I can’t believe it’s all coming to an end. Have I really been here for 8 weeks? My body knows I’ve been here for that long, but my mind thinks it’s been shorter. My life for the past 8 weeks has been strictly theater. It’s going to be really weird going back to normal life. I’m used to living my life around call times. This schedule was really hard to begin with, but now running three musicals simultaneously is like breathing in and out. It comes naturally.
That brings me to my first question from someone reading my blog! I was really doing this blog just for my parents and a few friends to keep them updated on what I’m doing, but it’s kind of cool that other people are reading it as well. So, the question is, “which [of the shows] is the most complicated, in your opinion??” Well, we have now done White Christmas 14 times, Mulan 7 times, and Secret Garden 8 times. That doesn’t count all the tech rehearsals and dress rehearsals. When you do a show that many times, everything you do becomes almost like a reflex. I would say that none of the shows are complicated, but if we weren’t as organized as we are, than things would get complicated. If I thought back to the tech weeks for each show, I would say that Secret Garden is the most complicated. There is a lot of scenery that rolls on and off stage so that means all that scenery has spike marks on the stage and some of the scenery comes on multiple times for different scenes and goes in different places and since we are running three shows at the same time, there are a LOT of spike marks on stage. We started out with the spike marks for White Christmas. Each scene shift in White Christmas has a different color spike tape. Then we moved on to Mulan where we only have three pieces of scenery that come on and off so Mulan spike tape is all one color that isn’t the same color as any of the spike tape for White Christmas. So by the time we got to Secret Garden, we had to spike everything with two colors to identify the show. So the different scenes in Secret Garden have different colors of spike tape, but all the spikes for Secret Garden have a green spike with whatever color the shift is. Then we had the problem with people not being able to find their spike tape in blackouts, so we started putting glow tape on the spike marks. Well, in a blackout, a stage covered in spike marks all marked with glow tape just looks like a lot of little pieces of glow tape. So then came the sharpies. Actors started putting their names or the names of the furniture on the spike tape and making designs on the glow tape to differentiate it from the other glow tape. This was very complicated originally, but we have done it so many times now that everyone knows what spike mark they are headed towards. The other complicated part of Secret Garden is storing all the scenery backstage, but I have that down to an art now. There is a 5 minute period where I do about 5 shifts all backstage while only 2 shifts have happened onstage. The one thing I fly in during Secret Garden, I have to fly it out while standing with my back up against a wall so the actors can get a small train past me. There are only two pieces of scenery on my side of the stage that can fit out the backdoor after they come off stage. The scene shop door is blocked during the show because that is where the orchestra is. So, to answer your question, Secret Garden is the most complicated of the three, but we have done it enough times now that it’s a walk in the park now! That was a very long answer to a pretty simple question. Sorry.
Alrighty, so this week was Secret Garden, Mulan, White Christmas, Secret Garden, White Christmas, Mulan, Secret Garden, and White Christmas! We had changeovers after every show this week. We had a few mishaps and things break this week, but it’s been a fun week. First off, the entire company is playing Secret Santa. That started on Wednesday. They apparently do it every year, but it just so happens we are doing White Christmas this summer which makes it even more appropriate. I got my first gift from my secret santa on Saturday before Mulan. They left me a clue at my station backstage and it took me into the scene shop where we store the snow for White Christmas. They got me Glow Explosion! It’s the markers that you color with and then they glow in the dark! It’s awesome! I put on my form that I like things that light up. They also got me heat wraps, but I’ll explain why that was really funny a little later in this blog entry. Today my secret santa put the clue at my station during intermission. They are very sneaky! Today’s clue led me to one of the desks used in White Christmas that had already been struck to the shop. They gave me M&Ms and this princess globe thing that lights up and spins like something you can get at a circus! It’s awesome!!! I am such a kid at heart! :) My Secret Santa has given me puzzle pieces with each gift that when put together will be my clue to find my last gift. I’ve been getting stuff for my person as well, but I can’t talk about that because it’s a secret! The big reveal of Secret Santas is Wednesday night! I have no idea who my secret santa is. I guess I’ll find out Wednesday! Doing Secret Santa has gotten everyone’s energy up a little bit. It’s fun to be doing our normal job and then find gifts from our secret santa! It’s Christmas in July!
So, I have encountered some more bats in the cove this week. None of the guys believe me. I try not to look around too much when I am in the cove. I have to do my job so I would rather pretend that there aren’t bats up there.
