Sounds like your group is high school age...so my response is based on that.

I completely respect the approach of working with actors as much as possible, especially on a small cast and a straight play.

The musical, in particular, was tough.  My cast included varsity and JV volleyball players, cheerleaders, varsity soccer players, varsity and JV football players, marching band members...

One of our leads was a junior playing JV football.  He NEVER came to rehearsal if he had a game, even if that game was over at 7:30 and rehearsal went until 9.  I don't know if he was tied up by the coach or whatever, but my varsity volleyball girls got out of their games at 8, and were in my rehearsal by a quarter after... often still in uniform.  When I would ask him about it, he said he didn't get done in time to come to rehearsal.  When he was there, he was attentive and had a positive attitude, so I'm inclined to believe him; the time just doesn't make sense to me.

We're also very limited with the days we can practice.  Wednesdays are the unofficial "church night" for the school district, so I try to only infringe upon that once or twice in a run, usually only for production week.  Fridays are football games, which always ties up football players (JV and varsity both suit up) and cheerleaders, and all the band kids whenever the game is at home.  Saturdays are tough because the volleyball players have 3-4 tournaments on Saturdays.  Sundays are doable, but I try to protect Sundays, not only as church days, but as family time for my students and myself.  Thus, I'm left with Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday.  Volleyball games still infringe on Thursdays, JV football is Monday, and soccer is Tuesday, but this is the best we can do.

When the Spring Play comes around, I have to deal with wrestling, basketball, and a bigger conflict among my actors: forensics.  Next year I may move the play to get out of forensics season- I had several rehearsals where ALL my leads were gone for a forensics meet... not fun.  In fact, with this show that just closed, it was Tuesday of production week before I had a full cast- it was the first time in three weeks that I wasn't missing anybody at all.  I called Saturday rehearsals, Wednesday rehearsals, Sunday rehearsals... and there was always somebody sick, out of town, or at a school function.

Now, I've thought about the idea of just varying the rehearsal times to match the availability of my cast, but I worry about asking young teenagers to remember a constantly changing schedule.  I know that they also struggle to keep me appraised of their own constantly changing schedule.


Edited by MusicManD - 3/30/11 at 11:11pm

Reviving an old thread, we're just about to open our fall musical, Seussical (although with snow on the ground, it doesn't feel like fall).  I tried a schedule worked around the kids' conflicts.  Couple of things happened:

1) A lot of kids don't have a clue about their own schedules, especially weeks or months in advance.  I handed out a schedule for the first half of our rehearsal run then handed out a second based on where we were.  I based it completely around their games, work schedules, and other conflicts... and then things inevitably changed.  Even splitting it in half (5-6 weeks per schedule) wasn't enough to really get it covered, so I'd inevitably lose someone that I scheduled to be there, often on the ONLY TIME I was planning to block a simple scene.

2) It just worked out that it was tough to schedule around sports.  For example, the soccer team had Horton, Mr. Mayor, and one Bird Girl.  That meant as much as I hated it, I ran Whoville scenes when there was a soccer game.  Volleyball had JoJo, another Bird Girl, and several Whos, so we ran Jungle of Nool/Bird Girl scenes, and that last girl would just have to catch up.  I had two Wickersham brothers playing JV football; one being the brother of the Cat in the Hat, who was expected by his family to support his brother on the field, which means that I lost them Monday nights.

The end result is that a lot of people still missed when I scheduled "around" their conflicts, and we ended up running some scenes a half dozen times, just to still have people saying, "Am I in this scene?"

I'm doing this whole thing completely differently for the spring play, because I feel like I'm beating my head up against the wall.

I have to work around athletes all the time--usually OK, but the kids are VERY tired by week 3 from having to stay up really late doing homework and memorize lines, work on character, etc.