Well, dear readers, let’s start with the good – our first Kritzerland rehearsal. It began at four-thirty with Isabella Sawoski, daughter of our musical director. She’d sung for me when we were rehearsing the Bacharach show. Normally, for a very personal show like this Richard Sherman show, I wouldn’t take a chance on a first timer, but I needed someone her age to do a key song that no one else I knew could handle. She sang a bit of it for me over the phone and I gave it to her. And what a good decision that was, because she’s singing it beautifully and knows it completely by heart already. She’s only doing the one song. Then came Robert Yacko, and we ran through his three songs, and they’ll be great. Then Guy Haines didn’t show up for his short rehearsal, so I filled in for him. After that, we had young Sophie Petersen, who you may remember from Tonight’s the Night as the fictional daughter of her real-life father playing her fictional father. We ran her big solo, the Nonsense Words medley we’ve done many times. She’ll be great. Then our other young gal came, Ava Madison Gray, and they did their duet together. Then Ava ran her solo. Finally, we had Danika Masi, who’s really great and her three songs fit her perfectly. That was it for the first rehearsal. Brent Barrett and Kerry O’Malley are only coming to the stumble-through, but she and Brent have both done their songs many times and they’ll come early to run them with our musical director. That was that, and afterwards, I just had to relax and rest my voice, which I have to be VERY careful with, due to lack of sleep and allergies. The lack of sleep was due to the curious incident of the idling car in the night. At four-thirty, I was awakened by the noise of an idling car. At first, I thought it was the idiot next door and his motorcycle, but ten minutes later it was still going on and the motorcycle guy takes off after a couple of minutes. I got up, furious, and went outside and saw a beat up, awful-looking care parked across the street, one house south of me on the other side of the street. I walked over a bit and shrugged my shoulders and said, “Can you turn that thing off?” Whoever was in there ignored me. I tried to go back to sleep but after thirty minutes of this nonsense I’d had it. I called the Van Nuys Police Department. Even though there’s a desk man twenty-four hours, no one ever answered. That’s top-notch policing. I then called 911 and told them immediately that it wasn’t really an emergency but that there’s been a rash of people doing bad things to cars in this neighborhood and that I felt threatened that that’s what they were there to do. I also said that if that wasn’t an emergency me going out there with a baseball bat would be. She immediately switched the call to the LAPD – they never picked up either. Is it any wonder that miscreant thieves feel so emboldened to do whatever they want with no consequences because the police can’t be bothered? They could have sent someone over to get them the HELL out of here, but noooooo, not our police. Finally, after an hour, they shut the engine off. Just before going back to bed, they had the door of the car open – what they were up to I know not and when I got up at eight they were gone.
So, I maybe got five hours of sleep – not good. I then had to leave and go have a breakfast – Hugo’s – an omelet and small Caesar salad for my side. After that, I picked up one tiny package, then went to Macy’s – nothing really on sale, and then I walked around the mall and looked at various stores. Then I came home. I answered some e-mails, got the tiny fixes to the designers for Benjamin Kritzer, then I had to sit on my couch like so much fish. I turned on the TV and checked out the transfer of How to Murder Your Wife – nice transfer, but I instantly fell asleep and woke up halfway through it. I shut it off, then shut my eyes and the next thing I knew, the doorbell was ringing. Say what? I’d slept a full three hours. I tried to get coherent quickly, which I pretty much did and then we had our rehearsal, and the rest you know. Oh, and the good news is we’re already up to 118 tickets sold, which is great this far in advance. I’m really hoping we get to at least 150 or that we completely sell out at 170.
Today, I’ll be up when I’m up, then I’ll do a quick Gelson’s run, then relax until our one-hour three o’clock rehearsal with Bonnie Gordon and then Linda Hart. After that, I’ll eat something fun, then watch, listen, and relax.
Tomorrow is completely a ME day – no talking, no doing, no going, no nothing. Friday is our second Kritzerland rehearsal, Saturday is another ME day – no talking, no doing, no going, no nothing. Sunday, we have our stumble-through and then our Tony Awards Bash right here at haineshisway.com. Then Monday is sound check and show.
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, do a quick Gelson’s run, have a short rehearsal, eat, then watch, listen, and 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, where we will hopefully not have a repeat of the curious incident of the idling car in the night.