I think Colorado is trying to kill us
It's really too bad that I had no time to write last week because every single day was an adventure. You'll have to be satisfied with the abbreviated version.
It seemed like it was going to go so well. We had just finished several one nighters and our stint in Ft. Collins, Colorado was going to be a 4 night sit down, which meant hotel rooms and a few days without a load in or load out. Plus Ft. Collins has the cutest little downtown area with great restaurants and shops and bars, everything you could need for a short interesting stay. And to be fair, it was interesting...
Tuesday: Mike is diagnosed with an upper respiratory infection and I load the show in by myself. It went well and was very productive, but it also meant that for 8 hours I was running around doing 2 people's jobs and trying to solve some difficult issues like dry cleaning and getting shoes fixed.
That night male dancer #4 calls in sick, so we start our show run with the swing actor running his track. Normally this is a standard situation. But in a new city it's always a crunch to have only 2 hours to train new dressers about our show system, give them all written tracks and show them where things are and make sure nothing falls through the cracks. It's doubly complicated to have to tell them that their tracks are already wrong since they refer to an actor who is not in the show tonight. And the show is completely chaotic with several missed cues, dressers missing changes and Mike and I having keep track of everything.
Then in the middle of the second act, female dancer #2 runs off stage and throws up. Apparently she has food poisoning. We pull costumes together in the middle of the show and the female swing goes on for the rest of the act. For the final scene she goes on barefoot because she can't find her shoes.
Wednesday Matinée: Male dancer #4 is back in the show but looks horrible. In addition to some pulled muscles he also has mild altitude sickness and is dizzy, pale and can't seem to catch his breath. After every dance scene he has to sit down for several minutes and pull himself back together. We hold our breath all night because the male swing is already in the show for character man #2 who is acting as stage manager that night. Female dancer #2 is also back in the show and says she feels better. She is proud that she managed to both not throw up on stage and to not throw up on her costume. I am also proud.
Then half way into the first act female dancer #3 runs into a set piece on stage during one of her exits and falls, badly bruising her hip and her knee. Again we pull together costumes during the show and the female swing goes in for the rest of the show. As far as I know, she went on stage in shoes for every scene, which was a small victory in itself. And the show is again chaotic. Dressers are still missing cues and changes and not seeming to get the hang of the show. Mike and I are still sleep deprived and run off our feet trying to fill in the gaps and answer multiple questions about all the actor changes.
Evening show: Female dancer #6 has called out with stomach ailments and a cold and female dancer #3 is still out of the show and not able to dance on her injured leg. Since we only have one female swing and two female dancers out, this introduces the hell of “split tracking.” We have to combine actor tracks, use both of our swings and eliminate characters in the show to accommodate our male swing playing some of the parts in the show. It's wretched and spawns more questions about what each dresser is doing. Plus, in one dresser track we have yet to have the same person every day. So each show I'm figuring out which actor is playing which part and which costume they will need and I'm training a new dresser. Horrible. Plus everyone is complaining about the altitude and the dryness. Our lead male who plays Max is especially unhappy. Mike is still sick with a horrible racking cough and several other people in the crew are also starting to sniffle and cough
Thursday: Female dancer #3 is back in the show but female dancer #6 is still out. Our swing goes in for her. Then half way through the show, character woman #1 sprains her ankle. It takes everything in me not to walk up to her and say “YOU ARE FINE! YOU CAN FINISH THE SHOW!” and instead say “Are you ok, sweetie? If you can't do the show it's ok, we'll cover you.” But she perseveres and we finish the show with only one swing and no split tracking. This is seeming like the normal situation by this point.
Then Jen Wilson comes up to visit and spend the night. I'm SO excited to see her and we have a great but very late night out.
Friday: We get very little sleep and then do a lot of shopping all day. I get a great winter coat and some Christmas presents and go to work. Jen stays to see the show that night. I get to work and hear that our lead male, Max, has called out of the show. Our actor who plays Franz is promoted to play Max, our character man #1 is promoted to play Franz and our male swing plays character man #1. Then female dancer #6 calls out again so our female swing goes in for her. This means switching costumes out for 4 people and then switching them back again at the end of the night so we can load out the show.
