Opening Night

Here we are, pals! If you're in Central Ohio, come see the central Ohio premiere of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, starring a lot of people and five Darwins.

Theater has a lot of superstitions and traditions, and one of them is that a bad tech makes for a good performance. Well, we've had our bad tech. Tuesday night was perhaps the nadir of my theatrical experience (excepting, perhaps, that one student show my freshman year where I was on stage wishing the ground would open and swallow the whole misbegotten production, and the director was called back to speak with the professors afterward, and I had a nervous breakdown, and the stage manager didn't arrive until after the show...).  Everything was slow, awkward, ugly. Lines were dropped by the score. The car was only half-built, and all the sound cues misfired. It was the first rehearsal with the full complement down in the pit, and that went as you'd expect. Things that worked wonderfully in blocking rehearsals fell flat. The dances were a mess. For myself, I flubbed every chorus entrance, though I did remember my lines. The show dragged miserably.

In short, if it could go wrong, it did. The director didn't even give notes. He just looked at us solemnly, and sent us home.

Last night was completely different. Everyone was on fire. Things that had been funny before were even funnier. The car was done, and it looked fine. The dancing improved greatly, and the chorus hit their entrances, and I didn't miss that one step that's been plaguing me. The children's chorus hit a cue that had been eluding them since the beginning. The costumes fit. The pit played together. If it could go right, it did. We enjoyed ourselves. The director smiled and laughed.

So! Good last night, better tonight! By Saturday night we should be ready for our Tony nomination. And if you've ever wanted to see me playing an insane inventor in a white curly wig, now's your big chance.