The morning began with rehearsal of the entrance of the Vices (Flattery, Falset and Dissait) and the pantomimic nature of their dialogue became apparent. We also discussed the meaning of lines 666-681 and where Dissait ‘comes from’ socially and morally.

The music director, John Kielty, joined us and, following the rehearsal on Saturday, it had been decided that some of the Vices’ dialogue will now be sung rather than spoken, so there was some song practice.  Also, the moments where the relationship with the audience can be built up were identified too, such as where the female audience members can be spoken to directly – platea- rather than loci-determined acting.

In the afternoon, the company were joined by the ‘royal’ vices, the king, and the women, and we went through speaking lines 808 –937 in the vernacular before speaking it as written. Guess the line: ‘Thou hast a fanny like a treacherous bog’!

The remainder of the afternoon was spent rehearsing and sharpening the ‘sex’ scene part of the play followed by Rex’s engagement of the disguised Vices into royal office.  Of particular interest was seeing Rex being witlessly led around the stage in thrall of Sensualitie, as well as his kneeling to Flatterie when he appoints him his spiritual counsellor – both spatial expressions of the king’s debasement.

The actor playing Veritie, Alison Peebles, joined rehearsal for the final part of the and we rehearsed her  first entrance.  Whom she was addressing became the most important question to solve, as many of her lessons are directed at princes and bishops who obviously won’t be amongst our audience.  Alison felt uncomfortable delivering a lesson meant for rulers to the common people.  We thought about directing the speech towards the VIP box area, but also considered whether she was articulating a biblical truth that needed to be directed at specific auditors at all.  It was decided that the first verse would be directed towards those in the field, the next four to the VIP area that political rulers might be imagined to inhabit, and the final stanza back to the ‘groundlings’.

Making Verity’s speech work with its complicated constructions and series of qualifications within single sentences made this, as the director said, “the hardest bit of Lyndsay yet”.