Despite all the swing outs, the show finally goes fine for wardrobe. The dressers appear – after 5 shows – to have figured out their jobs just in time for us to leave town. However, one of my jobs during the show is to stand in the wings for a particular scene and give the props people the go ahead to do their cue. Some cities I only have to do this once and after that the props people know when to complete their cue during the blackout. In Ft. Collins I had to be in the wings every single show to make sure they made their cue. In this last show, the props person misunderstood me – after doing the show 4 times – and walked on stage to do his cue during a scene. While the lights are still on. And people are still on stage talking. And the other props guy is still in the wings waiting. Are you kidding?
The show ends at 11PM, we load out the show for our usual 4 hours, crawl onto the bus at 3AM, drive 30 miles up the road to Greeley, CO and get up at 5AM to load the show in for a matinée performance at 3PM. We would be angry about the ridiculousness of this situation, but we are too tired.
Saturday matinée: our lead is still out so we have the show cast from last night. And that we are all exhausted is the understatement of the decade. We pull the show together. The venue is huge, which is a lovely change of pace. Our dressers all appear to have their act together, for which I am so grateful as I don't have the mental capacity for more stupidity.
Then the top of the second act the main curtains won't open. We cut the cords and manually open them. The show runs late. We then have an hour and a half between performances. Jennifer, the wig girl, and I have so much to do that we don't take a dinner break. Other crew members bring us dinner and we eat while running around.
Saturday evening: Our lead is still out. And now character woman #1 is having so much trouble with her ankle that she calls out of the show. Once again we have to swing out 4 people and then readjust so we can load out all the costumes after the performance. Load out goes until 2AM, we fall into bed on the bus and travel 200 miles.
Sunday: We wake up in Pueblo, Colorado and have a 6AM load in for a 5PM show. Ingrid is so tired she falls asleep outside on top of a work box during load in. Half the crew decides to take a nap instead of eating lunch. But there are delicious green chili breakfast burritos available at the mid morning break!
And that bring us to now. We've already cut major set pieces and unloaded the decking outside and carried it in by hand because of the small load in doorway, so load out promises to be buckets of fun. And the stage is small and the ceiling is low... All else is TBA. You will know as soon as I do
xox
k
It seemed like it was going to go so well. We had just finished several one nighters and our stint in Ft. Collins, Colorado was going to be a 4 night sit down, which meant hotel rooms and a few days without a load in or load out. Plus Ft. Collins has the cutest little downtown area with great restaurants and shops and bars, everything you could need for a short interesting stay. And to be fair, it was interesting...
Tuesday: Mike is diagnosed with an upper respiratory infection and I load the show in by myself. It went well and was very productive, but it also meant that for 8 hours I was running around doing 2 people's jobs and trying to solve some difficult issues like dry cleaning and getting shoes fixed.
That night male dancer #4 calls in sick, so we start our show run with the swing actor running his track. Normally this is a standard situation. But in a new city it's always a crunch to have only 2 hours to train new dressers about our show system, give them all written tracks and show them where things are and make sure nothing falls through the cracks. It's doubly complicated to have to tell them that their tracks are already wrong since they refer to an actor who is not in the show tonight. And the show is completely chaotic with several missed cues, dressers missing changes and Mike and I having keep track of everything.
Then in the middle of the second act, female dancer #2 runs off stage and throws up. Apparently she has food poisoning. We pull costumes together in the middle of the show and the female swing goes on for the rest of the act. For the final scene she goes on barefoot because she can't find her shoes.
Wednesday Matinée: Male dancer #4 is back in the show but looks horrible. In addition to some pulled muscles he also has mild altitude sickness and is dizzy, pale and can't seem to catch his breath. After every dance scene he has to sit down for several minutes and pull himself back together. We hold our breath all night because the male swing is already in the show for character man #2 who is acting as stage manager that night. Female dancer #2 is also back in the show and says she feels better. She is proud that she managed to both not throw up on stage and to not throw up on her costume. I am also proud.
Then half way into the first act female dancer #3 runs into a set piece on stage during one of her exits and falls, badly bruising her hip and her knee. Again we pull together costumes during the show and the female swing goes in for the rest of the show. As far as I know, she went on stage in shoes for every scene, which was a small victory in itself. And the show is again chaotic. Dressers are still missing cues and changes and not seeming to get the hang of the show. Mike and I are still sleep deprived and run off our feet trying to fill in the gaps and answer multiple questions about all the actor changes.
