Standard disclaimer: these are just some notes that I accumulated over the course of the last few months, when I was too "busy" to document them here.
Saturday April 28 - the Closing Performance
I had been thinking about the School's production of the Music Man for nearly a year...Erica & Sharon had been noodling it even longer. The cast had endured months of rehearsals and many, many extracurricular man hours had been spent for this production. And unfortunately, the School does their Spring musical for just three nights. And tonight, was the last night. So it was with mixed emotion that I entered into this last day, thinking a mix of "we should keep on doing this...we're just getting the kinks out" and "I am so glad this thing is over".
Saturday's performance, besides being the last, had a different feel to it. Most of all, none of the kids had to be in school, so I think there was a looser feel to the whole event. For the first time ever, we decided to combine the Saturday performance with a sit down dinner, a Dinner Theater type of event, so there was a different vibe around the place. I had to hook the dinner theater people up with sound up in the commons area, so Jeff and I met around 3PM. He'd been so thorough in checking in with me throughout the last few weeks..almost to the point of being a nudge...luckily he's such a good friend. I set them up and everything seemed to work pretty well. I then set out to do some of my pre-show stuff, like testing the mics and a walking around the stage.
Before Friday's performance, I had noticed that one of the new wheels on the Paroo house had not held up to the weight of the various people on the "porch", so I replaced it before the show. I checked it out again, and deemed it capable of holding up for one more night. If I were to do it again, I'd have more than one wheel over the door, to distribute the weight better. But again, it would be "good enough" for one more show. I also tacked a couple of the siding strips that had come loose over the last couple of days. I was fortunate to have Jonathon tagging along. He'd been a last minute addition to the crew and since he lived so close to us, I gave him a ride to the show. He really liked to work hard and I sincerely appreciated that. It also turned out that he had connections with Dominos, as I had decided that to thank the crew, I'd buy them pizza, since the dinner theater was reserved for paying customers and I honestly wanted to keep them separate from that crowd.
I picked up the pizza and brought it back to the School, we were going to eat in Erica's room, which was as far away from both the cast and the dinner theater as possible. There was a lot of energy that night on appropriate behavior and apparently some of the crew was "participating" in that. A number of times throughout the night, I was told that "so and so from the crew was making out with so and so" or something like that. I honestly didn't see it happening myself and decided that if I saw it, I'd worry about it then. It was tough keeping the backstage crew occupied for the extended wait before the show. My "orders" were that they should make sure everything was where it was supposed to be, but for the most part, they goofed around. I did appreciate their need to blow off a little steam. While some of the crew had really only been involved for a little more than a week, it had been a very long and stressful week, so their goofing off was completely understandable, but a little stressful for me. So I just vanished and left them to their projects, the main one being that they needed to move in the four backdrops that we had moved out to the commons. The thought was that it would add a lovely touch to the dinner if the guests got to eat "in the park"...and our park backdrop added just the ambience. It did add an extra wrinkle in setting up as the flats had to be in just the right places before the show. So with a packed cafeteria, they honked those flats over and out and into the theater, really not much of a problem. Seth and I went through our mic checks, and the performers were truly uninterested in doing this. It's surprising to me how little value they placed in getting the sound correct before the show, yet many of them (and their families) have a lot of passion on the topic during the show! But again, it was the last show and the energy was different on the whole.
Dave S. had a couple of extra seats left over for the dinner theater, as apparently there were a couple of no-shows. I decided to not take him up on the offer, mainly because I still had a lot to do, and I truly wanted to remain as invisible as possible. I just imagined sitting at a table and all of the focus being placed on me, even briefly, when the true focus was (and rightly so) on the kids and Erica. They had asked a few of the seniors to be "interviewed" during the dinner and honestly I would've liked to see that, but not enough to want to sit there during dinner. And fortunately, Erica was able to peel away and sit with some of her family that was in town and "relax" a little. The rest of us just scurried around, doing all of our pre-show stuff...anxious to get the final performance underway.
