Day Thirty-Three: The Cast Gift

It's a theater tradition of giving tokens of respect to the cast and crew of a show. It can anything: roses, candy, mementos. Greenville Little Theatre had the great idea of shrinking down a show's poster and giving it laminated as fridge magnets. I have five from that company. The back of the magnets have a quote from the show. The Odd Couple magnet says "Nature didn't intend for poker to be be played that way." The Sound of Music magnet says "How do hold a moonbeam in your hand." I liked the idea so much that I wanted to continue the tradition even after I moved to other companies. But I didn't have a copy of the official Hot Roof poster. Fortunately, I'm a drawist. I just made my own.

I had thought about this for about a month now and sketched some ideas during rehearsal. I started off with a literal notion of a stylized cat on a roof and various forms of title logos. But it seemed a bit too on-the-nose, and I moved to items used during the show. The one thing seen throughout the production is Brick's alcohol, and it's the fundamental problem everyone works around. Maggie competes with it, Gooper and Mae depend on it, Big Daddy and Mama lament it. It made sense then that it would be prominent in the poster. That allowed me to put the title in the shadow of the glass to mirror Maggie's position. She's eclipsed by his dependency on booze. And sense she's the title character, well, this was too good a visual pun not to use. I also wanted to fill out the poster art with something suggesting the other characters, and I thought of the wedding rings. The play concerns three marriages in distinct conditions, and two rings would represent the spouses of each.

I needed the quote to complete the tradition. Fortunately, I had one immediately ready. The reverend is angling for a memorial gift for his church and spends his stage time talking about what other churches have gotten from wealthy widows. Gooper appears to direct him to something worth asking for: an air conditioner. When the reverend tries to change the subject during Act III, he goes right back to gifts and the Southern heat while complimenting his hosts: "I think this house is the coolest house in the Delta." Bingo. Out of context, the line salutes the cast and crew. That's my first and only choice for a magnet quote.

I took a photo at home of the a glass with iced tea to suggest a chilled liquor and drew it in Illustrator. I also took pics of rings and drew them. Then I made the logo fit inside the shadow and grabbed the theatre logo from their website. I made it approximately the same size as the previous magnets so it'll fit right in with them on the fridge.

I contacted a company the office works with and they were able to take my file as a PDF, print it, laminate it, cut it, and deliver it to me in an afternoon. When I got their after work, I discovered the lamination was shoddy on some cards, and they were redone. Right as I was leaving, and after I paid, I was informed they had charged me for re-laminating those shoddy cards. And that, ladies and gents, is how you lose business. I shan't go there when I do this for my next show. I then boogies over to Home Depot and found the exactly what I needed. Magnetic tape. This is surely the work of a highly civilized society. Yes, it's made in China. But my point is that it was something I didn't even know about but was searching for.

Got home, cut the tape, discovered laminate was coming off of a few cards again (doubling my conviction of taking my business elsewhere), and made the magnets in about 20 minutes. It looks right nice on the fridge. I'll give them out this weekend before a performance. I hope the theatre doesn't mind this cheek of making an unofficial poster, but then again, this is a great advertisement for me. If I can't be in a play, I could do the artwork for it.

Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical
Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are
Day Twenty-Three: Socks
Day Twenty-Four: Our First Audience
Day Twenty-Five: Calamity
Day Twenty-Six: Opening Night
Day Twenty-Seven: Second Night
Day Twenty-Eight: The Show You Saw
Day Twenty-Nine: Brush-Up
Day Thirty: Back to Work
Day Thirty-One: A Spreading Plague
Day Thirty-Two: Cast Party

Picture of the Day
Why, it's a magnet. Made by ME.

Day Thirty-Two: Cast Party

Victoria's still out, the younger boy is MIA, the middle girl is the walking dead, and we learn the oldest girl will be no longer available after today. We decide to take pictures of the happy-birthday scene with her in it to make up for her absence last weekend. But we will not have pictures will all the children. I feel a bit sicky myself, but the gunk I wake up with goes away after lunch. I carry DayQuil with me just in case but never use it.

The green room prop table has a bulletin board above it, and one of Mae's real daughters (also a crewmember) has started a stick-figure art gallery of scenes from the play. It's cute stuff. I show her my early sketches (which I posted in this thread), and she demands they go up as well. That leads to the kids wanting their own gallery space, and now the board is covered in backstage art.

It's a dandy crowd, even applauding for the new managing director comments. While she talks to them, I'm reading about the first Americans to orbit the planet. Once I hear my early cues to get ready (Maggie repeats the line "laws of silence don't work"), I put on my suit jacket even though the audience won't see me for another half-hour and move to stage-left for my Act I offstage lines. Ten minutes later, I'm reading again. The reverend and doctor still check their scripts to determine their Act I cues. The departing Gooper daughter has made notes for each of us. Mine says I was lucky to be in "Sound of Music." I don't get to tell her I was the bad guy. I'll be sad to see her go. She didn't misbehave backstage, and she hit her lines well.

Daddy conquers the audience in Act II. If his was a stand-up act, we wouldn't be willing to carry on once he leaves the stage. Act III feels good, and Gooper comes out a little angrier tonight. I like it, but I don't want to change up the character in mid-run. We'll see what happens in the subsequent shows; maybe natural flow and adjustment will allow him to show his temper more.

We have a cast party after the show at Susan's house, and the small turnout does nothing to diminish the fun. We have three types of soups -- Mexican, potato and a thick chili -- and assorted snack stuff. I learn that the Gooper Groupies tell Brick about Gooper directing the singing kids, something Brick never noticed. The crew noticed today that he looked and was cracking up at the sight. Big Mama sits right in front of Gooper at that moment, and I perform the moves for her as we sit and eat soup. We all joke about what we'd love to do on the last performance as on- and offstage pranks, things we would never actually do, you understand. We talk technical stuff about slightly off sound cues and small prop adjustments. It's like any other party among co-workers; we talk shop. And the women debate Hugh Jackman vs. Sean Connery. Also, there's still debate about Brick's sexuality (the character, not the actor).

Susan tells us that the director doesn't like to have last-week rehearsals to brush up our lines. A table vote is taken, and I say I'm comfortable without it. Brick is for it. Everyone else is agin it. I tell him, sincerely, that as I work so close to the theatre, I'll be there if he wants a run-through. We'll see. I suspect the absent Big Daddy won't need one, nor the absent Maggie. We've worked this play since November. We shouldn't need a line-through for the final three shows.

And for now, it's a welcome bit of rest and medicine to get ready for those final performances. Now its starting to sink in: This big project is almost over.

Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical
Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are
Day Twenty-Three: Socks
Day Twenty-Four: Our First Audience
Day Twenty-Five: Calamity
Day Twenty-Six: Opening Night
Day Twenty-Seven: Second Night
Day Twenty-Eight: The Show You Saw
Day Twenty-Nine: Brush-Up
Day Thirty: Back to Work
Day Thirty-One: A Spreading Plague

Day Thirty-One: A Spreading Plague

Victoria is out, which makes the stage-left manager in charge of backstage. I'm not worried; she knows this play by now, and Susan the stage manger calls the cues from the lightbooth. The oldest girl is also out again. Another child erupts into a nasty coughing fit near the drinking fountain, and it's not nearly as appetizing anymore. The fountain, not the child. We get a look at the first round of official pictures, and they are quite nice. The other half is supposed to arrive next weekend, and then we can place our orders for prints.

Big Daddy admits during warm-ups that he didn't see a signer at all; it was an over-dramatic coughing fit. A Fringe Festival is held downstairs, right below the stage, and we find a trail of carpets from the green room to the stage-left wing to cushion our footsteps. We can hear the noise wafting up the backstage staircase. It sounds like the Peanuts teachers imitating wrestlers.

It's our biggest crowd yet, and they're initially quiet. But once Maggie and Mae get catty, they laugh, and I hear an alarming mass of peoples. The birthday candles are only half-lit as I take the cake onstage, but Big Mama lights the rest during a quiet moment for her. Turns out the backstage lighter was acting up. I assure tonight's backstage chief that it's OK. Talky Boy is flat-out rambunctious tonight, and even a costume lady whisper-yells to them to shut it. They're getting listless with tedium.

I'm told after the show that the light-booth crew has formed the Gooper Groupies from a mix of pity and pride in what we've done with the character. Yeah, I'm pretty happy with that. Also, the cast party is tomorrow, not Super Bowl Sunday, as I thought.

Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical
Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are
Day Twenty-Three: Socks
Day Twenty-Four: Our First Audience
Day Twenty-Five: Calamity
Day Twenty-Six: Opening Night
Day Twenty-Seven: Second Night
Day Twenty-Eight: The Show You Saw
Day Twenty-Nine: Brush-Up
Day Thirty: Back to Work

Day Thirty: Back to Work

There's a small anxiety about starting up again. Standing backstage, waiting to heed a cue, my mind thinks no time has passed from last weekend, but my muscles know it's been a while. My little habits and ticks are off. Right before the play starts, the director tells us to insert a pause right before Mae and Gooper leave Act III. This kind of note doesn't bother me, as it demands such a small change. Now if he told us to drop a line, we'd be in trouble.

All the kids are back, and the return of the younger boy means Talky Boy has been cranked to 11. Maybe it's the hiatus, but he's especially annoying tonight. The returning girl seems like she's running in a low gear. the reverend asks if I see him and Gooper's asides as a comedy shtick like Abbott and Costello. I handle this question carefully, because his question suggests where he wants those characters to go, and I don't wanna try that as we start our second weekend of shows. What I say instead is that I think the reverend speaks so often of memorial gifts to local churches because he thinks Daddy's death will be a boon to his. He seems satisfied with that.

I have a lot of trouble with a contact lens, and take in so much saline solution in my system that my stomach falls out. I miss the first part of warm-ups because of this. Also, the damn shoes have apparently shrunk back to their crippling shapes. I'm starving backstage, but I avoid the giant bowl of candy lest I take the stage with a green tongue. My reversion to a pre-run schedule, even a brief one, has ruined my theatre diet, and I'm starving.

It's a sizable crowd out there, and they take forever to get back to their seats after intermission. The reverend and I hover on stage-right waiting for them. I just read earlier tonight the depiction of Alan Shepard's 15-minute flight into space and how it began with a four-hour delay. And once they sit, they aren't in the show. Even the kids' singing fails to entertain. Big Daddy has to work to win them over. He seems to have some trouble getting started, and he later tells us he was distracted by the sign-language provider near the front of the stage. I didn't notice ther person at all. I knew we were offering audio transcription for the seeing impaired this weekend, but I didn't know we had a signer too. I wonder how they did with "euremia" and, of course, "poontang." I imagine this poor, unprepared female signer suddenly busting out a DX crotch chop.

Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical
Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are
Day Twenty-Three: Socks
Day Twenty-Four: Our First Audience
Day Twenty-Five: Calamity
Day Twenty-Six: Opening Night
Day Twenty-Seven: Second Night
Day Twenty-Eight: The Show You Saw
Day Twenty-Nine: Brush-Up

Day Twenty-Nine: Brush-Up

We're just running lines tonight, sitting around the green room table. Ten of us, sans kids, simply saying lines with little acting. We're itching to make a short night of it. And we do. Starting a little after 7, we finish around 8:30. That includes stops. Big Daddy discovers he must walk around to deliver his lines. Mae has some trouble. The reverend reads his lines before delivering them, and the doctor again gets lost in his Act III dialogue. Big Mama has some small stumbles, but she rights herself. Me? Shit, I can rattle off my lines monotone in under five minutes. Remember the fast talker in the '80s Fed Ex commercials? It sounds like that. The brush-up reminds us just how much Maggie carries Act I, and she rightfully puts her head down to rest as we move to Act II.

We talk a bit about who's coming to see the show. Big Daddy says a friend's children were turned away by an overzealous box-office volunteer. The stage manager assures him that won't happen again. Mae says her in-laws are arriving this weekend to watch, but they're practically deaf. Daddy also recollects that when he did this play in the midwest over the past 30 years, some of the cast didn't know what "poontang" (which Big Daddy yells in Act II) was. Did they cast a whole ensemble of Radar O'Reillys?

We find out the reviewer for the Asheville daily saw the show on Sunday, not Thursday, after all. And we're told the review will run Friday morning.

And here it is:

Asheville Community Theatre plumbs the depths of family conflict and hypocrisy with Tennessee Williams’ intense drama “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.”

Charles H. Bell III is unforgettable as “Big Daddy” Pollitt, a Mississippi Delta tycoon whose family gathers to celebrate his 65th birthday and release from the hospital. Beneath all the birthday hoopla they have a serious purpose, to tell Big Daddy and his wife Big Mama (Cary Nichols) that he is dying of cancer.
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And family members are already scrambling to get control of Big Daddy’s fortune and his sprawling 28,000-acre plantation.

Oldest son Gooper (Gregory Dickens), an attorney, proclaims that he should head the family empire rather than his brother Brick (Dan Clancy), a former star athlete who now drowns his sorrows in alcohol.

Gooper’s scheming wife Mae (Lysa Kennedy) trots out their five children in a transparent attempt to win Big Daddy’s approval, while constantly pointing out that Brick and his wife remain childless.

