immidietly after the first one finished. We tried and tried and tried and we could not get her there in an acceptable period of time. So some padding dialog had to be added.
Fortunately most costumes are designed with quick changing in mind and in professional settings would be less of an issue.
Plus there are tricks. You have a quick change, start stripping as soon as you are off, if you are a guy wearing a suit keep the same shirt and a clip on tie. Larger productions have whole units of people dedicated to getting the costume changes right, and even smaller ones have people dedicated to or responsible for getting it right. I have had people assist me change many times.
I helped out backstage on an amateur production once, and can attest to this. We had a scene where a man had been to the dance studio, and was dressed for that activity: t-shirt, gym shorts, etc. We had to turn him around and send him back out in a tuxedo in 30 seconds or less.
To accomplish this, there were four of us, as I recall. Two were assigned to put his trousers on him, two were assigned to put his shirt and jacket on him. The tuxedo itself was either in pieces, or otherwise was constructed in a way unlike any other tuxedo would be–the shirt did not button, but velcro held it together. The velcro was hidden, so the black buttons (which were simply pasted on) still showed. The bow tie similarly attached with velcro. The trousers came in two pieces–the front half (which had the cummerbund attached) and the back half. Again, velcro held them together; this time, along the side seams and the inseam. And everything went on over the t-shirt and gym shorts.
When he came backstage after the dance scene, the clock started. One person would be holding out the tuxedo shirt, which the man put on, and did up the velcro. His tie would be attached, then he would put on the jacket, which was also held for him. Once the shirt was on and done up, one person would hold the front half of his trousers in place, then the back half was put on, and the two “trouser people” would do up the velcro–and his shirt would be automatically tucked in and looking neat. We practiced this like a NASCAR pit crew, and got to the point where we could do it in about 20 seconds–giving a little extra time to give a last once-over, to make sure the tie was straight, and so on.
But here is a good example of a costume designed for a quick change. Definitely not real clothes!