While we were waiting for the show to start, I wandered back stage to see what the crew was up to. I was "amused" when I saw that they had duct taped Joel to one of the benches. I had an overflowing of mixed emotion; laughter because it was truly funny and fear because it was only about 20 minutes to show time...so I did the responsible thing and vanished, telling Dan & Shaf that they should untie him...eventually. I then sat down in the teacher's lounge and wrote out thank you cards to Erica, Sharon, Connie and Jennifer. These four, plus Diane and Brenda, did an amazing job and giving them a simple thank you card was literally the least I could do. So I scribbled out a few sentiments and it was time to get this show on the road. After it was over, they too had handed me cards of their own, and these are treasures to me, that bond me with these people for ever. For this show, Seth had brought his walkie-talkies from home and they worked with the headsets, so he was now in the comm loop with stage crew and I was able to hear as well as command. I called out places and the overture began and the last show of the series began....
During the Wednesday rehearsal, one of the salesmen had inadvertently hung their coat on the coat rack that was backstage...which was part of the Paroo interior set. The stage crew just moved it on and there it was, tucked away in the background during the scene...no big deal. One of Erica's comments later that evening was something like "did you notice the coat on the coat rack?" My lack of response probably spoke volumes. "Clearly there wouldn't be a man's coat on a widow's coat rack" she continued. Man, this woman has an eye for detail. When I talked this over with Dan, Shaf and Rachel (my 3 Seniors in both grade and level of professionalism), we hatched a plan. On Saturday night, as a little inside joke to everyone, we would hang a coat on the coat rack for this scene. But not a generic man's coat but a coat that a lot of people would recognize..but not people in the audience, but the cast and crew. We had decided as a type of homage to Erica and all her efforts, we would hang up the Technicolor Dreamcoat that we used last year. That play had made such an indelible mark on most of the kids in this current show...and the school community in general, it was perfect. It was perceived as an incredible honor to have been in the play, and most of the kids from last year were involved somehow this year. To us, it was a symbol of an amazing year of theater, from Joseph to Music Man, and it was intended to be a little inside joke/way to honor a teacher and friend, Erica, who had pushed all of us harder than anyone would have thought possible. At least that was the plan.
The curtains opened the scene, early in Act I and there was coat, discretely hanging from the coat rack. Jeff, who had played Joseph last year, was standing in the back of the theater with me...immediately saw it and smiled. Everyone who saw it, got the tribute and smiled. Everybody except one very important person. During the scene, with Kaylee, Casey and Sammie doing their thing, Erica came up to me fuming mad. "What is that doing on stage?", she hissed trying to keep her voice down. I felt that I knew her as well as almost anyone at the school, and I can say I never in a million years expected this reaction. "Uncool Mike, totally uncool.." she continued. She was genuinely and totally ticked off. "There had better not be anything else to derail this play.." she added. My response was simple. I whispered "It was totally my idea, and I thought it would be more of an honor...but I guess I was wrong". And I turned away, and she stomped back to her seat...and we've never said a word about it since. I did call out on the walkies to all in ear shot that any other "additions" (if there were any) had better be scrapped. Everything, I meant everything, needed to be by the book. No exceptions. I knew that there was thought of adding a little extra pizzazz to the "firecracker" scene in the gym (the next scene) and there was a plan to pop a couple New Years type poppers after the final curtain call. But at the time, I didn't want to risk anything. My exact statement over the radios was "I have never seen her this mad..."
The rest of the show continued on without any hitches. Steven had tried to record the video of the performance using his new swanky DVD-Recordables. He wasn't successful. Friday's show was recorded, but tonight's didn't work for some. I guess that's what you get when you try to pull this all together at the last minute. Fortunately, I had multiple cameras going and one of the last remaining projects to do is to edit it all down to one, cohesive tape. The clav continued to cut in and out, but we dealt with it as best we could, and it didn't seem like such a big deal anymore.
After the show was over, the cast nicely called all of the directors to "come on down" for a little
recognition. It was nice and I think to a person; cast, crew, families and directors, everyone was glad that this was over. There was a ton of applause, a lot of hugs, high fives and other pleasantries tossed around up there. It had been quite an odyssey, one that physically, mentally and emotionally nearly beat me...but by God's grace, I had made it through. There was honestly the beginning of a plan on how I would return this theater back to it's original state but at that moment, I had no desire to be inside that room another second. I did inform Steven that the sound board, and all tweaking that had been done would be back to normal by Monday, so that meant a trip back sometime on Sunday, which I did as quickly as possible.
