Well, dear readers, the second iteration of L.A. Now and Then is finished and we could not have gone out with a better show or audience. Two-thirds full, very responsive, hefty mitts, laughs, some cheers, and, as all our audiences have been, people leaving happy. It was a bit of a journey with this production – actors coming and going, some Covid absences, not having the full company until five days before our first preview, but we ended up with the cast we were meant to end up with and I absolutely missed none of the actors who fell by the wayside for one reason or another. There are people in this company I’d work with anytime and anywhere – in fact, two of them will be in the June 3 Kritzerland, presuming I don’t cancel it this week. Some of the vocal performances were as good as it gets, and that especially holds true of the ladies that sang Midnite at the Roxy and An L.A. Love Song (Danika Masi), A Home in Laurel Canyon and duet on Ode to NoHo (Liz Grannis), The Black Dahlia and duet on Ode to NoHo (Lottie Arnold and I don’t think anyone will ever do The Black Dahlia better, both acting and singing-wise), and Lisa Dyson, the first performer to ever get Sunset Strip 1965 absolutely perfect in terms of its storytelling, laughs, drama, singing, and especially energy. The song has defeated some really good singers (two at Kritzerland) because it’s six minutes long and has tonal shifts throughout and the building of it is not easy to achieve – it took us a while to get it where it needed to get, but boy was it amazing to watch Lisa do it and then hear the cheering that followed every single performance. The men had excellence, too – our main guy, Jeffrey Rockwell, had the lion’s share of solos and he did really well by all of them and he really stepped up to the plate on the long and involved We Look Ahead monologue and a young man named Alec Reusch was an audience favorite and he delivered the disco number, Born Too Late, spectacularly well. The other gentlemen were Hisato Masayuma, hilarious as wrestler Mr. Moto, and very affecting doing Weekday Heroes, Marcel Licera, Harrison Fahn, also hilarious as wrestler Tricky Ricky Starr, Tamir Yardenne, who joined our merry troupe very late in the game and who really is a wonderful presence, doing a grand job of it with L.A. Is, and then our other ladies – Haruna Kajiro, who is just a delightful person with a great smile and personality and I’m not sure anyone loved being on that stage more than she did. Alariza Nevarez, just a bundle of energy and fun and what an asset she was to every number she was in. Margaret (Daisy) Staedler, who was fun in all the group numbers and funny in her sketch and who, for the final five performances, took over for Liz Grannis, our stage manager, Bita Arefnia, who took over Daisy’s track when Daisy moved up, and the indispensable Linnea Ingesson, who initially worked backstage but who also learned all the female group tracks and eventually went on a few times for people and then moved into the stage manager position when Bita went into the show. Our co-producer and do-it-all jack of all trades and our AD, Kathleen Delaney, who also ran sound for most of the performances, well, couldn’t have done it without her, our choreographer, Cheryl Baxter, who, despite a hugely busy schedule, came in and taught her four numbers, Steve Shaw, who did the projections. Tesshi Nakagawa and Pawena Sriha’s set (based on Tesshi’s original LACC design) and Michael Mullan’s superb costumes, and Sammy Stritmatter who did the sound design. And, of course, Doug Haverty, who had to troubleshoot constantly, deal with my occasional annoyances, and who is really doing a marvelous job as the artistic director of the Group Rep – they’re lucky to have him. I hope I didn’t leave anyone out.
After the show, for the first time, about eight of us went for some food and boy was that fun. We went to the Coral Café, and we all let down our proverbial hair and it was so much fun to have relaxed conversation. After that, I came home and caught up with a few things and began feeling the post-closing let down, which, coupled with all my other stress was making me feel pretty dreary. I sat on my couch like so much fish and noticed that Once Upon a Time in America has been added, so I checked out the transfer they’re running and today I’ll compare it with the hideous Blu-ray release of the extra-long cut, which I don’t like at all and which was turned into a faded brown mess in an effort to try and make the lousy quality footage being added into the Leone cut look less lousy. But this transfer, which carries a Regency Films logo rather than Warner Bros. looks pretty good to my eyes. Now, I’m not sure this is the extra-long cut, so that may be why the color looks as it should. I’ll know more today when I check it out. Funnily, I fell asleep almost immediately, but woke up just in time for the older Robert De Niro character thinking back to his childhood days, so I was able to watch the entire childhood sequence, which really is brilliant, most especially the incredible debut performance of Jennifer Connelly, who simply radiates before the camera. I watched up until we’re back in the adult section, and I’ll continue on from there, I suppose. Then I listened to Dimitri Mitropoulos conduct the Shostakovich fifth, for me, the best performance that incredible symphony has ever had, in an exceptionally great mono transfer whose clarity and detail is astonishing.
Yesterday was a bittersweet Sunday. I did get eight hours of sleep, but it sure didn’t feel like it. I dragged myself out of bed (no mean feat), answered e-mails, showered, and them moseyed on over to the theater. And there you have the day and evening in an overstuffed nutshell.
Today – well, who knows how today will go? I have organizing to do, decisions to make, things to arrange depending on how I’m feeling. I suppose I’ll eat, I’ll hopefully pick up packages, I’ll do whatever needs doing, but this week is going to be very difficult barring any miraculous miracles, which I don’t think are going to show up.
The rest of the week will be more of the same I suppose – difficult.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up when I’m up, organize, make decisions, arrange things, eat, hopefully pick up packages, do whatever needs doing, and then gird the old loins for whatever lies ahead this week. Today’s topic of discussion: What are your favorite gangster films? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy to have had a wonderful closing performance.