Continuing the weekend update from last week:
Some toilets are a piece of...no pun intended.
Friday, and the rest of the weekend, was pure SMOKE rehearsals. Friday afternoon, I used the bathroom in the house I'm staying at to do something that everybody does, even females (though they don't talk about it). Now I've gotten very good at not clogging. I do the multiple flush thing.
Apparently, my flushes weren't multiple enough. Nothing overflowed, but some brown water came up into the shower, clogged up everything else in the house, and leaked out from SOMEWHERE out the bathroom and several feet into the hall. Neither Amanda or I could find a plunger anywhere in the house, so I made a trip to Ace Hardware to buy one. Amanda had to leave for the theater to instruct a Broadway Bootcamp thingie. I got back to the house, plunged, and of course that fixed it. Now all that was left to worry about was cleanup. Mark, the theater's AD and owner of the house, had come down to help clean up. I was thinking "They're sure to invite ME back to do another show." But he was cool about it. It took us a half hour max to clean it up, and then everything was good as new. We used a bunch of beach towels to soak up what had leaked out into the hall. Good thing it's not outdoor swimming season. He said something about how the toilet has been a P.O.S. for a while and that everyone needs to just hold the flusher down for 5 seconds. And that I must have just broken the camel's back by not holding it down long enough. Awfully gracious of him to let me off the hook.
When that drama was all over, I had a couple of hours to calm down and watch some TiVoed Simpsons and Family Guy. Rehearsal was blocking Act One. Went well. Scott's a fast director. I like that. Some directors take forever to block the show to the point where I want to put a gun in my mouth. Scott's speed at it reminds me of Colleen, who directed me in Little Shop of Horrors in 2003. She was also refreshingly efficient. Scott's a big shutterbug, and took all sorts of pictures of the rehearsals, which are up on my Facebook page, but I'll put them here too once I figure out how.
Saturday was a 10 out of 12 type rehearsal. More like an 11 out of 13 for us. We rehearsed from 9AM to 10PM with 2 meal breaks. The feel of the show and our progress evolved in leaps and bounds, and I thoroughly enjoyed our time that day. We finished blocking the show, then worked through the whole show, where I did my monologue without holding my script for the first time. Had to call for line a couple of times, but getting rid of the training wheels is the biggest step. Spent the last of my physical money having Mexican food on the second meal break, where I had the 2nd best taco salad I've had in my life. Got some awesome news from Scott when we got back. Rehearsal the next day was cancelled - which meant I got to go home that night. The rest of the rehearsal was spent running Act 2 again, upon cast request. It's the easy act for me - my monologue is in Act 1.
Went home that night and spent 3 nights at home.
I'm going back today, but will be back home Thursday night, only to return to Tyrone Friday. Today I begin a stretch of 20 consecutive days of working.
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Sunday, January 18, 2009
a wonderful time down there
I'm back from my second week. Turned out to be only 4 days, 3 nights. Last week's stay was only 3 days, 2 nights. Not sure if it's better that I baby step my way into time away from home like it's been, or if it would have been better to start off with a 6-day stay and get used to it so everything else would be a piece of cake.
Got there on Wednesday for MVP rehearsal. It was scheduled from 6:30 to 10, but we didn't use all that time by a long shot. We just did a read-through and were out by 8:30. The script is about 30 pages long and apparently runs about an hour. The cast seems cool. I was really only meeting one person for the first time - the guy who plays Jackie Robinson. The other 4 in the 5 person cast is me, our two-hats-wearing director (he's the AD of the theater and it's his house I'm staying at), Amanda (who is also in SMOKE ON THE MOUNTAIN), and this guy named Dustin.
Okay, I was technically meeting Dustin for the first time, too. But I felt like I already knew him and vice versa, because he works at the theater, he's the one I had to e-mail my headshot and bio to, and he says he saw me in HEDWIG last summer.
After the rehearsal, I went to my temporary home, re-strung my guitar, looked at some of the guitar books I brought with me for fun, finally learned the riff to the DMB song "Rhyme and Reason," probably read some of my book and watched some stuff that was waiting for me on the TiVo, and went to bed.
