Wednesday, May 30, 2007

A Belated Post

So my current project (www.nytvf.com) has become all-consuming much more quickly than I had hoped it would, which has made it hard to gather my thoughts for the sort of final entry I would like. I am going to drop back and punt, therefore, and say that my final post will come after June 20th, when I am in St. Louis to see a matinee of the show. It will be nice to see how the show has grown in a month. In the meantime, I wanted to post an email I received from Alison Felter, the Education Director at OTSL:

With all the bustle of the season I thought you might enjoy a nice story of a very happy 12 year old from Jackson Park Elementary in University City who attended the student matinee of The Mikado last Friday. She was so enthralled with the production that she announced to her mother that she would like to take her to the opera using birthday money she received this month. Her mom says she can't stop talking about the production and that she (the mom) is now excited having seen tv commercials and reading about the show in the St. Louis American. So June 12 if you notice a 12 year old and her mom dining on the picnic grounds together, say hello and welcome new opera fan Deja and her mom Kym.

I must say that made me feel pretty good. I remember the shows I saw as a child and young adult so vividly (The Wiz, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, As You Like It, many others) that feeling like a show I directed had a similar effect on someone her age really makes my day. In fact, I remember asking for tickets for Joseph on Broadway for Christmas the year I turned 11. And after all, if the Dejas of the world don't find a taste for opera, I'll need to find a new profession in a few decades, and quite frankly I like what I do.

So forgive my evasions, and I promise to summarize in June.

Saturday, May 19, 2007

The Big Night

Tonight is the big night. I have a feeling that I might be a bit late getting home to blog tonight, and tomorrow I travel back to Philly to start my next gig in New York on Monday. I promise I will give a "final thoughts" entry some time next week, as well as an update or two over the next month, but after today my daily entries will be no more. It has been a wonderful experience, and I want to thank my readers (all 662 of you, according to google). I hope this has been as fun for you to read as it has been for me to write.

The pictures here are another sort of Easter egg. I have gone on and on earlier about the excellence of all the shops here at OTSL, but I want to point out something that you might miss during the show. All of the women's kimonos in Act 2 are hand made and hand painted. What is unique about them, though, is that when they are lined up in the correct order, they form a single unbroken picture. You can see the sun above Yum-Yum's head below. I still am amazed by this, and seeing it never fails to amaze me.
Hopefully this is the sort of detail that makes the show special. What is best about it is that the singers themselves feel the sort of love that has gone into creating all the costumes, sets and props, and it adds to their performances in ways that are impossible to quantify. So many hundreds (literally hundreds) or people have worked so hard to make this show what it is, and I owe them all a deep debt of gratitude. And what is more, Monday morning they all turn their focus to the next show to open. Everyone here is not just a consummate professional, not just a superb craftsperson, but also a unique and wonderful artist, and I wish them all a fantastic season.
Yes, I gush but that is just me. This has been a wonderful month in St. Louis, one of the most enjoyable of my career, and I must admit that my joy in seeing the show tonight will be slightly tempered by my sadness in needing to leave. For those of you who will be there tonight, enjoy the show. As The Rude Mechanicals said, it is all for your delight...
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Friday, May 18, 2007

Easter Eggs

Today is the calm before the storm. I generally spend the day before opening either happily writing opening night cards, or wallowing in a sea of blind panic. Mainly opening night cards today. Speaking of cards, at right are the cards that Pooh Bah hands out to the audience when he describes all his various entrepreneurial activities. He dines with middle class people, dances at cheap suburban parties, accepts refreshment at any hands and retails state secrets. His address has a few Easter eggs--the postal code is Gilbert's initials and the year the piece was written. The phone number has several references, most notably "42" which as any fan of Douglas Adams can tell you is the ultimate answer to life, the universe and everything. The occupations listed are all included for their humorous value except the last. OBE (Order of the British Empire) is my nod to Colin Grahm, the late and much missed Artistic Director of OTSL, who shared that title. Hopefully he would find it a fitting tribute.

There are several other Easter eggs hidden throughout the show. For instance, one of the stickers on the back of Nanki-Poo's guitar case is the symbol the singer Prince used for many years. As Nanki-Poo is a prince himself, it seemed fitting. Most apparent, perhaps, are the references to the three other operas in the OTSL season (La Traviata, I Puritani and Anna Karenina). There are others as well, for the quick of eye and ear.

I am not posting any pictures of the show today, because most of my new photos are pictures of the show, and I want to maintain some surprises for those of you who will be there tomorrow. Looking forward to seeing you there!
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Thursday, May 17, 2007

To Placate The Fates...

Today was our final dress, our last chance to try out the show before we go live on Friday. We had a lovely audience of several hundred people, which is vital for a comedy. Ideally we would have a week of previews before we open to test out what is funny, but sans that luxury I was thrilled to have at least one shot at it. Comedy is such a tricky business--half fate, half science and half blind luck. We learned a lot today, though.