Saturday April 28 - the Closing Performance
I had been thinking about the School's production of the Music Man for nearly a year...Erica & Sharon had been noodling it even longer. The cast had endured months of rehearsals and many, many extracurricular man hours had been spent for this production. And unfortunately, the School does their Spring musical for just three nights. And tonight, was the last night. So it was with mixed emotion that I entered into this last day, thinking a mix of "we should keep on doing this...we're just getting the kinks out" and "I am so glad this thing is over".
Saturday's performance, besides being the last, had a different feel to it. Most of all, none of the kids had to be in school, so I think there was a looser feel to the whole event. For the first time ever, we decided to combine the Saturday performance with a sit down dinner, a Dinner Theater type of event, so there was a different vibe around the place. I had to hook the dinner theater people up with sound up in the commons area, so Jeff and I met around 3PM. He'd been so thorough in checking in with me throughout the last few weeks..almost to the point of being a nudge...luckily he's such a good friend. I set them up and everything seemed to work pretty well. I then set out to do some of my pre-show stuff, like testing the mics and a walking around the stage.
Before Friday's performance, I had noticed that one of the new wheels on the Paroo house had not held up to the weight of the various people on the "porch", so I replaced it before the show. I checked it out again, and deemed it capable of holding up for one more night. If I were to do it again, I'd have more than one wheel over the door, to distribute the weight better. But again, it would be "good enough" for one more show. I also tacked a couple of the siding strips that had come loose over the last couple of days. I was fortunate to have Jonathon tagging along. He'd been a last minute addition to the crew and since he lived so close to us, I gave him a ride to the show. He really liked to work hard and I sincerely appreciated that. It also turned out that he had connections with Dominos, as I had decided that to thank the crew, I'd buy them pizza, since the dinner theater was reserved for paying customers and I honestly wanted to keep them separate from that crowd.
I picked up the pizza and brought it back to the School, we were going to eat in Erica's room, which was as far away from both the cast and the dinner theater as possible. There was a lot of energy that night on appropriate behavior and apparently some of the crew was "participating" in that. A number of times throughout the night, I was told that "so and so from the crew was making out with so and so" or something like that. I honestly didn't see it happening myself and decided that if I saw it, I'd worry about it then. It was tough keeping the backstage crew occupied for the extended wait before the show. My "orders" were that they should make sure everything was where it was supposed to be, but for the most part, they goofed around. I did appreciate their need to blow off a little steam. While some of the crew had really only been involved for a little more than a week, it had been a very long and stressful week, so their goofing off was completely understandable, but a little stressful for me. So I just vanished and left them to their projects, the main one being that they needed to move in the four backdrops that we had moved out to the commons. The thought was that it would add a lovely touch to the dinner if the guests got to eat "in the park"...and our park backdrop added just the ambience. It did add an extra wrinkle in setting up as the flats had to be in just the right places before the show. So with a packed cafeteria, they honked those flats over and out and into the theater, really not much of a problem. Seth and I went through our mic checks, and the performers were truly uninterested in doing this. It's surprising to me how little value they placed in getting the sound correct before the show, yet many of them (and their families) have a lot of passion on the topic during the show! But again, it was the last show and the energy was different on the whole.
Dave S. had a couple of extra seats left over for the dinner theater, as apparently there were a couple of no-shows. I decided to not take him up on the offer, mainly because I still had a lot to do, and I truly wanted to remain as invisible as possible. I just imagined sitting at a table and all of the focus being placed on me, even briefly, when the true focus was (and rightly so) on the kids and Erica. They had asked a few of the seniors to be "interviewed" during the dinner and honestly I would've liked to see that, but not enough to want to sit there during dinner. And fortunately, Erica was able to peel away and sit with some of her family that was in town and "relax" a little. The rest of us just scurried around, doing all of our pre-show stuff...anxious to get the final performance underway.
