Well, dear readers, March is flying by, like a gazelle singing Twist and Shout whilst doing the rhumba. I, myself, am singing I Wish That I Could Shimmy Like My Sister Kate whilst doing the Twist and the Rhumba at the same time – I call it The Twumba. And whilst I am writing these here notes, I am listening to Mr. Eugene Ormandy’s magical album of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker, suite from the ballet, along with Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet overture. Antal Dorati’s complete stereo The Nutcracker on Mercury will always be my favorite complete recording of the ballet, but this Ormandy version, which has a LOT of the music, is pure aural magic – a superb, detailed, glorious-sounding album. Prior to that, it was Hindemith’s Mathis der Maler and his Symphonic Metamorphoses on Themes by Weber. I will admit that Hindemith’s music has never won me over and despite this excellent recording, it still hasn’t. Next up is Bartok’s Concerto for Orchestra, and my recollection is that the Ormandy is one of my favorite performances of it and I have many, many versions. Otherwise, we assembled act two, which was a bit rougher than act one for some reason, but we finished with enough time left to run the entire act again, end to beginning, so I could do some detail work, clean up some staging, and even do a little directing. I think that was very helpful to everyone. I asked everyone to please go over stuff on their two days off and also to get off book. It was a very good day’s work. Then I went to the Coral Café with Lloyd Pedersen for my meal. I had the chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes, and a little dinner salad. It was really good and really filling. In fact, I’m still full. After that, I came right home, answered a few e-mails, and then finally sat on my couch like so much fish and watched a documentary on Prime about costume designer Bob Mackie. It kind of just jumps from thing to thing rather than be a linear start to now kind of thing. It’s got some really fun interviews, lots of his costumes (Carol Burnett says he probably designed 17,000 costumes for her show), Cher plays a big part, and it’s not too long at an hour and forty minutes. I didn’t know he sketched for Ray Aghayan and that they were partners. Ray was married to May Rose Borum, a marriage of convenience so he could live here. Miss Borum ran the costume and make-up department at Los Angeles City College when I went there – I think she left prior to me leaving – and I was lucky enough to wear some of her incredible costumes. She’s in Kritzer World somewhere. Anyway, I enjoyed the documentary and recommend it. Now playing, Bartok’s Concerto for Orchestra, a piece that certainly influenced more than one film composer. This performance is as fine as I remembered.
Prior to all that, I got seven and a half hours of sleep, answered e-mails, shaved and showered, stopped at the mail place and picked up the second important envelope, and then moseyed on over to the theater. And the rest you know.
Today, I’ll be up when I’m up, I’ll do whatever needs doing, I will have me a real old-fashioned ME day doing ME things. I’ll eat something light but fun, I’ll putter around the house, and mostly watch, listen, and relax.
Tomorrow will be more of the same. Tuesday we’re back and will run-through the show, then work scenes and staging after. Wednesday and Thursday are the same, Friday we’re off, then we do both Saturday and Sunday. And then it’s the final week before we begin tech. Yikes. I can only tell you that at this point in time on 70, Girls, 70, I hadn’t even finished blocking the first act, due to all the constant replacing and absences and crap. So, we’re far ahead of that, thank goodness.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, have a ME day, eat, putter around the house, but mostly watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s free-for-all day, the day in which you dear readers make with the topics and we all get to post about them. So, let’s have loads of lovely topics and loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy that we assembled act two.