I am sure you all know the superstition that a bad dress means a good opening. As I am very superstitious, I must point out that many, MANY things went wrong, if you catch my drift. Dropped umbrellas, mistaken cues, etc. Plenty to improve on for the opening. Which is good--nothing makes me more nervous than a perfectly smooth dress.

So another of the many groups of people who made all of this craziness come to life are my ninjas--the props and stage crew who move around buildings, tote rocks, hand off katanas and basically make the whole affair run smoothly. Like all ninjas, they are silent, swift, and deadly. I have yet to see any of them scale a sheer wall, but I have no doubt they could, if a prop needed to be delivered there. Those are their costumes, complete with flaming fists (most of them are in service to Katisha.)
That is our own Paul Kilmer. I thought he should be on the blog.

Ko-Ko, reading his little list, with the wonderful GYA Men's Coro behind him.
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Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Yesterday's News

Today was a day off, so I knocked around St. Louis on a series of errands. First a new tuxedo for opening night. My faithful old double breasted Burberry is being retired. It has seen opening nights from Boston to Miami and New York to Orange County, so it has had a good life. This is a good show to inaugurate a new one.

After that a bit of opening night shopping. So in lieu of new pictures, I am posting a few from yesterday. The top one is Ko-Ko attempting to soothe Pooh-Bah before "So Please You Sir, We Much Regret".

Here are Pooh-Bah, Ko-Ko and Pish-Tush at the end of their Big Black Block trio.
And finally Yum-Yum, just before the shojis open for "The Sun Whose Rays Are All Ablaze". I love that wedding dress. Linda Cho found the perfect balance of modern and classic Japanes fashion for this one.
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Tuesday, May 15, 2007

Once More into the Breach

So I took a day off yesterday to celebrate my wife's arrival to St. Louis. So today I will try to post twice, once before and once after rehearsal.

First we have Tammy Coil once more as our overture geisha. This photo does little justice to the beauty of this costume.
Matt Boehler, our Pooh-Bah, a vision in white.
Here are Matt Burns, our Pish Tush, and Alison Tupay, our Pitti Sing. There is a romantic undertone to their relationship that I find incredibly sweet and geeky.
I caught one photo of the changeover from The Mikado to La Traviata. It boggles my mind that the production team is able to flip between four different shows in rep, sometimes in just hours. It is a monumental triumph of organization and hard work.
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Sunday, May 13, 2007

Piano Dress

I'm not much given to hyperbole, but having the costumes onstage today was literally the most fabulous event in recorded history. Okay, maybe a bit of hyperbole, bu I kid you not when I say that the costues are fabulous. So fabulous in fact, that I am withholding most of them from the blog so as not to give anything away. Here we have Matt Burns (AKA Burnsy) as our Pish-Tush. The gentleman with the wig is Tom Watson, our wig designer and all around genius. Know how at a certain point in kung-fu movies the belagured peasants or oppressed villagers pool their meagar coins and find a hero of legend to defend them against the wicked samurai? Maybe not. But if what the oppressed peasants really needed was a fantastic wig, Tom would be their hero of legend.

Below Tom is Tammy Coil, who does a cameo as a geisha in the overture. And finally we have some of our schoolgirls, freshly free from scholastic trammels.

We are rapidly getting to the point where the awesomeness of Linda's costumes, Mark's lights and Mikiko's set far outstrip both my abilities and those of my camera to accurately capture them.

Tomorrow we do a brief dialogue rehearsal, and then Tuesday is our first orchestra dress. More then.


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Saturday, May 12, 2007

A Wandeling Minstrel...

That's our own Patrick Miller there, singing A Wandering Minstrel at today's wandelprobe. Always thrilling to hear the orchestra and the singers together, and hearing it in the theatre was even better.

A few pictures of our indomitable male chorus as well. You can see how they are curved out in an arc to address the full theatre. For those of you who are not familiar with the theatre, it has audience on three sides (see the last photo). That makes for some challenging staging situations, but makes for a much more vital and three dimensional experience.

So here is a Mikado Fun Fact (I need to get me a little TM for that). Did you know that as a child Gilbert was kidnapped? While travelling in Italy his nanny was convinced by some shady types that Gilbert's father wanted them to take custody of the young Englishman. A ransom was quickly paid, and order was restored, but it certainly shows something about Gilbert's repeated use of the themes of orphans, wards, and silly nurses who make big boo-boos. Katisha is related to them not in that way specifically, but merely as one of many women of a certain age that Gilbert likes to make fun of. One wonders if a modern writer could get away with some of the objectification of women that we let slip by in Gilbert's lyrics. (Schoolgirls we, 18 and under? Hmmmmm... Of course, if Bob Dole can appear in a Pepsi commercial ogling Brittany Spears, I guess we haven't changed all that much.)

