East Hampton - The Naked Stage Marathon presented by Guild Hall in association with the Naked Stage that took place from Friday, April 24 until Sunday, April 26, wasn't so much of a marathon as it was a grueling, knock down endurance race. "This week has been crazy," said Naked Stage Founder Josh Perl after the opening night's performance of "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest." "I literally have a suitcase downstairs," he laughs, "and I just found out that I'm in "Lysistrata" tomorrow and I haven't even read the play yet. You know it's been rough when people keep commenting on how tired you look and it's only the first night!"

Little rehearsal times and quick turnarounds are par for the course for Naked Stage actors, the performance of Cuckoo's Nest came about after seven hours total of rehearsal time. "We met for the first time last night at 7:30 p.m. and worked for three hours with half the cast," said Michael Nathanson on Friday night after the performance. Nathanson not only directed the reading but also starred in the lead role as Randle P. McMurphy. "We met again at 10 a.m. this morning, worked for another four hours - again with half the cast - and then brought you what you saw here tonight" [Friday, April 24]. According to Guild Hall's Artistic Director Josh Gladstone the hectic schedule is part of the charm and chemistry behind the readings. "The spirit of the Naked Stage is not to have a lot of rehearsal," Gladstone said. "It keeps the material fresh and I think that's part of the fun."

Josh Perl Introducing a staged reading of three comedies; "God" by Woody Allen, "The Way of All Fish" by Elaine May and "Boy Meets Girl" by Wendy Wasserstein as the final performance of the marathon.

The Naked Stage Marathon was unlike anything Perl and associates of the Naked Stage had attempted before, but Perl explained that the challenge of pulling it off was part of the allure. "One of the things that the Naked Stage does is focus people's talent and energy and I think that the marathon is an extension of that," he said. "I wanted to do it to prove that we could; to do some outrageous task and pull it off. I also wanted to see how we would work as a producing entity."

At the same time, Perl made sure to point out that the production aspect isn't as central to the Naked Stage as the entertainment value. "It's much more culture centric than production centric," he noted. By not focusing with production aspects like costuming, set design, music and choreography and all the other things that go into a full scale production enables the Naked Stage to provide people with a more affordable theater experience. "I think more people would come to the theater if it were more affordable."

Nathanson seconded that idea and added that in addition to being able to provide audiences with a quality performance at a reasonable price, it gives actors the freedom and opportunity to pursue projects they might not normally get the chance to do. "The great thing about the Naked Stage is that theater is supposed to speak to people but on and off Broadway, it's more about the bottom dollar than it is about entertainment. As an actor living in New York City, I don't get to do a lot of plays, or plays that I really want to do so what the Naked Stage provides for someone like me is the freedom to do something I want to do and something that interests me. That's how we're able to get such great actors. That's how I got my friend Stephen Largay to participate. I told him 'You're going to come all the way out to the East End, not make much money, rehearse for a couple hours and get thrown up on stage, but you get to read the role of Dale Harding.' Any actor who's into their craft will jump at that chance."

The Naked Stage really is just that: staged readings of plays with a minimal amount of props, simple costumes and no set to speak of. It really allows performances to be distilled to a point where they hinge solely on the quality of the script and the talents of the actors on stage.

In addition to being fun, if not somewhat grueling, for the actors and entertaining for the audience, the Naked Stage also serves as a vehicle to try out different plays without having to commit to a full production. "If you have something like a novel, it can be read and reviewed, but the only way to get the true sense of a performance is by actually reading it with a couple people," Perl explained. "Doing it in front of an audience also provides useful feedback. With Cuckoo's Nest, even having an audience of 40 in a house that seats 360, but having them laugh at the right moments is just great."

While the Naked Stage will be taking a hiatus after their May 12 performance of "The Miser" by Moliere, both Perl and Gladstone are excited to resume again in the fall and begin planning next year's marathon. "Next year I'd like to do a Naked Stage festival over two weekends and offer classes in-between," said Perl. "That's really at the core of what I want to do."