I think I slept until 11-ish. Thursday was an easy day. Just had SMOKE rehearsal from 6 something 'til 10. Spent the day doing some reading of my book, memorizing for SMOKE, watching more stuff that the TiVo taped for me, and went to rehearsal. Scott said he couldn't do what we had planned to do, which was start blocking, because he didn't get the set layout in a file he could open on his computer. He (understandably) didn't want to block anything without knowing 100% what was where. So we sat in a circle on the stage and did some monologue/characterization work. Surprisingly, not a total waste of time.
When it was over, I went back to the house, and listened to somebody talk. A lot. I was bored and wanted to relax and watch some TV, but I listened to them to be polite. It's all good, though. I enjoy talking to this person, but they were on a roll this night. When they were done, I did all the stuff I mentioned above and went to bed.
I'll talk about the next couple of days in the next entry. The last one was so long, I'm going to start splitting them up to make the reading easier. I've got more to say, though, so stay tuned.
Got there on Wednesday for MVP rehearsal. It was scheduled from 6:30 to 10, but we didn't use all that time by a long shot. We just did a read-through and were out by 8:30. The script is about 30 pages long and apparently runs about an hour. The cast seems cool. I was really only meeting one person for the first time - the guy who plays Jackie Robinson. The other 4 in the 5 person cast is me, our two-hats-wearing director (he's the AD of the theater and it's his house I'm staying at), Amanda (who is also in SMOKE ON THE MOUNTAIN), and this guy named Dustin.
Okay, I was technically meeting Dustin for the first time, too. But I felt like I already knew him and vice versa, because he works at the theater, he's the one I had to e-mail my headshot and bio to, and he says he saw me in HEDWIG last summer.
After the rehearsal, I went to my temporary home, re-strung my guitar, looked at some of the guitar books I brought with me for fun, finally learned the riff to the DMB song "Rhyme and Reason," probably read some of my book and watched some stuff that was waiting for me on the TiVo, and went to bed.
I think I slept until 11-ish. Thursday was an easy day. Just had SMOKE rehearsal from 6 something 'til 10. Spent the day doing some reading of my book, memorizing for SMOKE, watching more stuff that the TiVo taped for me, and went to rehearsal. Scott said he couldn't do what we had planned to do, which was start blocking, because he didn't get the set layout in a file he could open on his computer. He (understandably) didn't want to block anything without knowing 100% what was where. So we sat in a circle on the stage and did some monologue/characterization work. Surprisingly, not a total waste of time.
When it was over, I went back to the house, and listened to somebody talk. A lot. I was bored and wanted to relax and watch some TV, but I listened to them to be polite. It's all good, though. I enjoy talking to this person, but they were on a roll this night. When they were done, I did all the stuff I mentioned above and went to bed.
I'll talk about the next couple of days in the next entry. The last one was so long, I'm going to start splitting them up to make the reading easier. I've got more to say, though, so stay tuned.
Sunday, January 11, 2009
first weekend
Just got back from my first weekend. I don't have access to a computer down there (that I know if). I sort of wish I did so that I can blog more as all the stuff is happening, rather than just doing a recap when I come home. All I have is my iPhone while I'm down there. I can type on it, but I don't know if I have the patience to type up a blog entry on it.
But this is better than nothing.
This past weekend was all SMOKE rehearsals. It started at the theater on Friday at 6:00. I left my parents-in-law's house at 4:00, and made it there on time by the skin of my teeth. 5:55. Friday traffic sucks. (I covered that distance in less than an hour tonight coming home.) Our director for SMOKE is also our music director. He's apparently done a million productions of SMOKE and has worked on all 3 shows in the Sanders family trilogy (the other two are called SANDERS FAMILY CHRISTMAS and MOUNT PLEASANT HOMECOMING). He seems really cool. Very laid back, and it's a unique situation to have the director also be the MD. That's only happened one other time in my experience. He friended me on Facebook. Usually I'm the one to seek people out and friend them, but he sent me a request out of the blue last night.