Melissa Menard gives a mesmerizing performance as Brick’s sexy wife, Maggie, who writhes like “a cat on a hot tin roof” as she tries to break through Brick’s alcoholic haze of disgust and hate.

Nothing is as it seems. The fog of lies and deceit, or “mendacity” as Brick calls it, hangs heavy over this Mississippi mansion.

Director Leslie Muchmore and a talented cast manage to wrest the full impact of Tennessee Williams’ powerful story. Even if you saw the movie or other productions, this is a show worth catching.

OK, so this is technically a summary with a few subjective opinions. But that's what dailies do. It's possible 3/4 of this was written before he saw the play. I also think Big Mama was short-changed. Her reactions alone make Big Daddy's bluster less outrageously funny and more harsh and cruel. She does that with sharp delivery, and she deserves some laurels.

Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical
Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are
Day Twenty-Three: Socks
Day Twenty-Four: Our First Audience
Day Twenty-Five: Calamity
Day Twenty-Six: Opening Night
Day Twenty-Seven: Second Night
Day Twenty-Eight: The Show You Saw

Veni, vidi, vino

The threat of a snowstorm hovers over us to a greater extent than the so-far nonexistent storm. If it hits today, I might miss the rehearsal to brush up on our lines. It won't affect me directly -- I can recite all my lines rapid fire within five minutes -- but it might rattle the older actors. As I drove home, Your Sis called to ask if I could stop by the Mart of Wal to pick up notebook paper. Sure, I said, blithely ignorant that as this is the day new semesters start, that section of the store would be a jungle of kiddos. I swam through them to get the paper and fled the scene like a burgler. We reheated leftover spaghetti and ate pizza leftovers while chugging back a nice Yellow Tail Grenache mix. Then we watched "Six Feet Under," a show that improves with inebriation.

Oh, I also whipped her in "Jeopardy" once again. I shall soon tire of this tedium, one fears.

Picture of the Day
This was my first portable game system. Blip worked like Pong, except you pressed buttons to send the red pixel back to the opponent. This then-dazzling LED technology was still shackled to an analog timer that one wound like an old alarm clock. My parents enjoyed buy me games like this, apparently oblivious to the fact that I had no siblings. There were some board games I may have played twice because I couldn't find anyone to join me. Anyway, not to sound like a therapy patient or a troglodyte, but I'm still knocked out by current technology because I so clearly remember the state-of-the-art equipment we neighborhood kids used to marvel at.




In The News
The trial of Scooter Libby stays off the front pages, but it's starting to become interesting. This is the culmination of the investigation into the white House leak of a classified CIA agent identity in response her husband's criticism of the administration's allegations of WMD fabrication. Libby, Cheney's former chief of staff, is charged with perjury and obstruction -- hardly sexy headline material -- but of note is that former press secretary Ari Fleischer invoked the Fifth and later cut an immunity deal. The questions linger as to who in the White House knew Libby leaked the name and under whose authorization. Leaking a classified name is a felony, but Cheney cites a presidential signing statement affirming the right Bush or Cheney to instantly declassify any document simply by handing it to someone not cleared to read it. This sounds like a tacit admission of authorization and suggests who provided the name to Libby. Fleischer and his replacement Scot McClellan face scrutiny as to what they told reporters in briefings and whether they covered up for whoever was involved with the leak.

Pizza and the Prez

Working on a theatre show makes me eat less. While some folks gain weight in rehearsals by eating fast food before or after working the stage, I lose it. I eat a little so my stomach doesn't betray me during a scene. I also do this during performances. You may have noticed I wolfed down an entire pizza at Mellow Mushroom. I usually don't do that. Now that I'm away from the show for a few days, a man's thoughts turn to chowing down like a mofo. Your Sis thought she had laid out lasagna to thaw for dinner, but it was actually hot wings. We just had wings Monday for the traditional night of messy eats and rasslin', and I wanted a big meal. We made tracks for the phone, dialed up pizza delivery, and within a half-hour were up to our elbows in buttery cheese and bread. I even manged to get onto Guitar Hero and discovered it includes Matthew Sweet's "Girlfriend," only one of the best air-guitar songs evah. I was practically giggling as I played it.

And then I watched the State of the Union. Bush had a hard sell on his hands, and he delivered quite a nice explanation of why Iraq is a hellhole right now. But I think his level of detail undercut his argument for standing firm. If the region is a growing battlefield between Sunni and Shiite extremists, why should we expect a secular democracy to maintain stability? Saddam's Iraq worked because he was a tyrant, and we're selling a whole 'nother form of doing business in a region where an iron fist could be pretty damn handy right about now. Otherwise, the speech offered a lot of far-off deadlines for fuel alternatives, balanced budgets, and baby-boomer support programs. I liked the ending of the speech as Bush waited until the last five minutes to say the state was strong (usually occurs within the first five) and end the address on a high note.

This may have been his best speech since the 2004 convention, but he's hawking suspect merchandise with the meek accountability of a guy working on a countdown to Memoirville. Also, his choices for the annual roll call of Good Americans was weak: Dikimbe Mutombo, the founder of Baby Einstein, a quick-thinking construction worker, and the requisite military good ole boy hero. If there's anything to glean from the address, it was that Bush is well aware he owns a sinking minority stance on issues both foreign and domestic and needed a speech that would ask for help. He delivered it, doing no further harm but offering no greater notions. My biggest quibbles would be his alleged success stories of foiling further attacks such as the unfounded Los Angeles plot and the British liquid-explosive case that was thrown out of court for lack of evidence.

Picture of the Day
They brought the commercials back! Time to un-pimp yo auto!

Not The Rest I Was Hoping For

I spent all day Monday anticipating a relaxing night at home away from the show. As I drove home, Your Sis called me to ask if I would help her grade papers. That lasted from the time I got home to 9 p.m. There are better ways to unwind. For instance, I was hoping to play Guitar Hero again. Or go to the gym for a light workout. I'm a'feared of hurting myself in the middle of a show. I'll get back to running once the play's over. I've started collecting some ideas of mini-comics, and there is still the living-room painting to tackle.

I've got the Wailing Jenny's CD here at work along with 2 recent purchases: The Beatles' Love soundtrack for the Cirque de Soliel show, and the first Franz Ferdinand CD.

The Oscar nominations are out:

Performance by an actor in a leading role
Leonardo DiCaprio in “Blood Diamond” (Warner Bros.)
Ryan Gosling in “Half Nelson” (THINKFilm)
Peter O’Toole in “Venus” (Miramax, Filmfour and UK Council)
Will Smith in “The Pursuit of Happyness” (Sony Pictures Releasing)
Forest Whitaker in “The Last King of Scotland” (Fox Searchlight)

The presence of two black nominees will get headlines, but Gosling and O'Toole are nice additions to this list. From what I've heard, it's Whitaker's award.

