Maybe I've gotten spoiled the last month in Broadway Dance. First we did All That Jazz, and I already knew the choreography, then we did Steam Heat, which I also knew, and last week was Copacabana - also knew.
I got there this evening to find that we were doing Popular from Wicked. I have to learn new choreography?! Had I gotten lazy in learning?
I worried for a few seconds then I got into the new steps and had a wonderful time. Actually, the hardest part was that we were supposed to be cutesy, and that's not at all what I am.
Here's Popular sung by Glinda (Kristin Chenoweth) to Elphaba (Idina Menzel):
I was gloomy on Monday. After a fun weekend up in Asheville (well, fun - except for the part where we said goodbye to daughter at UNC-A), dear husband was out of town, younger son was playing with friends all day, older son was at NCSU, and I was cleaning. I was looking to Broadway dance to cheer me up.
It did!
We started with Life is Just a Bowl of Cherries from Fosse (and we sang along). Along with other songs, we did a warmup to Skimbleshanks, the Railway Cat from Cats.
We did the across-the-floor moves to You Can't Stop the Beat from Hairspray.
The major dance, however, was to one of my all-time favorite songs, I Can Do That, from A Chorus Line. It was a fun dance, and it also was one of the most exhausting dances I've done at a Broadway class.
I've looked at many videos. The movie version isn't done in the original style, and there aren't any videos of the original Broadway version, which is what we danced to. However, I found a version from the PBS series, The Best of Broadway, with the original Broadway Mike, Wayne Cilento, singing and dancing. It's not exactly the same version - the orchestration is different and it's longer. It gives you a feel for the energy, though - and I love the Dixieland part at the end!
Our choreography was totally different, though. The dance starts at about 0:54:
You can get a small taste of the original version, which is a crisper and more Dixieland-ish, at Pandora.
We dropped daughter off at UNC-Asheville this weekend. More about that when I'm in a better mood. I'm glad that younger son is out playing with friends today. They go back to school later this week so I want him to make the most of the time. Older son is at NCSU. Dear husband is out of town.
I'm cleaning house - all those things that I haven't gotten to all summer. Okay, I'm making a small start at cleaning all those things.
I just spent fifteen minutes doing research on the internet trying to find out how to get the shower clean. It just gets browner and browner, and nothing I try helps. The internet is no use: "Use your favorite household cleanser..."
I don't have a favorite household cleanser because none of them is any BLEEPING good! Vinegar and baking soda? Doesn't clean the shower. Comet? No. Clorox? No. Tilex? Just streaks. Oh, and of course my asthma LOVES all these things (Of course I open the window. I still get asthma from them). Stupid internet. Stupid people who give useless, NAUSEATINGLY PERKY, cleaning advice on the internet. "Just do this and your shower will be sparkling clean." No, it won't you stupid idiot. I've tried that. More than once. As "green" as I normally am, after years of scrubbing fruitlessly at this shower, I'm ready for the most toxic air-out-the-bathroom-for-a-week cleanser I can get just to get this over with!
On the way back from Asheville yesterday, I was thinking of all the things I needed to clean and straighten. A large part of the problem, for me, is that I get no sense of satisfaction from them. Other women can be really pleased at how clean they get their closets. I clean, say, "Good, that's over with!" and go on to something that I do get a sense of satisfaction from.
I told dear husband and that I'd be better at keeping things like closets clean and organized if I actually found that Ifelt a sense of achievement from doing so. For me, it's all discipline.
Younger son piped up from the back seat, "Mommy, if you were that way, my life would be so boooring!"
I replied, "Then I wouldn't have dragged you to rehearsals all summer." [I don't feel comfortable leaving him home after dark alone yet so he came along when dear husband was out of town - which was most rehearsals.]
He said, "That's great because theater is aaawwwwwesoooome!" [He didn't feel that way at the beginning of the summer. I don't have the change quite thoroughly in my head yet.]
Okay, my shower is discolored, but I'm doing something right!
I've known all summer that today was going to be bad. After having my family around lots all summer, and after being around lots of theater people for weeks, I've known that today, when everything is back to "normal," was going to be like a bucket of cold water in the face. I could either get really depressed about the next few rather lonely days, or I could sing loudly with John Jasper (played by Howard McGillin) in A Man Could Go Quite Mad* from one of my favorite musicals, The Mystery of Edwin Drood:**
I'm going to go sing and finish the stupid bathroom. :P
* I love the way Rupert Holmes puts the words together in this song - lines like:
Unblessed are the dull. One ceaseless, peaceless lull. One wondrous night, Storm-struck thund'rous light Will cast me right
or
A sculptor lacking arms, a sorc'ror lacking charms, A fiend who frightens no one for there's no one that he harms. Whose clutches clutch at only desp'rate respite From this dim tableau!
Sing along with the part in italics - it trips wonderfully off the tongue!***
** The tape of which (you can't get it on CD), I found in daughter's closet when I went in her room to get library books to return.
*** From shower cleaning to how it feels to sing the lines of an obscure song in one post**** - I just can't be normal.
We danced to this song and did this choreography at the Broadway dance class the last two weeks. Today's class was the last one for daughter. We take her back to Asheville on Saturday.
[::::Internal monologue: "I will not whine. I will not whine...."::::::]
This dance was a lot of fun to do, but it's very intense for my back. I was sore last Tuesday after class.