Friday night we had a 4 hour music rehearsal. It had been a few months since I'd had an intense sit-down music rehearsal like this. My voice hadn't been getting much exercise. I sounded like Rod Stewart by the end of the night, which made me (and always makes me) self-conscious as hell. I tried to talk as little as possible, and I hope I didn't come across as rude to the people who came up to me to converse. Amanda, who plays Denise, my twin sister, offered to let me ride with her to the house we were staying at to save a little gas. We're staying in the basement floor of the theater's Artistic Director's house. When we got there, she showed me my room, the kitchen area, the TV area with TiVo, etc. And yes, we're allowed to program what we want. The house was purchased with actor housing in mind. Shortly afterward, Amanda, me, and Scott (the director/MD) went out for a quick bite to eat at Chili's. [Just to help you follow along, the 3 of us are the only ones using the actor housing for this project. I guess everybody else lives in town. Scott's room is somewhere in one of the upstairs floors.] We were out a little late for having to be up for a 9AM rehearsal, but not too bad. I think I was in bed by 1:00.
Woke up at 7:30 Saturday morning. Took my shower and did all the other hygiene things. Since I'm sharing the bathroom with a girl I just met, I tried to be as considerate as possible. Used my own towel, didn't apply my cologne in there, etc. We rehearsed from 9 to 5 ish. Once again, nothing but music. My voice had a tiny bit more stamina, but that evening, Emily (my wife) said on the phone "wow, you're voice is shot." I have a water bottle that I refill a lot during these rehearsals. The theater was hosting a weekly church service, so we decided (and got permission) to have all 8 hours of Sunday's rehearsal at the "actor housing" house, so I followed Amanda there in my car with all my instruments. At Chili's, Scott, Amanda and me were talking about going out for drinks on Saturday night since we didn't have to be up so early for Sunday's rehearsal. I ended up hoping that didn't happen because I was tired, fried, and hoarse. It didn't. I ended up having a restful and antisocial evening. Amanda went to her room to look over lyrics, vocal parts, and instrumentation. I did some of that in my room too, then went out to Papa John's. Got myself a 10 inch pizza. I was irritated that they didn't have anything smaller, but it turned out to be perfect. It was dinner and then lunch the next day. I got back and ate my pizza while looking over lyrics to my solos and watching Huckabee. Wow. His insecurity and defensiveness is so transparent. He's like I would be if I was a political public figure like him. I thought it would have gotten better now that he has his own show. I took the time to program the TiVo to record The Simpsons and Family Guy, played a couple Dave Matthews and BNL songs on the guitar to wind down, read a couple chapters of Breaking Dawn, then was asleep by 12:30. I remember feeling very alone and out of my comfort zone. Definitely in a "what did I sign myself up for" mood.
Slept until 11 ish. Apparently Amanda did too. The day left me in a much more upbeat mood, and my voice, while not at the stamina it needs to be during the run of the show, took a leap in the direction of improvement. We finished going through the show musically, and have now mapped out who's playing what in every song. Thankfully, I get to take my ukulele home. Scott has me playing 6 instruments throughout the show. Wish it was more. Always the overacheiver in that department. We ended the rehearsal with a read-through of the show, but I have to tell you about what we did during the lunch break. People made things and brought them, and we ate at the house. The theater's AD and his wife came down and joined us, as well as a couple spouses of cast members. Amy - who plays June, the non-singing Sanders sister ("I don't sing. I sign.") - made this mouthwateringly delicious Beef Vegetable soup and the best cornbread I've ever had in my life. It was so moist, you didn't need butter. Scott kept the football game on mute for the 2nd half of rehearsal. He did turn it off when it got down to the wire in the 4th quarter and there was no more hope for his beloved San Diego. I was on the road a good 15 minutes before rehearsal was scheduled to end. Scott isn't one of those directors who gives busywork to fill up the rehearsal time. He seems to let us go when we've completed what we're schedule to do. On the way home, Emily commented that my voice sounds much better.
And now I'm home, writing this. The next time I go back is on Wednesday for MVP rehearsal. Got my script for that tonight. I've got a good bit of memorizing to do. One of the characters I play is the manager of a team Jackie Robinson played on. I get to give a pep talk to the team, like Al Pacino did in Any Given Sunday. It's cool. Got a piece of good news from Mark, who's directing MVP (and whose house I'm staying in). Rehearsal is cancelled on Monday the 19th, since it's a holiday. It was in the midst of a stretch of 26 days where I work with no day off, but now I only have a stretch of 20 consecutive working days during this project. And I get to be home for one more day than I'd planned.
That's it until the next round. Congratulations to Bruce Springsteen on his Golden Globe win tonight. The best man won.
Why didn't I TiVo that?
But this is better than nothing.
