Well, dear readers, it was the kind of a day and evening that was nothing short of heavenly. Yes, you heard it here, dear readers, it was the kind of a day and evening that was nothing short of heavenly and I don’t care who knows it. As always with life, there are times that are, well, challenging, and having a day and evening like that just makes you want to kick the challenging crap in the butt cheeks and send it flying.
The day began with the book signing at the paperback book show, which took place at the Glendale Civic Auditorium in Glendale. I got there about fifteen minutes early, so I went and perused the room, which was fun. Then I sat next to a fellow author, Mel Gilden, who’s written quite a few TV shows and about forty books. Very nice fellow to sit next to and we had fun. The heavier guns were down the line from us – William Nolan and George Clayton Johnson. I sold a book or two and talked to some nice folks. I left as soon as our hour was up. Then I headed over to the theater, stopping first at a local CVS to get some stuff.
Our matinee was just about sold out and what an audience it was. Our very own Kay Cole and her ever-lovin’ Michael Lamont sat with me. Kim Huber and Heather Hoppus-Werner (mother of Jenna Lea Rosen) were there, too. And I knew quite a few others. And our ladies were ON FIRE. The laughs were huge, the applause was huge, and our two act two showstoppers really did literally stop the show – I thought the roof was going to come off the theater. One is a solo song for the character played by Adrienne Visnic – she got a huge ovation at every single performance – but yesterday it probably could be heard two miles away. I’ve never actually heard anything quite like it in a small theater. This girl is going places and I will champion her until the cows come home. The second showstopper is Dana Meller’s The Passing of a Friend, kind of a gospel homage to the end of her marriage certificate. It always stops the show and I will say that the staging when the rest of the cast joins it is very clever and very exciting and again it literally stopped the show with a HUGE ovation that just went on and on and on. There was an instant standing ovation that didn’t feel fake to me, and we just could not have gone out on a higher note. I am very proud of the entire production. I think the authors, Doug Haverty and Adryran Russ, were pretty happy with it, and I know I achieved every single thing I wanted to achieve. I so love directing and I so don’t do it very often for shows where I’m not the writer – but doing Li’l Abner last year and now this one, I’m ready to do more. And then there was the cast. We held not ONE audition for this show. We just lucked out and got the right people, and casting, as you know, is just about everything. My job is so much easier with a great cast because I just delight in watching them do their stuff, editing and guiding and maybe suggesting a thing or two, but we all find our way together and out of that comes wonderful work. I was especially proud of the staging – it’s hard when so much of the show is six women sitting in chairs, but I kept the pace fast (I was maniacal about it) and when we did get people up and moving around, it looked really good. I was helped immeasurably by the actress who helped me with the musical numbers, Leslie Stevens. She was also superb in the show – she struggled a bit with some of the singing and I simply did not care because she is a hugely gifted actor and her performance was so raw and so touching to me, I just would not have had it any other way. Adrienne and Dana are both comic treasures and two unbelievably creative actor/singers. Cynthia Ferrer, the first actress I went to, was real, warm, funny and just terrific as group leader Grace. Stephanie Fredricks found just the right stuff for her character and did a great job. And Sandy Bainum was the best I’ve ever seen her. A tough role that could be very one-note, we worked really, really hard to find the humanity in her character, so that she didn’t just come off as a relentless bitch. It took a while, but I could not have been happier with her performance. And I would be remiss in not mentioning our three wonderful understudies, all of whom got to play the show. Jill Marie Burke who covered Leslie Stevens, Brittney Bertier who covered Adrienne Visnic, and Amy Gillette, who covered Sandy. I will miss these ladies and this show. I had no idea I would miss the show, but I clearly will.