Katisha is an interesting figure in many ways. Is her marriage a punishment or a happy accident? I tend to think the latter. Somehow, through the magic of romantic comedy, Ko-Ko and Katisha have found each other and will live happily ever after. Personally I love nothing better than the moment when the Grinch's heart grows three sizes, or the Winter Warlock melts, or Darth Vader throws the Emperor down that shaft, or Jimmy Stewart wishes a Merry Christmas to the Emporium. Gotta love redemption. These days especially.

Tomorrow is a day I've been looking forward to all week--our piano dress. We finally get to see all these fabulous costumes on stage. Oh, yes. Hopefully I won't be so entranced by them I forget to take pictures.
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Friday, May 11, 2007

Think Pink

An excellent day today. A very full morning fixing some Act 2 issues, and then a run through of the show with lights, no costumes. I actually forgot the battery for my new camera, so these are pictures form yesterday's piano tech rehearsal.

It's actually just everyone standing around waiting for us to restart the act 2 finale, but I love the stage composition they have instinctively formed.

Tomorrow is the second and final sitzprobe (actually a wandelprobe). I cannot wait to hear it all with orchestra.
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Thursday, May 10, 2007

Tra la la la la la la la la...

End of a very long day, so justa few pics--Act I finale, mainly. Enjoy.

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Ladies and Gentlemen...Fred Astaire

The production team are working overtime this morning trying to get all the finishing touches completed with the set and lights. I never quite know what to do with myself on a morning off this close to opening, so I am working a bit on my next project but mainly enjoying Fred Astaire in The Broadway Melody of 1940. Thought I'd blog it for two reasons:

1. They have a fantastic bit about a comic opera singer giving a deliberately bad audition. At the end she rollerskates into the wings and we hear a horrendous crash. Not to tip our hand too much, but we have a similar joke in The Mikado. Made me wonder when certain gags become classics. A person careening offstage to the sound of a crashbox has been with us for decades if not centuries, but when did it become classic? When did the sound of a cat yowling get added to the end of the crashing sound? I've known this gag (fancy folk call it a trope or meme) for as long as I can remember, but where and when did it start?

2. Dance sequences in movies today are so hopelessly edited that any sense of movement, grace, or energy comes form the simulated motion of the editing, not from the performers themselves. The shots for these dance sequences hit the 2 minute range easily. They are much more of a performer's medium. While I love movies from all times and genres, I certainly miss the focus these older movies put on the dance. Of course these days Fred Astaire would never make it on Broadway or the movies--not with ears like those.

Tonight we continue our stage piano rehearsals--getting the show settled into the space, working out technical issues, and playing with the lights. I've been too busy running around the theatre checking sightlines to remember to take pictures--I'll try to be better today...

Wednesday, May 9, 2007

I think that is Cat, our ASM walking across stage in silhouette. Yes, this is the second day in a row featuring shoji silhouettes, but I do so love me a shjoi silhouette.

That is our full cast assembled onstage after their safety lecture. We had a good day today, working through most of Act I. Some nice discoveries, and a few unfortunate realities. Lots of challenges for tomorrow (especially after losing 3 hours of lighting time to an AC malfunction in the lighting room--yikes!) Nothing insurmountable, though. I'll try to break my shoji obsession as well...
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Tuesday, May 8, 2007

And there was light, and it was awesome

Today was our first set of lighting rehearsals. Our lighting designer, Mark McCullough, is brilliant. The shoji screens our set designer gave us lght up beautifully. You can see to different looks below. Lots of people involved in focussing the lights, especially for a repertory plot as complex as this one-4 shows need to share many of the same lights.

God, I love the way these screens take light.

Those are some of our light walkers below--very kind volunteers who give up their time so that we can order them around onstage to see them in various light.

Frankly I'm exhausted, so more tomorrow.
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Monday, May 7, 2007

Almost onstage...

So today was officially a day off, but the set was being loaded into the theatre, and I had to drop by and see what was going on. That is our Act 2 castle. It is, indeed, a thing of beauty.
Always amazing how many people work for weeks and months to make what we see onstage. That is Katisha's wagon being worked on by Kelly and her team from the props dept.
I love lighting paperwork. Okay, I love lighting, fulls stop. Our first lighting rehearsals are tomorrow, and all the mysterious runic markings to the left will turn into stunning visuals. A tasty casserole of science and art.
All of the kimonos for the women's chorus in act 2 are hand made and hand painted. Each an original work of art.

Tonight was our "Spotlight on Opera" event--6 numbers from the piece sung by our fantastic Gerdine Young Artist covers interspersed with thoughts by our set designer, Mikiko Suzuki and some espresso fueled ramblings from Yours Truly. A fabulous and well-informed audience as well. If any of you are visiting the bog, welcome! I hope you enjoyed the event.

Tomorrow we hit the stage. More pictures to follow.
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By Special Request...

By special request, here is a picture of LeRoy Lehr, our illustrious Mikado. That is Myrna Paris, our Katisha sitting is his throne behind him. She is flanked by The Dominicks, the Mikado's personal bodyguard.
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