This past weekend was all SMOKE rehearsals. It started at the theater on Friday at 6:00. I left my parents-in-law's house at 4:00, and made it there on time by the skin of my teeth. 5:55. Friday traffic sucks. (I covered that distance in less than an hour tonight coming home.) Our director for SMOKE is also our music director. He's apparently done a million productions of SMOKE and has worked on all 3 shows in the Sanders family trilogy (the other two are called SANDERS FAMILY CHRISTMAS and MOUNT PLEASANT HOMECOMING). He seems really cool. Very laid back, and it's a unique situation to have the director also be the MD. That's only happened one other time in my experience. He friended me on Facebook. Usually I'm the one to seek people out and friend them, but he sent me a request out of the blue last night.
Friday night we had a 4 hour music rehearsal. It had been a few months since I'd had an intense sit-down music rehearsal like this. My voice hadn't been getting much exercise. I sounded like Rod Stewart by the end of the night, which made me (and always makes me) self-conscious as hell. I tried to talk as little as possible, and I hope I didn't come across as rude to the people who came up to me to converse. Amanda, who plays Denise, my twin sister, offered to let me ride with her to the house we were staying at to save a little gas. We're staying in the basement floor of the theater's Artistic Director's house. When we got there, she showed me my room, the kitchen area, the TV area with TiVo, etc. And yes, we're allowed to program what we want. The house was purchased with actor housing in mind. Shortly afterward, Amanda, me, and Scott (the director/MD) went out for a quick bite to eat at Chili's. [Just to help you follow along, the 3 of us are the only ones using the actor housing for this project. I guess everybody else lives in town. Scott's room is somewhere in one of the upstairs floors.] We were out a little late for having to be up for a 9AM rehearsal, but not too bad. I think I was in bed by 1:00.
Woke up at 7:30 Saturday morning. Took my shower and did all the other hygiene things. Since I'm sharing the bathroom with a girl I just met, I tried to be as considerate as possible. Used my own towel, didn't apply my cologne in there, etc. We rehearsed from 9 to 5 ish. Once again, nothing but music. My voice had a tiny bit more stamina, but that evening, Emily (my wife) said on the phone "wow, you're voice is shot." I have a water bottle that I refill a lot during these rehearsals. The theater was hosting a weekly church service, so we decided (and got permission) to have all 8 hours of Sunday's rehearsal at the "actor housing" house, so I followed Amanda there in my car with all my instruments. At Chili's, Scott, Amanda and me were talking about going out for drinks on Saturday night since we didn't have to be up so early for Sunday's rehearsal. I ended up hoping that didn't happen because I was tired, fried, and hoarse. It didn't. I ended up having a restful and antisocial evening. Amanda went to her room to look over lyrics, vocal parts, and instrumentation. I did some of that in my room too, then went out to Papa John's. Got myself a 10 inch pizza. I was irritated that they didn't have anything smaller, but it turned out to be perfect. It was dinner and then lunch the next day. I got back and ate my pizza while looking over lyrics to my solos and watching Huckabee. Wow. His insecurity and defensiveness is so transparent. He's like I would be if I was a political public figure like him. I thought it would have gotten better now that he has his own show. I took the time to program the TiVo to record The Simpsons and Family Guy, played a couple Dave Matthews and BNL songs on the guitar to wind down, read a couple chapters of Breaking Dawn, then was asleep by 12:30. I remember feeling very alone and out of my comfort zone. Definitely in a "what did I sign myself up for" mood.
Slept until 11 ish. Apparently Amanda did too. The day left me in a much more upbeat mood, and my voice, while not at the stamina it needs to be during the run of the show, took a leap in the direction of improvement. We finished going through the show musically, and have now mapped out who's playing what in every song. Thankfully, I get to take my ukulele home. Scott has me playing 6 instruments throughout the show. Wish it was more. Always the overacheiver in that department. We ended the rehearsal with a read-through of the show, but I have to tell you about what we did during the lunch break. People made things and brought them, and we ate at the house. The theater's AD and his wife came down and joined us, as well as a couple spouses of cast members. Amy - who plays June, the non-singing Sanders sister ("I don't sing. I sign.") - made this mouthwateringly delicious Beef Vegetable soup and the best cornbread I've ever had in my life. It was so moist, you didn't need butter. Scott kept the football game on mute for the 2nd half of rehearsal. He did turn it off when it got down to the wire in the 4th quarter and there was no more hope for his beloved San Diego. I was on the road a good 15 minutes before rehearsal was scheduled to end. Scott isn't one of those directors who gives busywork to fill up the rehearsal time. He seems to let us go when we've completed what we're schedule to do. On the way home, Emily commented that my voice sounds much better.