Originally, we were going to use tracks in the show, but at some point, we just all knew that it was going to suck to do that – too limiting, no room for any freedom or interpretation when you’re completely locked to pre-existing tracks. It was a red-letter day when Alby Potts came into our lives and I will be working with him a LOT. He just came in, did it, and we suddenly had real music – and then we added a drummer and that really helped, too. Behind the scenes folks were equally great – Rei Yamamoto was our set designer, and he just “got” what I originally wanted instantly and gave it to me, and it was just so simple and so effective and so beautiful in its colors, I could not have been happier. Natalie Shahinyan had done Abner for me, and she did a fantastic job with almost no money – you instantly knew who every character was by what they were wearing. It also captured the period perfectly (1988), and there were a lot of quick changes all of which worked perfectly. I cannot say enough about Maarten Cornelis’s lighting – bringing such depth and dimension to the piece – I haven’t had lighting like that in a show in heaven knows how long. And we had our Abner stage manager, Victoria Chediak to keep everything all together. And Josh Benton, our sound guy from The Federal, came and was so helpful in picking three great mics that just gave that little bit of oomph we needed. Every single person who talked to me after the show mentioned how great it was to hear real voices coming from the stage – and boy do I concur. Every tiny little pit hole theater mics everyone with those hideous head mic things – why? It’s just silly. There’s just nothing like the real human voice of a singer. Finally, we only had a handful of props, and our prop gal, Maggie Marx got them perfectly.
Our front of house staff was one person, Doug’s wife Dorathy and she was amazing. In any case, maybe we’ll get to do it again sometime. Certainly it proved that there’s life left in this show.
After the show finished, I went directly to The Federal for our sound check. That went very quickly and the band sounded great. We got everything set up for the show and then people began arriving. I think we had around sixty people there. The great thing about The Federal is they really know how to set the room up for any number of audience members so that it looks full. The entire Inside Out cast was there except for Leslie Stevens, who had a gig elsewhere. Even our two of our three understudies were there. Cousins Dee Dee and Alan were there, along with Dee Dee’s mom, Paula, Andrea Marcovicci was there, Dan and Kendra Miller (parents to Hadley Miller) and Karen Staitman were there (Sami is in tech for A Chorus Line), and I’m zoning on who all else.
The show was really fun. Sandy was in good form, sang the songs beautifully and looked gorgeous. There were only a tiny handful of lyric mishaps, and there certainly were some tempo issues with the band, but overall it was just such a great evening. This was our first time doing it, and I saw some things I’ll change before we do it again – it felt one song too long, and it’s a really easy thing to cut one number and I already know what that would be. And I felt the patter was occasionally problematic, so I want to look at that – most of it’s fine, but we need to hone it and really work on it so that it’s smooth and effortless. But those are very minor nits to pick and I was very proud of Sandy and our band sounded great. I must say, however, that it was a completely weird feeling to sit there listening to all my songs with patter that is mostly about me. It was like being in another dimension, frankly, like an out of body experience, and rather like an eighty-minute time travel trip through one’s entire life or life from fifteen years old on.
For dinner, they were very sweet and made me some carbonara. It was a very healthy portion, but the helper, who was there helping, ate a bunch of it, as did several others, so I really only had about half, which was just perfect. On the way home, I thought I deserved a treat, so I stopped and got two donuts, which I gleefully ate as soon as I got home. And that was my extraordinary day and evening.
Today, I’ll be up by ten, then a local CD dealer is coming by, then I’m going directly to Grant’s to enter the thirty-two corrections, which should only take about twenty to thirty minutes. Then I’ll hopefully pick up some packages, maybe do some banking, then come home and start writing the commentary for the Kritzerland show. I’m also supposed to hear if the piano will get done today or if it has to wait until tomorrow – I really hope it’s today. Then at seven I’m meeting someone for dinner at The Smoke House, where I will be a VERY good boy, because for the next two weeks I am really, REALLY on a diet – jogging will resume and I will damn well lose twenty pounds, however long that may take.
The rest of the week is meetings and meals and stuff and doing and going and seeing a few things, working on ALS stuff (we’re only four weeks away), and writing another song or two.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, enter fixes, hopefully pick up packages, write, bank and sup. Today’s topic of discussion: What is the longest and loudest ovation you’ve ever heard in a theater? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, grateful for a day and evening that was nothing short of heaven.