I don't want my posts about the angst of auditions or even the joy of rehearsals to come up in searches for the community theater group (for their sake, not mine) so I don't mention the group by name in more personal posts.
I am so excited about opening night!!!!!! As much as I enjoyed the musicals the last two summers, I've enjoyed this one even more. It's really one of the most fun things I've done my entire life. I have a few blog posts percolating in my head about it, but I don't know if I'll get around to writing them.
The costumes for this are so beautiful! We look great!
If you want to come, all the information is on my previous post. Daughter will be one of the ladies in waiting at the Saturday morning Tea mentioned there. If they don't get enough ladies, I might be there too.
If you come, I'd love to talk to you in the lobby after.
More photos on the community theater's Facebook site:
I'm in costume By the way, I haven't mentioned that I love my costume for this!!!! It's made for someone about half a foot taller so it had to be shortened, and the sleeves had to be fixed (our wonderful neighborly friend who is also the jester's mother did this).
As you can tell by the lack of written blogging, the community theater musical this year has been much more involved for me.
In other words…
I’M HAVING SO MUCH FUN!!!!!!!!!!!
I had a wonderful time in the musicals the last two years, but this one is even more fun than those were. The chorus numbers are very involved and humorous. The teen chorus is with the adult chorus this year so I’ve gotten to know more of the teens than I usually do. That’s one of the things I love about community theater – you just end up talking to whomever you’re next to, or working with, onstage (or backstage). You get to know all sorts of people.
I’ll back up. We’re doing Once Upon a Mattress this year. It’s a musical based on The Princess and the Pea, only this is a princess with more attitude.
Who swims.
The music was written by Mary Rogers, daughter of Richard Rogers who wrote the music for The Sound of Music, The King and I, etc.
Since most of the members of the chorus play lords, ladies, knights, and musicians, the costumes are particularly beautiful. Some of the chorus members are scullery maids, but they have a lot of fun things to do. I’ve been helping with the costumes this year, although, one morning last week, younger son and I went and helped paint sets.
I’ve never painted before, but, if you volunteer, they’ll find something at your skill level to do. That’s one of the (many, many, many) things I love about this group! I painted the fronts of some of the steps, and younger son and I painted the ladder to the bed. I occasionally look at the front of the steps: “I painted that!” – and now I know how to use a paint roller.
Younger son has painted sets and helped with props. He sprained his foot a few weeks ago so he’s had that foot in a “rigid shoe” to keep it from bending or putting stress on the sprained area while it heals. He’s sick of it so we now call it the “wretched shoe.” He’s had to come to lots of the rehearsals because dear husband has been traveling a lot, and I don’t feel comfortable with younger son being home alone after dark. This week, he said he’s caught the fever – he now loves coming to rehearsals and helping with theater work.
Oh, and I haven’t had a chance to mention – I’m dancing in this one!!!!!
There was a try out for six women dancers for one brief scene. I knew it was a long shot because there are a lot of good, younger dancers in the chorus. I tried anyway – at least I could dance during the try out – and you never know what happens.
What happened, was that 5 teen/20’s dancers and I tried out. I was in!!!!!
I’ve been bouncing around the house for weeks: “I’m dancing! I’m dancing!”
After me, the next oldest dancer in the formal scene is at least 10 years younger than I am (probably more).
Also, in this musical, there’s a really good dance scene for the chorus in general, too.
There are rehearsal pictures posted on the group’s Facebook page, and they’re open to the public so you don’t have to be a Facebook member to see them. Here are some of them:
Learning the dance (The dance teacher is in white, daughter and I are both in green (how did we do that?), and older son is in sage green behind us)
We've got a wonderful cast. Click here for a video of Sir Harry and Lady Larkin singing the first part of their love song. I wish they'd recorded more - they harmonize in the second part and it's beautiful!
If you're in Central NC, and you'd like to see it, here's the information:
Performances will be at the Orange High School auditorium in Hillsborough, NC:
July 28 - 8:00 p.m. July 29 - 8:00 p.m. July 30 - 8:00 p.m. July 31 - 2:00 p.m.
I love the opening number from this year's Tony Awards (and I've watched it over and over). Neil Patrick Harris uses the opportunities given by this years Tony nominees to sing about the broadening appeal of Broadway, and he's aided by flight attendants, high-kicking nuns (Sister Act), Mormon men (Book of Mormon), businessmen (How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying), manly sailors in tight pants (also Anything Goes) and (non) random guests in the audience (rated TV14):
Sadly, we had the last choir rehearsal for the spring this evening - just when my voice was starting to get back to normal. Choir won't start up again until after Labor Day. I'll miss it.
For the last few weeks, there have been signs up at church for this summer's Vacation Church School, which is titled "Promises, Promises."
Of course, every time I see the signs, Jerry Orbach (right) starts singing in my head,* and I have to sing along. Older son and daughter are patient with me.
Happily, the first community theater rehearsal is tomorrow night!
* He won a Tony Award for best actor in 1968 for his role in the musical, Promises, Promises.
I've been on a Pippin kick (again). It's been alternating with Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (other current kick) in the CD player in the van.
Here are Ben Vereen, as the Leading Player, and William Katt, as Pippin, who is trying to find his purpose in life, singing The Right Track :