And now I'm home, writing this. The next time I go back is on Wednesday for MVP rehearsal. Got my script for that tonight. I've got a good bit of memorizing to do. One of the characters I play is the manager of a team Jackie Robinson played on. I get to give a pep talk to the team, like Al Pacino did in Any Given Sunday. It's cool. Got a piece of good news from Mark, who's directing MVP (and whose house I'm staying in). Rehearsal is cancelled on Monday the 19th, since it's a holiday. It was in the midst of a stretch of 26 days where I work with no day off, but now I only have a stretch of 20 consecutive working days during this project. And I get to be home for one more day than I'd planned.
That's it until the next round. Congratulations to Bruce Springsteen on his Golden Globe win tonight. The best man won.
Why didn't I TiVo that?
Monday, January 5, 2009
the calm before the storm
Well, here we are in 2009, and this is my first post. I will be using this blog to document my journey through my crazy crazy rehearsal/performance schedule for two shows I will be doing in rep with each other. SMOKE ON THE MOUNTAIN and MOST VALUABLE PLAYER - both running at The Legacy Theatre in Tyrone, Georgia. SMOKE runs January 30 - February 22, and MVP runs February 9 - 20. Performances for the former will be Friday at 8:00, Saturday at 3:00 and 8:00, and Sunday at 3:00.
Performances for the latter will be Tuesday - Friday at 9 and 11 AM. So yep, you guessed it, there will be a lot of 2-show days and even some 3-show days.
I live a good hour and a half from Tyrone, but they're providing free housing for me and the other actors who live far away. I was cast in these shows back in June 2008, so I've had plenty of time to "dread" this. Just kidding. I will be going back and forth a lot between home and where I'll be staying. I worked it out in my schedule so that I'll never be away from home any longer than a week.
In SMOKE, I'll be playing Dennis Sanders. I bought the cast recording last July, and we received our scripts and scores shortly before Thanksgiving. I've had a couple of one-man readthroughs of the show and have even sat down at the piano to plunk out my parts in the songs. Rehearsals start this Friday, and I'd like to do some more studying. I have no idea if I'll be ahead of the game or behind in the familiarity factor compared to the rest of the cast, so I'm trying to be "too prepared."
I know absolutely nothing about MVP, except that I'm playing Pee Wee Reese and Clay Hopper, whoever they are. My audition in June was very unique in that the director of SMOKE wasn't even there and I didn't read anything from MVP. I'm looking forward to these two projects. I've never performed in multiple shows at the same time, and I've always been envious of the people at places like the Shakespeare Tavern who do it regularly.
I think I've given all the background info I intended. As I said, the craziness begins January 9th. Let us pray.
Performances for the latter will be Tuesday - Friday at 9 and 11 AM. So yep, you guessed it, there will be a lot of 2-show days and even some 3-show days.
I live a good hour and a half from Tyrone, but they're providing free housing for me and the other actors who live far away. I was cast in these shows back in June 2008, so I've had plenty of time to "dread" this. Just kidding. I will be going back and forth a lot between home and where I'll be staying. I worked it out in my schedule so that I'll never be away from home any longer than a week.
In SMOKE, I'll be playing Dennis Sanders. I bought the cast recording last July, and we received our scripts and scores shortly before Thanksgiving. I've had a couple of one-man readthroughs of the show and have even sat down at the piano to plunk out my parts in the songs. Rehearsals start this Friday, and I'd like to do some more studying. I have no idea if I'll be ahead of the game or behind in the familiarity factor compared to the rest of the cast, so I'm trying to be "too prepared."
I know absolutely nothing about MVP, except that I'm playing Pee Wee Reese and Clay Hopper, whoever they are. My audition in June was very unique in that the director of SMOKE wasn't even there and I didn't read anything from MVP. I'm looking forward to these two projects. I've never performed in multiple shows at the same time, and I've always been envious of the people at places like the Shakespeare Tavern who do it regularly.
I think I've given all the background info I intended. As I said, the craziness begins January 9th. Let us pray.
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