THEY LIKE TO USE “THAT” WORD

I love audiences. Not just because they pay money to see the shows, although that goes a long way towards working their way into my heart. No the reason I love audiences, is I love to hear their reactions to the show. Some times they pull you aside after and tell you how much they like it, other times they make comments during the show.

One comment we got during the show was “Oh… they like to use THAT word.” This was relayed to me by my girlfriend as she was watching Award. Now it’s no secret Jay and I love to use profanity, not just on stage but just in our real lives. We curse like sailors and thus so do our characters. I am especially bad about it; I do it in church, which is why I don’t go a lot. But what I loved about “Oh … they like to use THAT word” was that when the story was relayed back to me, there was no judgment involved. Apparently the woman said it to her friend very matter of factly. So in spite of mine and Jay’s penchant for profanity, she seemed to be on board with it.

Thing is, once you get a crowd that talks out loud they don’t stop. In some cases it’s a good thing. During Award, after Josh said his line about it being true bad movies get nominated for awards; there was an audible “Ooooh” from the audience. Kind of like they practiced it. They were talkers. While setting up for Funeral, Jay and I both heard one woman yell out as we were setting up the furniture, “Wait… is this a kids show?”

By far the biggest reaction we got was from something that wasn’t supposed to happen, and cosmically I think it was my fault. As Award was finishing up on Wednesday, I made a comment like “Wow, we haven’t had any problems with the bed tonight.” And it was true. No shaking, no loud noises. But not two seconds after I said it, WHAM! The legs facing the audience gave way and the bed fell to the floor with Josh and Mal on top of it. Luckily neither of them were hurt, and Josh covered with “You know they are going to charge us for that.” Nice ad lib, saved the scene.

But afterwards, we had all of these people come up and ask if it was planned. UGH, if they only knew we consider it a good show if it doesn’t fall. One woman asked me if it was planned, and when I told her it wasn’t she said “Well in my experience in theater… if something works, you should keep it.” Apparently it was Elaine Stritch. Another friend of Jay’s swore it was planned. He even went so far as to claim he could see the lynch pin that was pulled out off stage. HUH? We don’t even know what a lynch pin is. But yes you totally saw one. It was attached to Wonder Woman’s magic lasso and pulled off stage by the ghost of Charles Nelson Reilly.

Well that was last week’s adventure with the audience. Again I love them, and I love how they make the show their own. We are going to have some nice crowds this week and God only know what they will see.

This is why I love live theater.

OPENING NIGHT

Well it is opening night, the culmination of over a years work. Now we get to see if after all the blood, sweat, and tears, if the shows are any good. (Crossing my fingers)

I used to get really nervous on opening and I probably will right before we open, but right now I am feeling pretty confident about the shows. Not that we haven't had a bumpy ride.

We spent the weekend in tech, and if you don't know already, Tech sucks. For those that don't, Tech is the time when you add all the elements together: acting, props, lights, set, sound, costumes, the kitchen sink. Its a lot like baking a cake, once the cake is done its awesome, but when you first add all the ingredients together, it looks kinda gross.

We had some interesting moments, well no one ran over a homeless guy, but still interesting. During one run of Award, Malorie kicked one of the glasses and broke it. Punted it actually. She could be in the NFL. It was one of those moments where, if she had tried to kick it, she couldn't have. But on accident... she nailed it. So if you watch the show and wonder why there is only one glass in a Four Seasons hotel room, that is why. They also terrorized a script during the show, ripped it to shreds. Again they had never been done this before, yet during one run, this poor prop met it's demise.

Not that Funeral didn't have it's moments too. I am still not sure where, Anne's "Children's husband" came from or Bryce summarizing his monologue to "everything". We also had to ask Tim to wear socks. It seemed like his bare ankles during one run had a special spot light on them.

On the plus side, the Boys in Funeral are happy to finally have a wall. Our rehearsal space most of the time made using the walls for the fight scenes a little hard. For weeks, Ben, Bryce and Tim have been mime-ing walls. So it felt good for them to finally have some walls, so that could start REALLY throwing each other around.

Well just wanted to do a short one before we started letting people in the door. After tonight, in a strange way, the shows no longer belong to Jay and I, but they belong to the cast and the audience. Sometimes it gets hard to let go, but its necessary.

A real quick thanks Aaron Johnson at the Live Bait, Don Johnson and the rest of the cast and crew of "A Murder of Crows" for the fabulous job they did getting the set ready for us. They have no idea how great they are. And to such a great cast. We could not have done it without them.

I hope you all enjoy the shows.