Well, dear readers, Sandy Bainum came through with flying colors in last night’s ‘Swonderful Ira Gershwin show. The growth since we began working together almost three years ago now has been absolutely astonishing to watch. I have been very tough during this process and I know it hasn’t always been fun, but in the end it was all in service of getting her to understand the joy and love and life a cabaret performer must have. And last night that all came together so beautifully – she just lit up the stage and had the audience in the palm of her hand, and the good news about that is that she only had a few people who really knew her, so this was mostly an audience of strangers. She finally took charge of the patter and really delivered, got lots of laughs, and was captivating. Her voice was in top shape and other than one unfortunate musical hiccup (not hers), which I have to say she covered amazingly well – I think other cabaret performers who’ve had decades more experience would have fallen completely apart, but she just did what she needed to do to get through it – it happened at the end of one song when Lanny inadvertently missed a key change – the band and Sandy did it, naturally, but they all somehow managed to get back with him and I really don’t think many noticed. That stuff happens, but I was really proud of her for not getting freaked out about it. She got a standing ovation and not one of those “we must stand because everyone does” things – they just wanted to stand and stand they did. I think she really heard that because she was in control and delivering, how difference the audience reaction was last night. That’s the hardest thing for people new to cabaret – to really understand the nature of patter and how it has to be delivered. I won’t go into my theories on that because, you know, I get paid for that sort of thing. In any case, it was a wonderful evening of music and laughter and Sandy should be very proud of herself – I know I am.
We ended up with about seventy people because, as always, fifteen people didn’t show up. We all hung out after the show. Sami and her mom were there, as were Richard Sherman and his ever-lovin’ Elizabeth. They’ll be back for the July Kritzerland show – celebrating their anniversary with us, which I love. Four of our LACC Abner kids were there, and a few of Sandy’s 42nd Street cast mates were there. She’ll be doing the Simply show in New York in a few weeks, and I’ll let everyone know about that because our dear readers will get in for free.
Prior to that, I’d gotten just about eight hours of blessed sleep, then I was lazy and played on the computer, did a little writing, and then I moseyed on over to The Federal for sound check. For dinner I shared the artichoke with Sami, and then I had a chicken breast and a small portion of mashed potatoes – a pretty light meal. When I got home I caught up with e-mails, reviewed a letter that LACC will be getting from my attorney, which we’ll finesse this morning and send. It’s the last letter they’ll get and if he doesn’t have a response within a few days, then we’ll decide whether to move forward with a lawsuit. Given what we feel are major improprieties and irregularities in what they’ve done, we’ve given them the easiest way to get out of this with no fuss, but apparently they would rather do it the hard way and if that’s the way they want to play then that’s the way we’ll play.
Today, I may go visit a postproduction house to hear the 5.1 mix for Holiday in Spain. My pal is preparing a Blu-ray release of it – as some of you know, Holiday in Spain was a faux Cinerama release – when Scent of Mystery in Smell-O-Vision was one of the biggest flops in movie history, Michael Todd, Jr. had to do something to cut his losses and he sold the film to Cinerama. They took the ToddAO 65mm element and extracted three panels from it for Cinerama showings, cut the film by over twenty-five minutes, added narration to cover the gaps in the plot, moved the intermission and, of course, removed the smells. Holiday in Spain didn’t really do any better than Scent of Mystery and it didn’t play that many dates – it never played Los Angeles as far as I know. I’ve seen the first pass of the transfer and it looks very nice. There are a couple of the missing scenes and I’m hoping that in the extras the original intermission will be recreated – it was one of the best into intermissions ever. I’ll be doing a commentary track, if all goes according to Hoyle, and I’ll also lend my memorabilia for the extras. Other than that, the helper will be preparing invoices for It’s a Wonderful Life – she’s leaving town for fifteen long damn days on Wednesday, but she has a friend trained to do the actual shipping and she’ll have everything laid out and prepared and all the packages will have their address labels on them so all her friend has to do is put the CDs inside. And she’ll also ship all the dealer orders, too. I’ll eat something light at some point and hopefully I’ll pick up some packages.
Tomorrow, I have a short work session for the Kritzerland show, then I have to write and do other stuff. There are several projects whose masters are close to being finished and I have to review all that stuff. The rest of the week is meetings and meals and seeing a couple of shows, I think.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, maybe hear a sound mix, eat, prepare invoices and write. Today’s topic of discussion: What are your favorite ten-dollar words – you know, those out of the ordinary words that you like to use or that tickle you. Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy that Sandy’s show was received so ‘Swarmly and ‘Swonderfully.