Frustration...

on a bunch of levels.

I've been off the blog for a while. Felt SO GOOD not to be sick that i had some euphoria going on there for a while. There were some fun parties over last weekend (including a very small roving bash called slut-it-up-a-notch) Had some really good shows, and some that were less so.

Did a PR event with a local radio station yesterday - a car dealer donated a loaded 2007 vw beetle that's been dubbed a 'Bah Humbug,' which we raffled off on the radio: buy a ticket for a hundred bucks and get a chance to win the car. Total of about 350 seats for sale, so those aren't bad chances, and the money is split between the theater and a local charity. We sold all the tix, so that's a guaranteed full house and upwards of $35,000. The actor playing scrooge and i both helped out - a teeny tiny bit of air time, which was kind of fun, a lot of answering phones, and no small amount of sitting around. We met lindsay, the PR coordinator, at 6:30 a.m. and were told they'd need us for a couple of hours. We didn't get back until well after 11 - no big deal, but mildly annoying. Still, a HUGE success for the theater and for lindsay.

Then came this morning's student matinee. The theater rep makes his curtain speech, where he asks everyone to turn off cell phones, etc. For our regular performances, this is also when they acknowledge the corporate patrons, but i was a little surprised to hear him run through the list for the benefit of these junior high and high school kids. And then even more surprised when he went on to discuss individual contributions, and suggest that when they get out of school and start making money they should consider giving to the theater. Ugh.

And then about 10 minutes into act one, around the time marley's ghost shows up, one of the students begins moaning, loudly, in the audience, fairly near the stage. Other kids were laughing, and it rattled some of the actors. Pretty soon it became clear that this wasn't some jackass being disruptive, but a special-needs kid who couldn't control himself. But that wasn't necessarily clear to everyone, especially the folks who aren't on stage a whole lot (i.e., almost everyone) So there was some line shakiness, some unintended laughter (onstage and off), and even some pretty inappropriate improv. When the act ended i went to the deck stage manager, who was laughing about it - really not a bad reaction all in all, but i wasn't finding it funny at the moment. I asked her what was going on, and what was being done about it, and she had no idea. Not only that, no one had tried to find anything out or do anything about it at all during the act. I make it clear i'm not happy and ask to be told what's going on when somebody gets a clue.

Soon the stage manager shows up in the dressing room all 'i hear you wanted to talk to me.' I hadn't said anything about wanting to see her, but she went on to say "there's a group of disabled kids in front."

"Duh."

"And none of us knew about it."

"The house manager didn't know?"

"The house manager knew, but didn't tell us, and put them down front - he says he's going to move them to the back where they'll be less distracting."

"I'm not sure that's the best idea - don't you think that might be demoralizing for them?"

"Well, we'll figure something out"

Ok, basically it's too late at this point to DO anything much to help. Beforehand, some foresight in seating might have been helpful, and a little foreknowledge of what was going on would DEFINITELY have been good. I mean, last week they warned us that there would be some kindergardeners in the house, and this week they didn't feel it necessary to let us know that somebody in the fifth row would be moaning and wheezing and gasping for breath. Then one of the other actors comes into the dressing room and starts complaining about the inappropriate behavior of the young actors vis a vis the situation. I almost yelled at him: "They had no knowledge of what was going on!"

"The people in fezziwig's party were laughing and making faces"

"Those guys thought it was some kid being an asshole."

"It was obviously a disabled student."

"It was obvious to us because we were on stage the whole time - the fezziwig people had no clue. I didn't know for a few minutes what was up."

"I knew right away. And no matter what, it was inappropriate."

Which, of course, it was. And unprofessional.

And frustrating on so many levels...


Wow. I've got to write more good stuff, and less overwordy rants.

Next time i think i'll throw down another Magic 8pod.