Performance by an actor in a supporting role
Alan Arkin in “Little Miss Sunshine” (Fox Searchlight)
Jackie Earle Haley in “Little Children” (New Line)
Djimon Hounsou in “Blood Diamond” (Warner Bros.)
Eddie Murphy in “Dreamgirls” (DreamWorks and Paramount)
Mark Wahlberg in “The Departed” (Warner Bros.)

What surprises me in both categories is the absence of Matt Damon, the actor who owned The Departed. I wonder if there was confusion as to whether he was the lead actor. Murphy has the momentum, but Arkin made Sunshine a better film.

Performance by an actress in a leading role
Penélope Cruz in “Volver” (Sony Pictures Classics)
Judi Dench in “Notes on a Scandal” (Fox Searchlight)
Helen Mirren in “The Queen” (Miramax, Pathé and Granada)
Meryl Streep in “The Devil Wears Prada” (20th Century Fox)
Kate Winslet in “Little Children” (New Line)

I'm not sure if Streep can win for what's essentially a teenage girl-marketed comedy. Not that I'd mind. Mirren has been the early favorite for months now.

Performance by an actress in a supporting role
Adriana Barraza in “Babel” (Paramount and Paramount Vantage)
Cate Blanchett in “Notes on a Scandal” (Fox Searchlight)
Abigail Breslin in “Little Miss Sunshine” (Fox Searchlight)
Jennifer Hudson in “Dreamgirls” (DreamWorks and Paramount)
Rinko Kikuchi in “Babel” (Paramount and Paramount Vantage)

Breslin is the title character from Sunshine, and there's no way in hell she wins. She just didn't do enough to warrant the nod. Hudson is the critic's darling for the award.

Achievement in directing
“Babel” (Paramount and Paramount Vantage) Alejandro González Iñárritu
“The Departed” (Warner Bros.) Martin Scorsese
“Letters from Iwo Jima” (Warner Bros.) Clint Eastwood
“The Queen” (Miramax, Pathé and Granada) Stephen Frears
“United 93” (Universal and StudioCanal) Paul Greengrass

Scorsese is overdue.

Best motion picture of the year
“Babel” (Paramount and Paramount Vantage)
“The Departed” (Warner Bros.)
“Letters from Iwo Jima” (Warner Bros.)
“Little Miss Sunshine” (Fox Searchlight)
“The Queen” (Miramax, Pathé and Granada)

There will be a lot of talk about Dreamgirls' absence from this list in favor of Sunshine, a thin bomber-crew road comedy with a majority white cast. Sunshine is not the brilliant film everyone claims, and I can't see it winning. The Departed is the best film I saw this year, and Your Sis, who is hardly a film aficionado, agrees.

Picture of the Day
Sunspots through a filter.




In the News
Bush is to deliver his State of the Union tonight. He'll stand amid an opposition Congress and try to convince them to ignore their overwhelming mandate against the Iraq occupation. I also look forward to the catalog of pie-in-the-sky initiatives that pad out the last fifteen minutes of every SOTU.

+ + +

Dig this: Scientists have managed to store and retrieve an image on a photon. This means we can transfer information on light waves. Wowsers.

Day Twenty-Eight: The Show You Saw

I bought a new eyeliner pencil at CVS for $8. EIGHT BUCKS. I thought art supplies were expensive.

Two kids are out sick today, the youngest boy and the oldest girl. Without a sidekick to impress, the talky boy is eerily quiet. Maybe he's feeling ill too. He does have a nasty croupy cough today. The kids have practiced exchanging lines, and after a few practice drills in the green room, they're ready to replace the missing. The assistant stage manger orders us to wash our hands religiously today to keep us from catching the kid bug. Big Daddy even refuses to hug the girls, despite their cute smiles and wide arm spans.

The doctor can't figure out what happend last night, but I assure him we got it covered. We're told about half an hour after we report for duty that we can't use the regular parking space shared by the Thomas Wolfe House. Something about an agreement. But it's freezing cold outside, and no tourists are milling about for those parking spaces. I think it's silly, and I haven't dismissed the notion that one of those employees took my plate.

The crowd is the usual, older Sunday gang, and they're sedate throughout but they do applaud the set. They're too polite to really dig into the play; they chuckle instead of guffaw but feel attentive.

I discover that the recent stage-left staff changes are due to the lead assistant's obligation to present a speech to an intern program last night. She coached her replacement on Friday, and that person worked with an assitant Saturday, hence the phone-call timing shifts. But the initial assistant is back today, and everything runs smoothly. The reverend misses a line in Act III, but it doesn't affect my cue, and only we two realize it.

After the show, we take photos. Almost 30 shots are listed on the hand-out, and we start quickly. But right before, we sing happy birthday to the assistant managers on either side of the stage. It happens to their birthdays today. Cake is available but only after our photos. I count four people with cameras: one with a wide lens in the auditorium and three roving photographers. The hand-out tells us what scene the theatre wants a photo of, and we're instructed to act out a minute's worth until we're told to freeze. We do, and the photographers move about to get their pictures. After a show (and a week of shows), this is more tiring than you'd think. I only have to do about ten photos, and I'm ready to quit after three. It seems to take a long time to finish up each shot, and I get a little light-headed. Soon enough, I'm gone, and out the door. The stage manager tells us we're to meet up again Thursday to run lines, and that sounds years away from now.

I run down to the local pizzeria to meet y'all for dinner. It's a good end to the week, a good end to a lot of work. So much so that I can't imagine volunteering for another show when Your Dad asks when they can see me onstage again (not counting the next 2 weekends). That's something to worry about later. For now, I want to enjoy being away from the show, and I'll go back to it fresh after time away.

Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical
Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are
Day Twenty-Three: Socks
Day Twenty-Four: Our First Audience
Day Twenty-Five: Calamity
Day Twenty-Six: Opening Night
Day Twenty-Seven: Second Night

I also had the Pats-Colts game on TiFaux, and we missed none of it. Well, I didn't. Your Sis hit the bed around the second quarter, but in her defense, the game appeared over with New England up 21-3. But then Indianapolis went to town with passing plays and took the lead with one minute left with a run. An interception 30 second later sealed it, and Payton Manning goes to the Super Bowl to face Da Bears. This should be a very good game.

