Ever heard of "Fire Marshall Bill"? A character Jim Carey dreamed up on 'In Living Color'. Anyway, in order to keep things somewhat light in these outrageously tension filled rehearsals, my assistant stage manager and I have taken to quoting Fire Marshall Bill. While only mildly amusing to most, for us, it sends us into peals of laughter (which we have to hide, of course...don't want to upset the D.)
The quote really works best, we've found, if you make the face Fire Marshall Bill makes which really takes some doing: dry both your top and bottom gums and then stick your lips to them. Now try and talk without your lips. Fun, right?
When this doesn't work in lightening the mood, we can also refer to what we're calling 'tapping points'. Since we been told that when stage management is talking amongst themselves that the D believes we are talking about her, we've written simple quotes on post-its which we keep on the desk. Depending on our mood, we'll tap the corresponding post-it, thus communicating without speaking and without causing any undo trauma to the D. Heaven forefend.
The "O.M.G." post-it gets a lot of taps, as does the "Cray-Cray". Lately, "I need beer" seems to be getting a lot of play.
Don't try this at home. We are professionals.
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