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March 4, 2015:

WHEN THINGS GO SWIMMINGLY

Bruce Kimmel Photograph bk's notes

Well, dear readers, our first Kritzerland rehearsal went swimmingly even though none of us were actually in the pool.  I must say, everyone was completely prepared and a couple of folks were even off book already, which I always appreciate.  First to arrive was Valerie Perri.  We ran her three songs – As If We Never Said Goodbye, I Don’t Know How to Love Him and Memory, all of which she does superbly.  Then came Adrienne Visnic, who is one of our Inside Out gals.  She did her three songs – Invocation and Instructions to the Audience, Getting Married Today and Tell Me On a Sunday, all of them perfect for her.  After Adrienne it was Kimberly Hessler.  She sang through Half a Moment, What More Do I Need and my put-together of With So Little to Be Sure Of and Who Could Be Blue.  She sounds beautiful on all three.

Then it was time for our two fellows.  First was Kevin Earley, he of the absolutely amazing voice.  He began with Make the Most Of Your Music, then did his other solo, Music Of the Night.  Then Stan Chandler arrived (he was one of the original Plaids) and Kevin and Stan ran Agony.  Then Stan did his two solos, Love Changes Everything and The Road You Didn’t Take.  That was it for the first rehearsal.  Our two guest stars join us on Thursday – Bruce Vilanch and Sue Raney.  Bruce is doing Losing My Mind and Sue is doing Send in the Clowns.  Lloyd Cooper did a great job accompanying all.

Prior to the rehearsal, I’d gotten almost eight hours of sleep, then I tried to be a problem solver for a show choir that’s having some trouble with clearing the song they’re doing – hopefully it will all work out for them.  Then Sandy came over and we went and met with a radio promotion person, who will be working her Simply album.  He does all stations that play standards, so is not really the person for the new album.  We’ll try to find that person.  After that, I went and had some chicken tenders (unusually small) and a bagel, then picked up a couple of packages.  After rehearsal it was answering scads of e-mails, mostly about the benefit.  Then I sat on my couch like so much fish.

Last night, I watched a motion picture on Blu and Ray entitled The Band Wagon.  I know it’s always been considered the poor cousin of Singin’ in the Rain, and every time I watch it I just want to say, well, it’s every bit as good.  But, it never is.  I’m not sure what, for me, stops it from being an all-time classic.  All the elements are there, but it just always seems disjointed to me.  I dearly love many things about it, most especially, Fred Astaire’s first two numbers, which are among my favorite numbers ever committed to film – By Myself and There’s a Shine on My Shoes.  But most of the numbers are fine and certainly Dancing in the Dark is lovely as can be.  I think part of my problem is that nothing is ever quite as funny as the writers think it is, whereas those same writers in Singin’ in the Rain created one huge laugh after another.  And I’ve just never been a big fan of The Girl Hunt Ballet, even though I like the idea of it.  The transfer – well, it’s gotten rave after rave from the likes of Robert A. Harris and others posting where his thoughts are posted.  I did own a 16mm dye transfer print of the film that did not look at all like this transfer, but it was a later issue from the 1960s.  So let me be the lone voice in the wilderness that says I found it a little too yellow for my taste.  Some of the sequences look gorgeous, but the majority of the scenes the actors’ skin tones are flat brown and jaundiced-looking.  When I say these kinds of things, I’m usually told that three-strip Tech and IB prints looked like that back then and later dye transfer prints adjusted the colors more in line of what was in favor.  But I just don’t buy it – because then I see The Red Shoes or some gorgeous color movie from back then, that people also praise to the skies, and there is no yellow bias like I’m seeing here.  Yes, there are many wonderfully vivid colors, but it varies from scene to scene, with some scenes looking just fine to others having almost no color in them at all, save for the yellow hue.  In fact, I will be most interested to view Calamity Jane and Kiss Me, Kate to see what that color looks like, since they were all made in a similar time frame.  Still, it’s good to have this on Blu-ray and it’s got nice detail and pretty good contrast.  I just can’t rave about it as others are, I’m afraid.

Today, I have a little lunch meeting at eleven-thirty, then a little understudy meeting at two-thirty, otherwise I’m going to try and relax some, while doing work for the benefit.  I’ll eat at some point, then hopefully pick up some packages, too.

Tomorrow is our second Kritzerland rehearsal, Friday I have a lunch meeting (at Dino’s Pizza – yay!) and then I’ll attend our show that evening.  Saturday is our stumble-through, and then Sunday is our sound check and show.  Prior to sound check there’s a chance I’ll go to Grant Geissman’s house and we’ll do work on the new book.

Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, have a lunch meeting, hopefully pick up packages, have an understudy meeting and then relax.  Today’s topic of discussion: It’s Ask BK Day, the day in which you get to ask me or any dear reader any old question you like, and we get to give any old answer we like.  So, let’s have loads of lovely questions and loads of lovely answers and loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy that everything went swimmingly.

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