Day Twenty-Seven: Second Night

Because we had a late night followed by a party that lasted well into the a.m., the director and thus the managers are worried about show energy. I worry about it for another reason: burnout. This is the eighth show of this week, and once I enter the green room, it feels like I never left. Also, there's a danger of becoming bored once you've proven to yourself that you can handle gaffes. The audience will smell that immediately and pull away from you. All the above threaten to mix tonight, and the director requests a high-energy warm-up session. That's great for the Act I leads who start the show onstage, but the rest of us barely sniff the stage for another hour. Sunday's show -- a dreaded matinée -- is much more likely to see us dragging.

My shirt has lost a button in the wash, but the costume commanders take care of it before the curtain goes up. One of Gooper's sons is chastised by his real mom to behave a certain way onstage, and the kid wrangler interrupts to say only the director gets to do that. My eyeliner pencil proves too soft to sharpen conveniently, and I notice Big Daddy has the perfect pencils for this, but I won't ask to use it. That's risking infections. So I'll have to say something I never thought I would: "Honey, can you buy me some eyeliner?"

Once the show starts, all seems well until the first offstage phone scene. There are three of them, one in each act, and since Thursday night, someone different has manned the button. The rings happen in different times and for different durations, and tonight, the Act I ring is super early and goes on for days. Big Mama heads toward the phone before her cue is spoken by another assistant. I don't understand why why the phone is given to people who can't be there for the entire run. I wonder what Gooper's phone cues would be like if I weren't standing right there to answer it. This is just one of the things we have to be ready to adapt to in front of everyone. Also, right at the end of Act II, as four guys and the stage-right manager start to sing "Pick a Bail of Cotton" onstage, the bar band across the street cranks up. We do not sing to the beat, but the doctors tries some pop-and-lock, I believe.

Speaking of which, the doctor botches his Act III lines as he gets distracted by, well, I'm not sure, but I think it's a cigar Big Daddy left onstage. The cigar is fake (we didn't smoke in the show, after all), and it sits in an ashtray in the very back of the set. Right as Mae, Gooper, and the doctor are to surround Mama about Daddy, the doc stays behind and fiddles with the cigar and misses his cue. I have my back to him. It's only later that I figure out what he's doing over there, but I wait for him to say his lines. And wait. And wait. Right as I'm about to pipe in, he starts up. But then he misses his second line, not ten seconds later. He's lost now. And Mae is covering for this until he finds his place and joins in the scene. After the show, the stage manager gives notes about the scene to the doctor and me, and the director talks to him about the moment. I didn't jump in quickly enough, I admit. That won't happen again.

A good crowd tonight. Tomorrow, we get the Blue Hairs and finish the week o'hell.

Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical
Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are
Day Twenty-Three: Socks
Day Twenty-Four: Our First Audience
Day Twenty-Five: Calamity
Day Twenty-Six: Opening Night

Day Twenty-Six: Opening Night

Opening night begins with a mixed bag of traditions. People give gifts of various investments: Mae hands out candy, Mama hands out roses, the doctor has cat magnets bearing the names of each member of the show, the director gives out cards thanking and congratulating us. I plan to give out my items next week. My previous theatre handed out fridge magnets of a show's poster image and bearing a memorable quote on the back. I wanna continue that, and I'm working on new artwork of the magnet. The new managing director offers us all a glass of sparkling cider to toast our work. We're given a copy of the program with our bios and photos. The director officially turns over the show to the cast and crew, saying his work is done. It's a little party, and then we approach curtain time and settle down to work. During warm-ups and prop check, we discover the crew repainted the floor, and it's now a deeper black.

It's a great crowd (they applaud the SET!), and the previous night's string of chaos has got me ready to knock this one out of the park. This is when I remind myself that I have gotten roles in every show I've auditioned for, including walking off the street to get roles with three theatre companies. Deep breath, straighten the tie, check the hair and makeup. Overture, hit the lights, this is it, tonight's the night. And oh what heights we'll hit, on with the show this is it. Can you believe there's at least two generations of kids who never heard the theme music to CBS' Saturday morning Warner Brothers cartoon show? Wait a minute. You're one of them.

I have to admit that I'm starting to count down the days of the week now. We have two performances left after tonight, and we all murmur just how ready we are to have a break. But we must zap up our energy when we're onstage. During the show we trade notes backstage on reactions. Gooper seems to get the biggest laugh of the show when he insults mama in Act III. Big Daddy's profanity shocks them into laughter. Brick gets some laughs. The wealth is spread out, it seems. During an Act I fight scene Brick, unfortunately, lands mouth first on the foot of the bed. It's near the end of the act, and he ices his mouth before Act II. The Act II fight scene between Daddy and Brick spreads ice cubes on the floor and word quickly moves backstage to be careful. This is such a good crowd that we anticipate going back on stage for them. They catch a lot, and we can be more subtle.

Act III goes great. We run right past one of the reverend's lines, and I screw up a word, but otherwise, the energy is solid, and it flies by. The cast moves over to a downtown Indian restaurant for a small party. I walk out to my car right before to discover someone has stolen my license plate. I file a police report over the phone and walk to the party and find seated Your Sis, Kathy, and Travis. I had no idea they were coming tonight. I just unknowingly performed in front of them. I make introductions and sample some alky-hall and curry chicken.

It's a great night, and I can celebrate the start of the end of the production with my girl and my pals. I don't even care about the license plate.

Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical
Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are
Day Twenty-Three: Socks
Day Twenty-Four: Our First Audience
Day Twenty-Five: Calamity

Day Twenty-Five: Calamity

It's the stage manager's birthday, and we present her with a cake and a giant signed card. Because Mae and the kids sing Happy Birthday to Big Daddy, she leads us in serenading the manger, followed by a round of "Skina-ma-rinka-dinka-dink," the second and diabetic song they sing. We do all this early in the evening so the cast can eat cake before donning the costumes.

Someone has unearthed photo albums of past shows, A Few Good Men, Christmas Belles, and Wizard of Oz, and they are perused by all. They are huge Easily 50 pictures each album. We're to take our show's pictures after this Sunday's performance, which strikes me as a rough assignment. This will take place after the ninth performance within a week. Normally they do this session during the second week's run, but it was moved here for some reason I never hear. I prefer it to be done during tech rehearsal. Taking pictures after a show means you have to reapply make-up and straighten the clothes you've slogged around in for three hours. Also, I am desperate to catch the Patriots-Colts game Sunday evening. We have already been assured that our set strike on the last night will not last long enough for us to miss the Super Bowl kickoff. I need to mention that the photo albums reveal a design that makes Hot Tin Roof look like a Broadway production. Our one set allowed the crew to go crazy with details and light design.

