Well, dear readers, once again the night before a stumble-through yielded almost no sleep. Maybe I did sleep here and there, but certainly not more than thirty minutes the entire night. It was very irritating but I tried to just be still and at least rest, which I guess I did. But by the time I finally got out of bed at eight-thirty I was thoroughly trashed. I felt like I had bricks under my eyes and my voice was extremely hoarse, which always happens when I don’t get enough sleep. I did a three-mile jog, which was the first jog in a week. It felt good and when I got home I did forty-five sit-ups. Then I went and had two poached eggs on an English muffin, just to tide me over until dinner. After that I did some banking, picked up no packages and then came home. I decided to sit on my couch like so much fish, figuring if I watched a motion picture that I would nod off, which frequently happens when I’m overtired – but no such luck, since I was watching Jumbo and was too entertained at that point in the film to nod off. After that, I prepped our new release announcement. Then it was time for our stumble-through.
The cast arrived at three, as did Mr. Richard Sherman. I was happy to see Jane Noseworthy looking and feeling a bit better than the previous evening, and I must say that you’d never have known she was sick, her singing was so beautiful. Jenna Lea Rosen kicked off the stumble-through with Ten Feet Off the Ground and it was a great way to start. Everything went pretty smoothly with only a few lyric fumbles along the way. As I always say, the stumble-through day is almost my favorite part of the process, as the cast is together for the first time and just so filled with support and warmth – it’s really wonderful to watch. And Mr. Sherman was visibly moved several times. One thing he was absolutely thrilled with was the put-together of Chim Chim Cheree and A Man Has Dreams – the latter is just about his favorite of all the brothers wrote. I still can’t tell you about the eight-year-old, but I can tell you she is amazing and everyone loved her as I knew they would. I actually had very few notes this time around – just one tempo thing and one intro that got weirdly misplayed. Happily, the show order and structure seemed to work really well.
Then it was time for Jenna’s Birthday Dinner at The Smoke House. Jenna’s step-dad was there as was her mum and her grandfolks. Also in attendance, me, Sami and Sami’s grandma. It was quite a fun dinner – many people ordered the prime rib, in fact that was the most ordered thing. I had a little cup of clam chowder, an artichoke, and a pulled pork sandwich, all yummilicious. Sami was adventurous and had the salmon stuffed with crab, which she absolutely loved. The wait staff sang Happy Birthday to Jenna and gave her a little cheesecake thing. I’m kind of blessed to work with the incredibly talented youngsters I work with, and I’m especially grateful that they have such good parenting. Not all performer kids do, but I lucked out. After dinner, I came home and sat on my couch like so much fish.
Last night, I finished watching a motion picture on Blu and Ray entitled Billy Rose’s Jumbo, starring Miss Doris Day, Mr. Stephen Boyd, Miss Martha Raye, and Mr. Jimmy Durante along with an awful lot of really good circus acts. For whatever reasons, I didn’t see Jumbo when it was originally released – I can’t imagine why, really. So, the first time I really saw it all the way through was when the DVD was issued. I enjoyed but didn’t love it back then. But the Blu-ray is really pleasing, with a great image and really good stereo sound, and so, for its first half at least, I really had a great time with it. It was the last of what you’d call the real MGM musicals – I don’t believe there was another until Goodbye, Mr. Chips, and that was nothing like a real MGM musical in terms of its look and feel. But Jumbo was directed by MGM veteran Charles Walters and it just feels like MGM all the way, from the look to the sound and especially to the incredible orchestrations of Conrad Salinger. Unfortunately, despite really entertaining numbers, the script by Sidney Sheldon is pretty pedestrian and that is the film’s biggest problem, especially in its second half. But those Rodgers and Hart songs are incredible, including Over and Over Again, My Romance, This Can’t Be Love and The Most Beautiful Girl in the World, and Miss Day has never sung more beautifully than in Little Girl Blue. Martha Raye and Jimmy Durante make a good comic couple, and Durante gets the film’s biggest laugh, just as he did at the Hippodrome when he starred in the show in 1935. Trying to escape with the elephant Jumbo, he walks quickly with the elephant behind him only to be greeted by the law, one of whom says, “Where you going with that elephant?” to which Durante replies, “What elephant?”
The best number is Over and Over Again, staged with all kinds of wonderful circus acts going on. And I have to say, it’s the best use of doubling I’ve ever seen – you virtually cannot tell it’s not Day and Boyd doing their circus work, thanks to really clever angles and doubles who are perfect matches. But the presentation’s the thing, and I doubt anyone will be disappointed – the colors are bold, the contrast is great and it’s just always a pleasure to see a big, old-fashioned MGM musical, even if it was the true end of an era with Jumbo, which did not fare well at the box office. It was also Miss Day’s final screen musical.
I did doze off once whilst watching, for about twenty minutes, so I went back and re-watched those minutes. After that, I just relaxed and played on the computer and then began these here notes early.
Today, I shall hopefully arise after at least eight hours of sleep, which I desperately need. Please send the most excellent vibes and xylophones that my voice holds out for both shows. Then I’ll hopefully have time for a jog, then I’ll have to leave right away to be at The Federal for sound check at twelve-thirty. Then we do our early performance at three, and then our evening show at seven. And then I’m sure a few of us will go get a little something to eat.
Tomorrow I have to be up at six to announce our new CD, then I’ll try to get some more sleep before Sandy and Lanny come for rehearsal. After rehearsal we’ll go eat, then we have our evening rehearsal for the show. And that’s the rest of the week – morning rehearsals for Sandy and evening rehearsals for the show, with a video shoot on Tuesday for Sandy.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, do a jog, have sound check, do a matinee performance, do an evening performance and then eat. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s free-for-all day, the day in which you dear readers get to make with the topics and we all get to post about them. So, let’s have loads of lovely topics and loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, with only one thing to say: What elephant?