I'm back from a very frustrating show. The show itself was wonderful - a half-house but appreciative audience. But when I walked in I was told the stage right speaker was out. Now, I've been complaining about the sound for a week. Everyone has been telling me it's this and it's that and I kept saying how can the level be right for one number and non-existent on the same person for their next number. I kept positing that it had to be the speakers going out intermittently and everyone kept saying no. Well, they were wrong and I was right. I was disturbed, but we did a check and it sounded okay with just the stage left speaker - we checked our prerecorded CD and did a mic check on two actors. The show began and I heard nothing coming from the mics. I walked over to the booth and signalled our sound fellow to raise the level - I saw him do this but nothing happened. At intermission I told him the sound was not happening, and he checked all the plugs and rebooted the system. We got to the funniest moment in the show, the faux movie trailer, he pushed "play" on the CD player and nothing happened. Why? Because somehow in the time we heard the stage left speaker prior to the show and the show's beginning, the stage left speaker also gave up the ghost. I had to announce to the audience we were having a sound problem and we went ahead to the next number. It was all handled very smoothly. After the show, I informed the house manager that the only acceptable postion was that there would be completely new speakers in the theater by Tuesday - so that I would have time to okay them, test them, and make sure our levels still work. I said I would begin cancelling shows if they merely put bandaids on their current speakers, which are ancient. We're paying a LOT of money for the three-show weekend we're doing, and I'm not paying for a theater with crappy out-dated un-checked equipment. Tammy will insist that we not pay for the matinee performance, and since I've been complaining about this for a week (they finally took me seriously after opening night and began doing checks on the speakers) and they totally mucked up one of our shows, and also the fact that we had continual problems on our opening night (not that noticible to the audience but definitely there) and also the Friday and Saturday performances, that she is due a substantial refund on our first week. Hopefully they will do the right thing.