This is Preview Night, when local reviewers attend for their columns, and from what I've seen in those albums, the local reviewers are of the rah-rah variety. You might notice that daily papers, when they run reviews of shows, are positive to a fault. Literally. You can't trust them to provide anything but an glowing advertisement. The weekly papers are where you find objective articles. When I worked at the Spartanburg daily, I was told the paper's policy is to in no way discourage the people volunteering their time for the shows. Know you this: Most daily arts reviewers know nothing about art, and their comments are analogous to your Aunt Yvonne telling you your giant abstract painting of the horrors of war is "nice" and "certainly colorful." The audience is also made up of employees of theatre corporate sponsors. The companies get a free night of the show in return for their monies. I've yet to see such a show well-attended.

As the show starts, they are formal and quiet. Maybe the actors are a little flat. Last night's audience may have spoiled us. And this is the fourth night of doing this show. Maybe we're dragging a tad. That might explain how tonight became a series of calamity.

Mae and Brick sound good for Act I, but we're down one Gooper daughter, and another kid is pulling double duty. This never seems to be a problem. When the stage-left manager moves to activate the offstage phone, she accidentally body slams her metal stand, and it crashes to the floor. The actors onstage seem to drift right past it like pros.

The crowd warms up to Mae and the kids and really take to Big Daddy. He has them in complete control for the night. But in Act III, we seem to lose our focus. We've had constant problems with the stage-left door. It works fine, but it's created a distracting amount of choreography. Last night, the director asked me to close it when Gooper says "we can talk," and I practiced my lines all day by adding the direction "close to door" when I say that line. But as we move through the act, a weird moment emerges. Mama instructs Gooper and Mae to open the door to let in some air into this summer-swaddled Southern plantation. But the door is standing wide open. To their credit, they know this. Mae makes a comment about keeping the door closed so Big Daddy doesn't here. She closes it, and then Mama says to open it, and it's re-opened. The audience probably never notices. It may even look like Mama is unknowingly countering Mae and Gooper's plans. But to us, it feels like bomb defusing, and the moment lasts forever.

This takes us off-guard for the rest of the act, and we never hit a flow. Indeed, we can feel the audience pulling back from us. When Gooper is to say the line "Mae took a course in nursing during the war," I apparently have some sort of stroke and can't get the line out. It's embarrassing and seems to last as long as a parade. I finally spit it out, and we move on. Then Mae reverses an insult directed at Maggie. Then Big Daddy has trouble with his two-page-long elephant joke. Then, as we line up for curtain call backstage, a stranger walks up to the kids. It's the littlest girl's grandmother, and she has blithely strolled onto us before the show is over. The child wrangler and I, standing right there, shoo her away, and off she walks toward the back of the set -- a set with no back wall -- and we whisper-yell for her to come back before she walks onstage.

I feel stupid for my line trouble and joke about it after the curtain and while we change clothes. But I hear the stage manager yell for us to receive director notes, and the director is there with all of the Act III folks, and they, well, it feels like they pounce on me. The director has the same direction from last night, concerning the door, and makes a mantra out of "now we can talk, close the door" and leads the other actors in reciting it. I'm baffled. I did that. I stood up, said my line, and closed the door. Just as he told me. I'm at a loss, and it seems like attention is focused on my doing something as instructed but discounted, when the real problem was with the earlier door debacle and my screwed-up delivery of a later line. I feel like a scapegoat for the whole act, and the happy ribbing feels cruel. I'm tired, and I take it too seriously.

I go backstage and grab my things and start to leave. The crowd has dispersed, and I track down the director out front to confirm a suspicion. Williams repeats many lines. We joke about it. It's said that if we cut every repeated line, we could finish the show in an hour. And Gooper says the same line twice. He says "we can talk" two times, and I thought the director meant for me to close the door on the second time. No, he points out, and I apologize profusely, and now I feel like shit. We had a crappy Act III on preview night (yes, even though it's just the rah-rah reviewers), and we barely escaped the stage with our lives, and it's because I didn't close the door at the right time. A small, tiny thing. But I've worked very hard to be reliable to this new group, and it feels like that's all gone, that I have to start over from scratch. Sure, the reverend and doctor may have had line trouble, but not for a real audience. And I beat myself up for it on the drive back home. Fuck.

But Friday is the real opening night, and if we're to have a night of chaos, let it happen before people pay to see us. OK, that's my one (self-)allowed moment of incompetence. The rest of the run will be good and solid and dependable and in no way indicative that my brain fell out of my head. Fuck if I'll mess up in front of Harry Anderson.

Speaking of the doctor and reverend, here they is.


Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical
Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are
Day Twenty-Three: Socks
Day Twenty-Four: Our First Audience

Day Twenty-Four: Our First Audience

Even though this show makes 13 I've been in since high school, it's the first in almost two years. And even though I've got my lines and my blocking and I've even prepared lines in case the reverend and doctor blank on stage, I find myself getting nervous in the middle of the day. I start running lines before I leave work. I can't tell if it's eagerness or nerves, but I don't like these jitters, and I want to get the show started, despite opening tonight an hour earlier than we will for the rest of the run.

I could always quell the panic by telling myself that the audience has paid to enter our house and watch us. This makes the theatre a business and us indirectly professionals (I guess we are paid in free snacks backstage), so we have to behave like pros, know our stuff, go out there, and not suck. Responsibility clams me down instead of spooking me.

I already have turned back to my old theatre habits. When I arrive, I set my camera and books and sketchpad at my dressing room area. If the clothes have been laundered, I gather them or confirm they're back at my station. Then I check my props. Gooper has four props: a briefcase, a cake, car keys and a notepad. The pad resides in his suit jacket, the others can be found on a stage-left wing table, and I put the keys in my pocket. I then prowl the theatre, wandering everywhere and greeting the crew. I'm just killing time. We have to be at the theatre an hour before the curtain goes up, and I don't go onstage for an hour after that.

We do a quick set of warm-ups onstage, and after that I start assembling Gooper and talking to the cast as they arrive. Once I get the make-up and costume on (even those damn shoes of +3 Toe Pain), I pace about the green room, talking to folks, or sit at my station to read. I'm not the only person with a bout of energy. Big Daddy is concerned about hitting his notes, and the reverend and doctor go over their lines when they aren't reading at their stations. We assemble in the green room as the director tells us to make the show move and enjoy ourselves. The phrase "break a leg" flies around the room for a while. There's always uncertainty about how someone will behave in front of an audience, and we new people are one more thing for the theatre to worry about. Also, the balcony space is tighter tonight because of the a new column. Those of use who work on that balcony have to move so the entire audience can see us. Just another note to bear in mind when we go onstage.

