A few examples off the top of my head x
- you CANNOT adjust clothing on stage, even during rehearsal, it’s one of the first things we’re taught. So imagine your costume has such a tight belt squeezing your bladder.. there’s nothing you can do to loosen it until you get a second off stage (that is.. if you don’t have a quick change or have to sprint to your next entrance..)
- I remember one time in an audition I was so close to wetting myself, honestly id never had to go that badly before. We were all sitting in the audition room, waiting for our number to be called (this was maybe an hour in, I’d been chugging water to calm my nerves) and I was kneeling on the floor trying my BEST not to squirm because the director was right there.
Anyway my number was one of the last to be called, and while I was waiting I truly thought ‘I’m either going to have to run out of this room and accept I won’t get a part, or I’ll have to hope I don’t leak visibly’. I had my heel under me, pressed on my pee hole, I was sweating and trying not to move. When my number was finally called I’m pretty sure I was leaking a little, but of course it’s an audition, you HAVE to give it everything. I sprinted to those toilets the second it was over.
- In one of the theatres I perform at most, the dressing rooms only have one toilet for the cast, and it’s forbidden to use the Main House toilets, do I’ve witnessed plenty of people running off stage, through the dressing rooms, shouting about how they’re about to wet themselves.
- on stage freezes. Absolutely golden. You can’t move a muscle, you can’t even blink, so imagine someone’s there, frozen in place, they can’t squirm or hold themselves or cross their legs. Maybe they’re slowly leaking, knowing nothing can be done to stop it. Maybe they’re shaking. They’re definitely thibking go the scene ahead, are there any moments they can subtly grab their crotch?
- someone subtly rubbing themselves against the set. One show I did, we had a huge metal frame structure to sit on. Someone with one of those metal poles between their legs, rocking on it slowly.
- directors often give notes after rehearsals, before anyone can leave. A bladder shy person, absolutely desperate to go for the whole rehearsal, which is often 6 hours with one 30 minute break. They’ve been drinking water for their voice all day, you get dehydrated during a physical rehearsal. They’ve been too scared to ask to run to the toilet, not in front of the directors, stage crew and entire cast, so theyve held it through sheer willpower.. but now, during notes that famously drag on.. theyre sweating and squirming. They want to cry. They’re rocking in their seat maybe, barely paying attention.. do they make it to the toilet? Can they stomach using the one in the dressing room?
- cast members are usually very close with each other, literally you do awkward scenes, change in the same room, youre together every day for weeks.. imagine all the ‘god I have to go right now’ ‘mate I’m not sure I’ll make it through the scene’
- watching a show?? They don’t let you leave for the toilet like you can in a cinema. But at least it’s dark, you can shove a habd between your legs and pray the lines aren’t too long at the interval…