The Finish Line

I finally made it to the finish line. It was fun, but tough, and I was sad and glad to see the play end. It ended on Sunday. The final three performances with the new cast was just as good as the weekend before, however, no performance ever goes smoothly.

On Sunday, my contact tore, and I had to do the play with one contact. It was awful, because the contact tearing hurt. I tried to wear it anyway, because I couldn't wear glasses in the play, and couldn't see without some kind of vision correction, but it didn't work. It hurt. So I threw it away and instead, I wore one contact and acted that way. I took it out as soon as the play was over, because I know doing that is horrible for your eyes, but it was only for a couple of hours.

The greatest thing about the play was that everytime I roared, or showed up at the very first of the play, little kids cried, but by the end, they loved me and were sad when I get "shot" with an arrow and "die." At the end of the show, they always wanted their picture taken with me. It was great.

This week we've been busy, and we're trying to scrape together some money for me to go visit my college roommate sometime next week. And then...it's back to school! Yes, college is right around the corner.

Anyway, that's my little update for now. How have things been for you guys?

Mid-Week, Mid-Performance Updates

Hey, guess what? I've been swamped with play practice. I've been spending literally 8 hours a day working on that play.

Friday was our first performance. It was a totally awesome show. I got a ton of applause, and a lot of people were surprised that this was my first part in a play ever. I was very happy. Everyone did great, and so thrilled that we had a successful opening night. (Incidentally, everytime someone mentioned the words "opening night" I either sang that song from The Producers, or the song "It's bad luck to say good luck on opening night" -- I know...I'm a nerd.)

Saturday was another story, though. We met out back, which is theater tradition, to get eachother pumped for the show, and our supervisor told us to try to avoid the "Saturday Slump" -- which is where the cast gets comfortable after the first success and sucks it up totally the second night. So we were on our game, doing great, making sure to give it our all. But by scene 7, I saw the lights flicker and I knew something horrible was gonna happen. Then, we blew a fuse, and the lights went out. We had early intermission, but had to run on limited lighting after that. And then, to make things worse, we all got rattled from that first big disaster and started screwing up. And to make matters worse, Beauty's dress ripped and she had to wear a shawl to cover it up until we could get it fixed. After that horrible show, I went to go see The Dark Knight to make myself feel better (and it did, because it was awesome!).

Sunday made everything better. We made sure that everyone who came tonight got the best performance ever -- especially if they had come the night before. We blew them out of the water, and did excellent.

Now, however, I have to look forward to next weekend -- Beauty and the Beast...Cast 2! This weekend is with an entirely different set of girls, and it's going to be interesting. I think we'll do awesome though.

Anyway, just a quick update while I dive back into the play...again. I sure can't wait until it's done.

Performance 16

1. Furiously read through the script because even though you've run this play at least 200 times, you seem to have forgotten the order of the scenes.

2. Constantly check yourself to make sure your fly is zipped, your shirt is buttoned, your wig is on straight and you are in fact, wearing your pants.

3. Avoid water 7 hours before your performance in fear that you will need to pee in the middle of the performance.

3 a) Despite your efforts, you have to pee anyway, and for some reason this is the time you decide to contemplate how Noah avoided sea sickness on the ark.

4. Scratch your legs until you bleed trying to keep from itching that spot in the middle of your face and screw up your make up.

5. Develop the habit of blinking frequently and rapidly because you're brand new contacts have chosen this moment to screw up and glaze over.

6. Frantically quadruple check that all the props are in their proper places, reorganize them, forget your "improved" organization order, and panic when you can't find one prop.

7. Sit in a corner, crying, and asking yourself why you chose to be in a stupid local play in the first place, you don't like talking in front of people anyway.

8. Write out Post-Its with custom deadly threat and place each one in the seats your friends will sit in. Make sure they understand, if they laugh at you, they will suffer.

9. Tear down every flyer in the town and throw a bucket of paint over the giant sign advertising the play and hope nobody will show up because they don't know what time the play starts.

10. Fake a sign saying the play is canceled.

11. Dress in dark clothes and a white mask and, through the power of song and special effects, scare the audience away and close the show early.

12. Practice loosening your lips for 2 constant hours before the performance in fear of messing up a line during the play.

12 a) Work your lips too much and suffer a rare but painful face cramp in which your face locks down and you cannot move your lips to say your lines, and just so happen to look like you're sneezing through your nose as well.

13. Badger your fellow actors back stage every 5 minutes to ask if your make up still looks fine.

14. When someone mentions breaking a leg, stand and curse loudly for 10 minutes, accusing the director and the rest of the cast of trying to jinx you before your first big performance.

14 a) Insist a witch-doctor be brought in to rid the area of its "bad joo joo."

15. Write a blog post about your fears that will help you loosen up and then try to relax before your performance.

16. Call up the local government officials about being entered into the witness protection program to escape your humiliation if the performance goes bad anyway...just in cast.