The stage managers regularly come by with a countdown until we open the house (the audience is allowed past the lobby and into the auditorium) or raise the curtain. If you've seen the Muppet Show, you recognize this as what Scooter does at the start of each show ("Elton John. Mr. Elton John. Five minutes to curtain, Mr. Elton John."), and we, just like the week's celeb, respond with a confirming "thank you." When we're close to starting the show, the managers countdown to "places," and this is where the actors go if they are walk onstage as the play begins. They do this for every act, but once the play starts, the actors are responsible for getting to their places for their entrance or line cues. For those of us who read, backstage, we have a sense of time leading up to our next cues, and the backstage monitors let us hear the actors get nearer to them.

Before the show, we can hear the audience talking in their seats, and that gives us an idea of how many folks are there before we see them from the stage. When they become quiet, we know the lights have gone down and the curtain is opening. The overture tells us that too, but the audience is the new element tonight, and we focus on them. They laugh early as Maggie insults Mae and Gooper's kids. They laugh shortly, suggesting they don't want to miss the dialogue. The boys are wandering backstage, and one of them is the kind who starts a conversation with you even if you don't look up from your book or respond in anything but grunts. The kid's gifted, and gifted kids won't shut up.

I shout out my offstage lines and go over my Act II lines and finally get to walk out there. As the lines come out of me, I feel incrementally more calm and confident, and within five minutes, I'm almost arrogantly comfy. Once onstage, you can see the entire audience clearly. Its a trick to avoid eye contact as you stare at the fourth wall, and this role isn't one for connecting with audience members that way. There's maybe 40 people tonight.

I get a few laughs in Act III, especially with a line that Gooper means to be jovial and comforting but comes across as cruel, and when I get to Gooper's monologue, I feel the audience hanging with me. You can actually feel their focus and attention, and as they invest in you, you hit your notes right and give them more to digest, and a new entity is formed. They're as much a performer as you are, and they control how this moment will be played. This is why I do theatre. The doctor blanks on his first big line in Act III and looks to me to help him. I'm the next speaker, but my lines are dependent on his, and you know, I know how to save this moment and have lines ready to move ahead, but I'm gonna let him dangle a bit. This is still a glorified dress rehearsal, after all. Let him feel this, and maybe it won't happen again. Soon enough, he remembers the second half of his line, and gets it out, and we move on from there.

Show ends, curtain call, nice bit of applause for me as I bow, and as the curtain closes on our cast tableau, we all exhale. We started at 7 p.m., and I'm in my car, un-costumed and Noxema-ed, at 9:50. We're no longer a three-hour show. There it is. There's our show. Now we do that ten more times.

Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical
Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are
Day Twenty-Three: Socks

Picture of the Day
And here's me as Gooper. You can kinda see the eyeliner.

Day Twenty-Three: Socks

The costume and make-up managers (a tag team of older women) also do our laundry every day. If you want clothing washed , you just put it in a basket in each dressing room, and they take care of it before rehearsal. They've tagged some of the clothes as our own, and each person has a list of their costume pieces separated into those own by the theater and what we brought from home. When I arrive, I go to the laundry machines to get my socks and shirt. One of the ladies hands them to me, and I take them back to the dressing room and sit them down at my stations.

We each staked out our regular seats in there as soon as we started wearing costumes for rehearsals. If you start from the left side of the room, we're in this order: the two Gooper sons, the reverend, Brick, Big Daddy, me and the doctor. Because we're in such a confined space, we have to be extra polite. As Heinlein wrote, "moving parts in contact contact need lubrication," and while he was indeed a dirty old man, he also regarded courtesy as a social foundation. Courtesy is that lubricant. So we're polite. But as I start to dress and put on my make-up and put in my contacts, I return to my station to find the socks gone. They were laying on top of my t-shirt.

Now, I'm not a paranoid guy. I used to be. Used to scream "theft" whenever something went missing, and because those occasions usually ended with the object found under something or where I had forgotten it, I stopped the paranoia. And as the socks were gone, I bite my tongue and search the place. I go all through the dressing room, the stage, the backstage, the laundry room, the green room, the bathroom. Everywhere. I ask the crew if they had seen them and apologize to the costume ladies for losing theatre socks. It becomes a joke that Gooper can't keep his socks. And after a while I know, despite my hesitation to say so, that someone took them, and the first suspects were the Gooper kids. But the last thing a theatre needs is drama, so I decide to just wear my day socks and bring in another pair tomorrow. As I go back to the green room, one of the costume ladies asks if I had checked the feet of the other actors and I say I hadn't. She promptly did. And there they are on the preacher's feet.

He claims they are his and points out that these dark socks go with his black suit. As a dilettante artist, I have some notion of color. I know the difference between brown and black. Those are mine. He's convinced they're his. We talk to the costume lady from whom I got the socks earlier, and we all recite how the evening began regarding piecing our costumes together. I ask where he got them, and he says simply "off your t-shirt." I coulda screamed. This I expect from the kids, but not an adult whose been a regular actor. He obviously waited until I was gone to take them, and he didn't speak up when everyone knew I was looking for them. He took them off and handed them to me and I promptly put them on. Fuck athlete's foot.

This is a tiny thing. Tiny tiny tiny. But the reverend is not hitting home runs with me lately, and this doesn't help. We now have a precedent of backstage items walking away, and I hate that kind of atmosphere. I don't need that distraction on top of everything else.

Before the rehearsal, Mae leads us in warm-ups. We stretch a bit, and jump a bit and do basic theatre mouth exercises. "The black bug bled black blood." "She sells seashells by the sea shore." "Red leather, yellow leather." "Unique New York." And we open up the lungs and breathing muscles. Then we practice our curtain calls and go backstage. The eyeliner pencil is really handy as it draws easily. Usually one has to hold the pencil to a light bulb to melt the wax and get a good flow. But it doesn't wash off well. And last night I forgot to use the pencil on my eyebrows over the base make-up. Again, I don't know how much this makes a difference for the audience, but if Mae and Big Daddy and Big Mama are slapping it on, so shall I.

While I'm waiting for my cues, I read Tom Wolfe's The Right Stuff with one ear cocked to the stage. I can't read but a few pages at a time out of eagerness to get going, and I close the book and wander off and recite my lines. I try not to put any inflection on them because I want the night's performance to have the fresh delivery. While there are snacks backstage (despite warning of eating in costume), I constrain myself to bites of leftover candy canes. My coat pockets are full of them. Before I go onstage in Act III, Victoria says I'm developing a fan club, and I attribute this to two possibilities:

1. I look a lot different than I did for read-throughs, and
2. Gooper's a damn fun role to play. I think he gives the show a sympathetic burst of energy in contrast to Big Daddy's bluster and anger.

But I do feel good about where I am with the role and confident about getting our first audience Wednesday night. The director even tells me before I leave that I can slow down Gooper's big speech. Wait, I can milk the big monologue and own the stage a little longer? Don't have to tell me twice.

Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical
Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are

Picture of the Day
The dressing room. My stuff is right of center. The clothes rack is on the left. See the brown liquid on the right? That's what drips from the ceiling.

Day Twenty-Two: We're Ready When You Are

Holy shit, I'm tired. That tech rehearsal plum wore me out.

Monday, before I work a half day, I run out to buy the theatre goods. Good Lord, buying make-up has gotten tricky. wanna buy a brown eyeliner pencil. Forget it. They have Onyx, Sage, Olive, Espresso, and a variety of other colors but no Brown. I settle for Espresso and buy Buff Beige base. It's not too much darker than my skin tone, and I hope the backstage crew OKs my color choice. It takes a while to find a color that's not too red or white. The theatre will allegedly provide rouge and powder.

I arrive a little earlier than normal. The director is concerned about getting kids out of there before their bedtimes. The theater's shoes are killing my feet, and I try to sit as much as I can. Everyone is dragging after Sunday. We're warned not to bump into the set columns as they might topple. I also am reminded which way to run behind the gallery windows with the kids. The two daughters and I ran in different directions, and the oldest girl won't let me live down that she was right. I bring a belt and tie tack to complete my costume and make a note on the costume sheet of which items belong to me. We're two nights way from a friends and family audience. This is the last dress rehearsal before an official crowd made up of sponsor company employees. We're also to begin communal warm-up exercises Tuesday night. Mae will lead those. The green room is a madhouse with kids and adults and costumers. This is usually more distracting than any audience, you should know. Kids are playing board games, dancing, imitating the adult actors, etc.

I've before expressed my concern about the reverend and doctor getting their lines down, and they seem to be getting better. Still a little halting in delivery. But tonight, the reverend missed his cue to walk onstage. Act II begins with him and Gooper talking on the balcony. When the stage-right manager called "places," I told her the preacher wasn't there. I don't think that registered. The curtain opened, I walked out, and there was not a reverend to be found. I said my line to the empty seats, and the cast on the other side of the balcony wall stood silent, waiting for the reverend discussion. About 15 seconds later, I hear the hurried footsteps. He takes his place, I give him a comforting smile and repeat my line. And we were off.

The stage-right manager said later that when she watches Gooper, she doesn't see me, and I appreciate that. I'm feeling really good about my part and my acting right now. I'm past anxiety and am enjoying the work. This is when the "play" of the play procedure kicks in. Everything before was work. But now, we're dressing up, we're spitting out Williams' profanity, we're talking like Foghorn Leghorn. This is the goods. I even improved a dramatic door closure that the director liked. But, fuck, those shoes hurt.

I'm taking a book to rehearsal tomorrow night to kill the boredom and block out encouraging eye contact with the kids. I have plenty of time to get into character while backstage in Act II. I'm jazzed about this. I'm ready for an audience.

Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words
Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical

Day Twenty-One: Getting Technical

Tech Rehearsal is always exhausting and takes all day, but this one seemed to fly by. We're all in costume for the first time as a group, even the kids. They are appropriately adorable. I am not. Big Mama has to wear a ton of makeup to age her, and that brings me to the first surprise of the day. Almost everyone arrives with a make-up kit. Everyone but me. The last theatre I worked with didn't require make-up. I've used make-up before. I know what layers to buy. Because of the bright stage lights, skin washes out, so we have to paint ourselves like Roman whores. Once the audience sees us in that light at a distance, they can't notice the make-up. Hopefully. We don't wear any tonight, but we will need it for the next three rehearsals.

The stage looks fantastic. There wasn't much they could add to it, but the new touches -- paintings, wall patterns, columns, etc. -- make the set look like a real 1950s plantation bedroom. And the yellow-toned stage lights help too. It's a warm set. The immediate backstage area is now a maze of black curtains to baffle offstage noises and hide our movements. Dark lights illuminate the back of the set and the two stations for the people talking to the sound booth and helping with sound cues. Behind all that, however, we are beset by a leaky air system, and nasty brown water plops down throughout the green room. This ready room has a siting table and chairs, a full kitchen, a sofa, and access to both dressing rooms. It's a zoo there. Kids, parents, crew, cast. Above us wafts the stage sounds over the speaker system (the stage is microphoned, not us), and we know we will be here the majority of the time for this day. We arrive at 12:30, and I bet we won't leave before 9. Before we start, Mae, who works at another theatre, informs us that she spotted actor harry Anderson ("Night Court," "Dave's World") and invited him to opening night. I have his autograph when I wrote to him during the "Night Court" heyday, but I'm not going to worry about any star audience members. I gotta a show to hold together.

I didn't bring make-up but I did bring contact lenses, hair gel, shoe polish, t-shirts, and my first wedding ring. My current one doesn't fit the time period, and I have a ring I'm no longer wearing. I asked Your Sis and she had no problem with it and even chastised me a smidge for thinking it would be a problem. I also bring sweet potato pie for tonight's potluck dinner. We'll do the entire show twice, but the first run will be for sound and light cues. We'll stop to adjust volume and let the director pick from among some possible sounds for fireworks, thunder, and dogs.

We do the show once, and it requires an extra hour to fix the effects. The kids don't arrive until the beginning of Act III as the full day might drive them stir crazy. Then we eat, dress, and get to work on the show again.

I get dressed up, and one of Gooper's kids says "you look 20 years weirder." He can't elaborate, but it is a big change, with gelled hair, no glasses, shaven face, and fancy duds. I try later to help him gel his hair, but it's already gooped for a modern style, and all I can do is laminate it with hair gel. My shoes are very tight, and I think this might help Gooper appear unsettled onstage. Or it might distract me to the point where I deliver a line from a completely different show. That's the mystery of live theatre, folks. Even we don't know what we're gonna say. We have to determine when and who will close the bedroom door and how to navigate the backstage curtains to move behind the set. But if we're dealing with those small details, we're obviously getting closer to the end.

Previous entries:
Day One: Reading It Through
Day Two: Act Two
Day Three: Reading Act Two
Day Four: Talking It Through
Day Five: Blocking Act Two
Day Six: Act Two Redux
Day Seven: Reading Act Three
Day Eight: The Da Gooper Code
Day Nine: The Laying On of Hands
Day Ten: Pictures and Pages
Day Eleven: Onstage
Day Twelve: Memory
Day Thirteen: The Quickie
Day Fourteen: The Lines
Day Fifteen: Act III Anxiety
Day Sixteen: Let's Just Get It Right
Day Seventeen: Molding the Gooper
Day Eighteen: Goopercalypse
Day Nineteen: There Is Not A Doctor In The House
Day Twenty: Back to Words

Picture of the Day
Set's almost finished.