Unexpected Crisis Days Before Opening
by Anna Fay William, composer/lyricist
While we had trepidations about putting up The Jury (www.thejurymusical.com) out of town, we never imagined the crisis that actually happened with the show. Two events almost put us in a tailspin.
One week before show time, our Director John Garrett became ill with painful headaches. At the time the show was at a critical juncture because everyone was not off book—meaning the cast hadn’t memorized their lines. Everyone was working diligently but the performance was still rough. And we were only five days from opening.
Diana Howie and I were getting very nervous. We knew we would have to figure out how to keep the show together. Fortunately, we had a wonderful cast and they kept working throughout very long rehearsals while John recuperated from a sinus infection. The stage manager wasn’t letting anything slip past. She, in essence, became the director for those days—running lines and checking on blocking for the scenes.
When Garrett returned in a few days, the actors told him that it was good that he hadn’t seen them rehearsing during his absence. “You would have fired us all,” they said. But John reassured them all. “Everything gets worse,” he said, “before it gets better. It happens in all shows.” He assured us it would all go smoothly. We are dealing with professional actors.
But we not prepared for what happened at the tech rehearsal only THREE days from the opening. The Festival only gave us only a couple of hours to rehearse on the stage, run through some of the blocking and check out the lighting. Our rehearsal was scheduled for noontime at the Bryant-Lake Bowl in Minneapolis. Everyone was there except one cast member who had been consistently late to rehearsals. When the stage manager called him about 10 minutes into the rehearsals, he told her he was not coming because he had to work. She persisted, “You were told you had to be here.” The phone went dead. She called him back and he said, “I quit.”
What a crisis! We didn’t have anyone to step into the role. Small productions cannot afford the luxury of having understudies. When we broke the news to the cast members, they began searching their memories for a replacement. It wasn’t long before several thought of an actor who had been in a show with them. And Garrett called him during the rehearsal. He accepted the challenge. We were greatly encouraged when he was able to deliver his lines with some dramatic flair after only the second rehearsal.
This is a fascinating process--living on the edge of dramatic disaster. It takes some fortitude to stick with it, especially when the actors must improvise when a cast member leaves. Our actors seemed to live by the often-said premise-- “The show must go on.” In retrospect, our crises were not any different than those experienced by many other shows. We were probably lucky that we only had two such events.
Originally post on www.showgab.blogspot, Feb. 20, 2006.
by Anna Fay William, composer/lyricist
While we had trepidations about putting up The Jury (www.thejurymusical.com) out of town, we never imagined the crisis that actually happened with the show. Two events almost put us in a tailspin.
One week before show time, our Director John Garrett became ill with painful headaches. At the time the show was at a critical juncture because everyone was not off book—meaning the cast hadn’t memorized their lines. Everyone was working diligently but the performance was still rough. And we were only five days from opening.
Diana Howie and I were getting very nervous. We knew we would have to figure out how to keep the show together. Fortunately, we had a wonderful cast and they kept working throughout very long rehearsals while John recuperated from a sinus infection. The stage manager wasn’t letting anything slip past. She, in essence, became the director for those days—running lines and checking on blocking for the scenes.
When Garrett returned in a few days, the actors told him that it was good that he hadn’t seen them rehearsing during his absence. “You would have fired us all,” they said. But John reassured them all. “Everything gets worse,” he said, “before it gets better. It happens in all shows.” He assured us it would all go smoothly. We are dealing with professional actors.
But we not prepared for what happened at the tech rehearsal only THREE days from the opening. The Festival only gave us only a couple of hours to rehearse on the stage, run through some of the blocking and check out the lighting. Our rehearsal was scheduled for noontime at the Bryant-Lake Bowl in Minneapolis. Everyone was there except one cast member who had been consistently late to rehearsals. When the stage manager called him about 10 minutes into the rehearsals, he told her he was not coming because he had to work. She persisted, “You were told you had to be here.” The phone went dead. She called him back and he said, “I quit.”
What a crisis! We didn’t have anyone to step into the role. Small productions cannot afford the luxury of having understudies. When we broke the news to the cast members, they began searching their memories for a replacement. It wasn’t long before several thought of an actor who had been in a show with them. And Garrett called him during the rehearsal. He accepted the challenge. We were greatly encouraged when he was able to deliver his lines with some dramatic flair after only the second rehearsal.
This is a fascinating process--living on the edge of dramatic disaster. It takes some fortitude to stick with it, especially when the actors must improvise when a cast member leaves. Our actors seemed to live by the often-said premise-- “The show must go on.” In retrospect, our crises were not any different than those experienced by many other shows. We were probably lucky that we only had two such events.
Originally post on www.showgab.blogspot, Feb. 20, 2006.
posted by Anna Williams at 5:23 AM
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