I finally got to go to the pool at the YMCA on Friday! It was sooooo nice to swim and then lay out in the sun! I felt rejuvenated! And I was wearing 100spf sunscreen so I did not get burned! Friday was the same day that we had a work call to clean up the shop and the warehouse to get ready for strike so it was the perfect day for the pool! Friday night however, was not very fun. I apparently did something to my back at some point during the day on Friday and I did not notice it until Friday night when I started having back spasms minutes after the show started. I felt a tiny pinch in my lower back before the show started, but I’m used to having back pain when I’ve been on my feet for a long time. We were doing White Christmas Friday night. I got through my first shift and when I walked over to stage right to get ready to fly in a piece of scenery, the pain became more than I could handle almost imedietly. I was sitting on the fly rail and all I could do was look over to the ASM and mouth the words that I was in pain and she could tell by my face that it was very bad. I was almost to the point of tears. There was not a single position that made the pain go away even the tiniest bit. I had to just stand there and endure it. I think I scared some of the actors around me. I did that shift and then they called in the Technical Director to do the rest of my shifts like moving the huge train off stage and my preset during intermission for the second act. The pain was just constant throughout the show so I’m not sure if it slowly got better or if my pain tolerance just grew. By intermission I was able to walk, I just had a major limp which made things a little more challenging. In the second act, all I really do it sit on the train and push buttons on the pacman to fly scenery in and out so I was able to do that. I had to put most of my wait on my left arm when I was sitting on the train though. The pain finally got to the point where I could bring my legs up to my chest and be a little more comfortable. By the time the show ended, it wasn’t spasming anymore, but it was still pretty painful. Technically I was released from changeover along with one of the actors who had a migraine, but I’m really stubborn and even though I would have loved to go back to the apartment and lay down, I didn’t want to get out of work. I wasn’t able to do a whole lot because I couldn’t really bend over or pick things up, but I didn’t have as much of a limp as I had at intermission. I made it all the way through intermission and then I went home and took a warm bath which was the first relief from the pain! Then one of my roommates gave me her heat pad that I slept on. By Saturday morning my back was feeling much better. It was still pretty sore, but it was nowhere near the pain from the night before. Then when I came into work, I got the heat pads from my secret santa and that helped a lot! So my only clue about who my secret santa is that they knew I had injured my back, but pretty much anyone who was backstage Friday night knew that. My back is 100 times better today! We did White Christmas again today and our Artistic Director still didn’t let me do the big shifts because she doesn’t want me to hurt myself again. I’ll be back to all my normal jobs by Tuesday! I am not going to let a stupid back spasm get the best of me!
Mulan on Saturday was very interesting. The show is only 90 minutes long so anything that happens that is not supposed to happen is the big talk of the day. One of our costume changes got messed up. We got the costume changed in time, but the wig was stuck to the head form with a pin so we couldn’t get it off. By the time we just grabbed the wig for her next costume change to replace the one we couldn’t get off, she had already missed her entrance. It was unfortunate, but it happens. The thing about that one song is that there are three girls who have three super fast costume changes all on the same side of the stage in the same song. There are also about three guys who have two quick changes on the same side of the stage during the same song. Then there are 4 of us who are crew helping with the costume changes. There is also scenery coming off stage at the same time. It is choreographed to the point where we haven’t had any problems with it since the first dress rehearsal, but one little thing like a pin stuck in a wig messes up the whole thing. There was also sound cues missed because the cues are taken from the actor who missed her entrance because of the costume change. But we moved on and finished the rest of the song without anymore problems. Later in the show however, I have Mushu come up to me frantically telling me that his fire didn’t get preset backstage so I jump off headset to run to the prop table. As I am running to find the props master, Mushu then finds the pyrotechnics so I relax a little. They had just been pushed behind something else on the prop table. So I am now walking behind Mushu headed backstage and we have to stop as the actors are coming off stage with there puppets and all I see is this huge flash of light on the other side of Mushu because as he was putting the pyrotechnics on his hand, one of them went off. I had only a couple of seconds to make sure everyone was okay and that none of the puppets were on fire, then in the next second I remember Mushu saying that he was only going to have the pyro for one hand and then in the next second the props master runs through the side door and before I can say anything to him, he plainly says, “I know” and starts running towards the flammables cabinet to replace the pyro that mis-fired. Later, I decided that he had to have teleported because he was in the audience when he saw the flash come from backstage and it was literally 4 seconds later that he was backstage. Amazingly, after all of that, the pyro was the best on stage that it had ever been. That little incident got everyone’s blood pumping though! Whew! It’s got me exhausted just retelling what happened! I feel like there was other things I wanted to mention, but they don’t really compare to that story. Oh, one thing is that Secret Garden Saturday night was apparently our best performance yet! I just always feel good when that show ends. It’s kind of depressing in a lot of places, but it leaves you feeling good!
I went back to Crosspointe Church today. I’m not sure if I will make it back next week. It depends on if I need to pack or not. We will see. Today’s show of White Christmas went pretty smoothly. Nothing big or crazy. A gel frame got knocked out by the mid stage traveler and was laying on stage all during “Count Your Blessings,” but according to the people on headset in front of house, it just blended in with all the spike marks. :)
The plan for tomorrow’s day off is to go to the mall, work out at the Y, and then go swimming! Should be a good day. Right now we are experiencing a pretty intense lightning storm so hopefully the weather clears up. We are having a company Cabaret on Wednesday of this week so that is something to look forward to. I am not under any circumstances singing in front of a bunch of musical theater majors, but I look forward to seeing everyone else sing. Also, my friends Erin and Mason from school are coming to visit this weekend. They will be ushering Secret Garden Friday night and then will be leaving Saturday afternoon. My parents are also coming this weekend to see all three shows. And then I am leaving Valdosta next Monday. It’s very bittersweet.
This time next week, all shows will be over.
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