While we were waiting for the show to start, I wandered back stage to see what the crew was up to. I was "amused" when I saw that they had duct taped Joel to one of the benches. I had an overflowing of mixed emotion; laughter because it was truly funny and fear because it was only about 20 minutes to show time...so I did the responsible thing and vanished, telling Dan & Shaf that they should untie him...eventually. I then sat down in the teacher's lounge and wrote out thank you cards to Erica, Sharon, Connie and Jennifer. These four, plus Diane and Brenda, did an amazing job and giving them a simple thank you card was literally the least I could do. So I scribbled out a few sentiments and it was time to get this show on the road. After it was over, they too had handed me cards of their own, and these are treasures to me, that bond me with these people for ever. For this show, Seth had brought his walkie-talkies from home and they worked with the headsets, so he was now in the comm loop with stage crew and I was able to hear as well as command. I called out places and the overture began and the last show of the series began....
During the Wednesday rehearsal, one of the salesmen had inadvertently hung their coat on the coat rack that was backstage...which was part of the Paroo interior set. The stage crew just moved it on and there it was, tucked away in the background during the scene...no big deal. One of Erica's comments later that evening was something like "did you notice the coat on the coat rack?" My lack of response probably spoke volumes. "Clearly there wouldn't be a man's coat on a widow's coat rack" she continued. Man, this woman has an eye for detail. When I talked this over with Dan, Shaf and Rachel (my 3 Seniors in both grade and level of professionalism), we hatched a plan. On Saturday night, as a little inside joke to everyone, we would hang a coat on the coat rack for this scene. But not a generic man's coat but a coat that a lot of people would recognize..but not people in the audience, but the cast and crew. We had decided as a type of homage to Erica and all her efforts, we would hang up the Technicolor Dreamcoat that we used last year. That play had made such an indelible mark on most of the kids in this current show...and the school community in general, it was perfect. It was perceived as an incredible honor to have been in the play, and most of the kids from last year were involved somehow this year. To us, it was a symbol of an amazing year of theater, from Joseph to Music Man, and it was intended to be a little inside joke/way to honor a teacher and friend, Erica, who had pushed all of us harder than anyone would have thought possible. At least that was the plan.
The curtains opened the scene, early in Act I and there was coat, discretely hanging from the coat rack. Jeff, who had played Joseph last year, was standing in the back of the theater with me...immediately saw it and smiled. Everyone who saw it, got the tribute and smiled. Everybody except one very important person. During the scene, with Kaylee, Casey and Sammie doing their thing, Erica came up to me fuming mad. "What is that doing on stage?", she hissed trying to keep her voice down. I felt that I knew her as well as almost anyone at the school, and I can say I never in a million years expected this reaction. "Uncool Mike, totally uncool.." she continued. She was genuinely and totally ticked off. "There had better not be anything else to derail this play.." she added. My response was simple. I whispered "It was totally my idea, and I thought it would be more of an honor...but I guess I was wrong". And I turned away, and she stomped back to her seat...and we've never said a word about it since. I did call out on the walkies to all in ear shot that any other "additions" (if there were any) had better be scrapped. Everything, I meant everything, needed to be by the book. No exceptions. I knew that there was thought of adding a little extra pizzazz to the "firecracker" scene in the gym (the next scene) and there was a plan to pop a couple New Years type poppers after the final curtain call. But at the time, I didn't want to risk anything. My exact statement over the radios was "I have never seen her this mad..."
The rest of the show continued on without any hitches. Steven had tried to record the video of the performance using his new swanky DVD-Recordables. He wasn't successful. Friday's show was recorded, but tonight's didn't work for some. I guess that's what you get when you try to pull this all together at the last minute. Fortunately, I had multiple cameras going and one of the last remaining projects to do is to edit it all down to one, cohesive tape. The clav continued to cut in and out, but we dealt with it as best we could, and it didn't seem like such a big deal anymore.
After the show was over, the cast nicely called all of the directors to "come on down" for a little
recognition. It was nice and I think to a person; cast, crew, families and directors, everyone was glad that this was over. There was a ton of applause, a lot of hugs, high fives and other pleasantries tossed around up there. It had been quite an odyssey, one that physically, mentally and emotionally nearly beat me...but by God's grace, I had made it through. There was honestly the beginning of a plan on how I would return this theater back to it's original state but at that moment, I had no desire to be inside that room another second. I did inform Steven that the sound board, and all tweaking that had been done would be back to normal by Monday, so that meant a trip back sometime on Sunday, which I did as quickly as possible.