Bill

Tonight marks the end of the first weekend of performances for Shannon and I in "Scrooge, The Musical" with the First Stage Theater Company.  We've been preparing for this past weekend for about three months so it is with great relief that I can say it has gone pretty well over these first four shows.

For those few people who may not know I am in my stage debut.  I've always wanted to act in a play but that seemed unlikely to happen if I didn't just suck it up and sing in public.  Thus, I'm in a musical.  Fortunately I tried out for a show that didn't have an abundance of experienced male's trying out so not only did I land a part but the part is considered a "principal role."  I  am guessing principal role means I am a lead or co-lead of an entire scene.  I was given the part of Mr. Fezziwig along side my friend Jennifer Williams who plays Mrs. Fezziwig.

The Fezziwigs

Mr. Fezziwig was Ebeneezer Scrooge's boss and mentor when Scrooge was just starting his career. Plus, Isabelle Fezziwig, was the young Scrooge's love interest before he became consumed by the desire to accumulate wealth.

The Fezziwig scene is basically a big Christmas party at the Fezziwig warehouse.  I danced, sung, and whopped it up while having a lot of fun surrounded by a great cast of young actors and Jennifer.

While Shannon didn't get a role with as much "spot-light" so to speak she did get a great part and she did a wonderful job in each of her characters.  She started the show as a towns-person (as did I) and then in that role we both sung "Father Christmas" as part of the ensemble.  She was also a dancer/singer at the Fezziwig party.  Then she was a phantom who accompanied Jacob Marley on the initial haunting of Scrooge.  Later Shannon was a reindeer in a creative twist helping to lead in the Ghost of Christmas Present.  She was then a towns-person again (along with me) as we sang "Thank You Very Much." She was then a phantom again and finally she was back in towns-person mode for the finale.

The final week of rehearsals before the musical are called Tech-Week.  It was the first week we practiced in the theater on the stage along with the set, the props, the orchestra, the sound system, costumes, and make-up.  It was also the moment where the cast finally started to convince me the show might happen. I've been told it is normal for a show to seem like it was headed for disaster going into tech week.  If that is true then I don't think I'd ever want to be a director as the stress of thinking the whole show will fail would be too overwhelming.  Amazingly, from last Sunday to this past Friday morning when we had our opening the show jumped forward by leaps and bounds.

The entire experience has been pretty amazing  At times it was frustrating and even a little annoying - but it was still all cool.  I've really enjoyed learning the dances (which are, for the most part, simpler than they seemed at first glance) and the songs (though I'm not sure I know them all as well as I could).  However, what has amazed me the most about the experience has been the people in the cast and crew.

The majority of the people in the cast already knew each other.  Yet, from the get go they all made me feel incredibly welcome and comfortable.  They were all super nice and any trepidation I had about singing and dancing in front of strangers instantly disappeared.  It was awesome.  By the time we had our opening I wasn't even a little uncomfortable about the idea of singing in public.  Not only did I sing in front of all sorts of strangers but I did it really loudly right near a bunch of the cast during the choral parts and, even if/when I butchered a note or I was way out of key, nobody ever called me out on it.

This might sound kind of crazy but being around so many nice people for so many hours in a situation where I was entirely vulnerable to criticism and contempt was incredibly transformative for me.  I honestly feel like I'm a better person for having just been around that group.

With all of that said the show preparations took up a ton of time and, most importantly to me, I basically missed Emily's 9th birthday entirely. That sucked big time.  In fact, as much as I enjoyed the show I regret having missed her birthday even more.  Therefore, I won't do another show of any kind if it runs the risk of overlapping with either of their birthday's unless I'm in the show with that person.  Honestly, I felt like I didn't see Emily for most of the last two months.  The experience of being in the show just wasn't worth that sacrifice.

Next weekend we have four more shows.  Friday morning and evening and then Saturday evening and Sunday afternoon.  Unfortunately, we are on stage at the same time that Emily's ballet company is performing the Nutcracker so I'll also miss seeing that show (which only happens on one weekend).  I'm hoping to go in and watch a dress rehearsal on Thursday night.

All this time and effort is only worth it however if people come and see the show. Thus, I hope - for the sake of the entire cast and crew - that we have some big crowds out to see the shows next weekend.  I hope that everyone I know in the Huntington area finds the time to come out and see the show.  It is a fun family friendly musical that adds a little twist to the classic Christmas Carol tale.  You can learn all about the show times and location at the First Stage Theater Company website

#musical #acting #singing #scrooge

Last night was our first rehearsal for Scrooge, The Musical.  The first half was right up my alley we read through the script and I got to try out my Mr. Fezziwig voice.  I have always loved reading and doing voices for different characters so I had a blast with my two paragraphs worth of lines (plus, maybe, some little unsolicited sound effects as per the script while others read their parts).

I'm really looking forward to that part of the play.  I really wish I had gotten around to finding a play sooner in my life.

The second half of the rehearsal was singing.  We just worked on the opening number which, I think, is called "The Opening Number."  It's pretty complicated to me.  At first there are three or four different groups singing different bits of christmas carols at the same time.  Then we separate into our vocal range groups and sing this really awkward non-flowing part where we aren't all singing the same words; they are close to the same but they are different and each vocal group has slightly different timing to what they are singing.

I was totally lost.

I think I'll get better with a lot more practice - I just hope I get enough practice.  Otherwise I'll just lip sync through that part.

I don't really know what vocal range I'm supposed to be in so I just joined the two other men who were singing as bass so they would have some help. I can sing deeply I'm just not sure it's my natural range.  Lisa insists it isn't.  Anyway, it really wouldn't matter which group I had joined last night because I kept switching groups as we sung.  Whichever group happened to be singing the loudest or most clearly in my ear won.  I just jumped onto their lyrics.  It wasn't even intentional - it just happened subconsciously.

For instance there is this one part where the lyrics kind of go like this (we'll see how well this formatting works:

yadda yadda yadda see__________________ blah blah blah blah blah

 foo doo doo doodly bop wop doo see____ foo na na la de foo blah

The top line is the sopranos and the altos.  The bottom is the tenors and bass.  So I'm in the bottom group but I can hear the top group reach see__________ before I reach my see_______ so I'd rush through my lyric to reach see___ with the sopranos and altos.  Then I'd be all messed up with the timing of the rest of my lyrics.

This is not easy.

Oh, and I can't read music either.  It turns out that would be helpful. I always figured you didn't really need to know how you could just sing the words and kind of get a feeling of the timing based on the space between them or those long underscores.  You can't.  You actually have to change notes while singing a single word sometimes.  Who knew?  Not this guy.  So yeah, I ended up off key quite a few times.

I think it will be an interesting experience (and experiment) to see if I can figure all of this out by the end of November.  I certainly hope I do.   I think the acting and dancing will be easy enough for me - but the singing will be an enjoyable challenge that will push me the entire time.

If you want to see if I succeed you'll have to come and watch the show.  I think we ar performing at City Hall the last weekend of November and the first weekend of December.  I'll post the official dates and times when I'm sure of them.

 

#acting #dancing #singing #performing