Evening show: Female dancer #6 has called out with stomach ailments and a cold and female dancer #3 is still out of the show and not able to dance on her injured leg. Since we only have one female swing and two female dancers out, this introduces the hell of “split tracking.” We have to combine actor tracks, use both of our swings and eliminate characters in the show to accommodate our male swing playing some of the parts in the show. It's wretched and spawns more questions about what each dresser is doing. Plus, in one dresser track we have yet to have the same person every day. So each show I'm figuring out which actor is playing which part and which costume they will need and I'm training a new dresser. Horrible. Plus everyone is complaining about the altitude and the dryness. Our lead male who plays Max is especially unhappy. Mike is still sick with a horrible racking cough and several other people in the crew are also starting to sniffle and cough
Thursday: Female dancer #3 is back in the show but female dancer #6 is still out. Our swing goes in for her. Then half way through the show, character woman #1 sprains her ankle. It takes everything in me not to walk up to her and say “YOU ARE FINE! YOU CAN FINISH THE SHOW!” and instead say “Are you ok, sweetie? If you can't do the show it's ok, we'll cover you.” But she perseveres and we finish the show with only one swing and no split tracking. This is seeming like the normal situation by this point.
Then Jen Wilson comes up to visit and spend the night. I'm SO excited to see her and we have a great but very late night out.
Friday: We get very little sleep and then do a lot of shopping all day. I get a great winter coat and some Christmas presents and go to work. Jen stays to see the show that night. I get to work and hear that our lead male, Max, has called out of the show. Our actor who plays Franz is promoted to play Max, our character man #1 is promoted to play Franz and our male swing plays character man #1. Then female dancer #6 calls out again so our female swing goes in for her. This means switching costumes out for 4 people and then switching them back again at the end of the night so we can load out the show.
Despite all the swing outs, the show finally goes fine for wardrobe. The dressers appear – after 5 shows – to have figured out their jobs just in time for us to leave town. However, one of my jobs during the show is to stand in the wings for a particular scene and give the props people the go ahead to do their cue. Some cities I only have to do this once and after that the props people know when to complete their cue during the blackout. In Ft. Collins I had to be in the wings every single show to make sure they made their cue. In this last show, the props person misunderstood me – after doing the show 4 times – and walked on stage to do his cue during a scene. While the lights are still on. And people are still on stage talking. And the other props guy is still in the wings waiting. Are you kidding?
The show ends at 11PM, we load out the show for our usual 4 hours, crawl onto the bus at 3AM, drive 30 miles up the road to Greeley, CO and get up at 5AM to load the show in for a matinée performance at 3PM. We would be angry about the ridiculousness of this situation, but we are too tired.
Saturday matinée: our lead is still out so we have the show cast from last night. And that we are all exhausted is the understatement of the decade. We pull the show together. The venue is huge, which is a lovely change of pace. Our dressers all appear to have their act together, for which I am so grateful as I don't have the mental capacity for more stupidity.
Then the top of the second act the main curtains won't open. We cut the cords and manually open them. The show runs late. We then have an hour and a half between performances. Jennifer, the wig girl, and I have so much to do that we don't take a dinner break. Other crew members bring us dinner and we eat while running around.
Saturday evening: Our lead is still out. And now character woman #1 is having so much trouble with her ankle that she calls out of the show. Once again we have to swing out 4 people and then readjust so we can load out all the costumes after the performance. Load out goes until 2AM, we fall into bed on the bus and travel 200 miles.
Sunday: We wake up in Pueblo, Colorado and have a 6AM load in for a 5PM show. Ingrid is so tired she falls asleep outside on top of a work box during load in. Half the crew decides to take a nap instead of eating lunch. But there are delicious green chili breakfast burritos available at the mid morning break!
And that bring us to now. We've already cut major set pieces and unloaded the decking outside and carried it in by hand because of the small load in doorway, so load out promises to be buckets of fun. And the stage is small and the ceiling is low... All else is TBA. You will know as soon as I do
xox
k
posted by KBARRETT at 2:27 PM
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