Well, dear readers, here we are on a Sunday, and the boxes are getting fewer, I’m happy to say. I haven’t made a dent in the CD boxes yet, but then again, why would you want to make a dent in a box? The book signing/reading was okay, not many people, because the book store did not promote the event at all. For the third performance in a row we had a quiet audience at last night’s show – I’m done with these Jewish holidays, frankly. It’s the strangest phenomenon – they sit there with big smiles plastered on their faces yet no sound coming out of their mouths – even Susanne’s sure-fire A Little Lift didn’t get much last night. And yet – and this is the strange part – at the end of the show they cheer and yell and about half the audience gave a standing ovation. It’s baffling. I was sent a post from a private cast recording newsgroup – someone who saw the show at last Sunday’s matinee – not a big house and the cast was coming off two incredible shows and it was the show where one cast member was incredibly not good, but this “critic”, doing his best to sound like John Simon (right down to criticizing the actor’s looks), basically hated everything and everyone in the show. He said I should leave the songwriting to the professionals – funny, I get these lovely ASCAP checks four times a year that would imply that I am a professional, but what do I know. He said I should stick to producing CDs and leave directing to others. He accused me of “stealing” the Fiddler on the Roof/A Chorus Line parody from Forbidden Broadway. Funny, I’ve seen five or six incarnations of that show and I’ve never seen or heard of it. Funny, I’ve got a cast member who’s been doing Forbidden Broadway for years and I just somehow think she would have pointed it out to me. Funny, I’ve had many audience members who’ve seen Forbidden Broadway and none of them have pointed it out to me. Funny, I wrote the Fiddler parody in 1997, all by my lonesome, and it’s been available to look at on the Internet all those years. Funny, no one has ever said it was stolen from Forbidden Broadway. Happily, someone who’d seen the show on a wonderful Friday night came to our defense (even though he had some problems with some of the material) and told everyone he loved the show and recommended it to everyone. The “critic” hated the choreography and basically accused me of doing it – the “critic” then called us a second rate Musical of Musicals, even though that show was not a gleam in the eye of its creators when my What Ifs were written. And, furthermore, when our show was announced, I believe it was this very same “critic” who accused us of ripping off Musical of Musicals’ concept. We pointed out to him then that if anyone was ripping off it wasn’t us, since our stuff had been around for the last seven years. This “critic” considers Musical of Musicals “genius”. I’m thrilled he loves it. But I just find it amusing he feels the need to trumpet his “opinions” on a group devoted to cast recordings. These people just slay me sometimes. They are, of course, welcome to their opinions and welcome to not like it – what they are not welcome to do is criticize people for their looks and basically say that professional people aren’t professional. But, you know what – I just sit in the back of the theater and listen to the audiences love the show and none of that kind of obvious bile means squat to me. Oh, and the new number worked really well last night – the audience, quiet as they were, really liked it a lot and the performer in question got a really nice applause. He finally did what I’ve been asking him to do – he relaxed and let the song do the work and he didn’t assault the audience. So, in it will stay.
Well, why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because it’s late and I need my beauty sleep.
After the show, Tammy, her dad, her grandmother and I went to Musso and Frank and had a yummilicious meal. Today I shall be unboxing CDs, hopefully making a dent, trying to relax a bit, and then seeing the matinee. Then I’ll have a few days all to myself, and then we begin our final week of shows. After that, we know not what will happen – we’re attempting to get financing to return to the Hudson in November, but that may be a bit too quick for it all to happen. We shall see.
Don’t forget, tomorrow is our Unseemly Live Chat at six o’clock Pacific Mean Daylight Savings Time. Be there or be round. And Donald should have a new radio show up this afternoon.
Now wait just a darned minute. I do believe we’ve got us a birthday to celebrate around these here parts. Well, let us put on our pointy party hats and our colored tights and pantaloons, let us break out the cheese slices and ham chunks, let us dance the Hora or the Lindy, for today is the birthday of our very own elmore. So, let’s give a big haineshisway.com birthday cheer to Larry Moore, shall we? On the count of three: One, two, three – HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHEER TO LARRY MOORE, SHALLWE!!!
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must unbox, I must see our matinee, and then I must come home and watch a DVD at long last. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s free-for-all day, the day in which you dear readers get to choose the topics and we all get to post about them. So, let’s have loads of lovely topics and loads of lovely postings as well.