From a whore’s perspective: The director has an image…

The diary thoughts of Val Punt as she prepared to play "The Woman Taken In Adultery" in the York Minster Mystery Plays 2016

'DARLING, I planned the end of the world tonight, and it was fabulous!’ said the director after a productive rehearsal one evening back in March, imagining his phone call later that evening.

The thing is, alongside our roles, we form part of a chorus who appear on stage watching the action - be it with Jesus himself or Pontius Pilate or even a heady combination of the two. On occasion, we are lucky enough to watch God and Lucifer go head to head (we try not to take sides).

Because the cast is so large it gives a much grander feel for many of the scenes but it does mean that we do a lot of hanging around on evenings and weekends.

This can be a sore point for family members (‘Not again’ said my two and a half year old just this week, echoed closely by my husband). So, it’s fair to say that there is a huge commitment required for being part of the Mystery Plays’ cast and sometimes rehearsals can be long and arduous.

Sometimes, however, they’re not long enough and we end up finishing early. The knock on effect is that I have to revert to my role as mother and sit in a cinema watching Zootropolis – an enjoyable film with a foxy lead as it happens (is it acceptable to have the hots for a cartoon character?!), but arguably, not as entertaining as playing a beaver.

Overall the rehearsal procedure has been a joy to behold with a great bunch of impassioned people, working towards a common end. I have made friends with people of all ages and from various walks of life, so I’m totally getting into the whole crowd scene.

It’s entertaining to see who you end up standing next to, almost like speed dating. One lovely person I have met is Blair who plays the blind man. We like to think that we are both friends of Jesus – Blair is healed and Jesus kindly stops me from being stoned. So, between us we have decided that, having been saved by the Son of God no less, it would be a bit rude to call for his crucifixion.

Not that I always take it quite so seriously if I’m totally honest… Disappointed that I had no flower to throw in Jesus’ direction during his entry into Jerusalem, I mentioned to Mary, sister of Lazarus, who I was hanging out with, that perhaps I could chuck my knickers, as one might do with Tom Jones. She was very quick to point out that, as a harlot, I would in fact not be wearing any – cheeky!

There have been some ‘interesting’ moments along the way – one bone of contention has been the chairs in the rehearsal space. Is it your chair if you put your coat on it? Or do you actually have to be sat on it to claim it?

I have observed a few tense stand-offs and even found myself in a tricky chair situation of my own with none other than Noah himself. Having just exited a particular scene, I sat down out of the way, or so I thought.

I realised that I was in fact sitting on the edge of somebody’s bag. Lifting said bag from beneath my buttocks, I heard a gruff voice aimed sharply in my direction. To my left, in a huge antique wooden chair (almost reminiscent of the ark), was Noah: ‘That’s my bag - and you’re sitting on my chair.’

‘Oh sorry’ I replied, ‘Would you like to sit here?’ Noah looked down at his own ornate throne, then back to my fairly average chair and muttered something unintelligible.

I didn’t have much luck with God that day either who, despite my best efforts to make polite conversation, was much more interested in his game of angry birds. To be fair, I think that he was on a good score (plus at the end of the day, he is God, so can do what he wants).

He did, however, pay attention when I informed him that he had nearly been my headteacher until I went to a different school – and told me ‘You made a bad decision there then’. I can’t help but think that patriarchy needs to move aside - bring on Mrs Noah…!

So, as you can imagine, a major difficulty for the director is how to handle us all - where, when and how we enter and exit the stage. Philip, the director, admitted that his main reference point coming into the York Mystery Plays, was Monty Python's The Life Of Brian and explained that he wasn’t used to dealing with such a large company.

In retrospect, I wonder if this was his way of telling us to shut up… But I am happy to report that he, and his assistant director, Becky, have risen to the challenge seamlessly.

And one Sunday afternoon, we witnessed a joyful moment when Philip became more animated than usual, enthused by his idea for a big reveal during one such scene. We, the crowd, simply cross the stage blurring upstage, only to reveal the next scene as we part ways… The Last Supper… Think Da Vinci style… Clever… Oh, and the disciples do a cool thing with a table cloth too. Worth a watch. His new favourite scene…

To be continued