No sold houses for the first two nights of our comedy, but we got laughs and thunderous applause – people appreciated the cleverness of two people playing ten. Some of the humor is pretty obvious, edging toward toilet humor, but it is farce. For the most part the cleverness wins out and it all works.
I’m a ninja again! I became a ninja on the Steel Magnolias tour, when we had to subtract a couple masking walls in order to fit into the theatre. I had to duck under a window to reach the phone ringer box, and from then on I became Ninja Jess. (Later it was Ninja Crocheting Jess, but that’s a different story). Then I went Equity and I sat in the booth…no more Ninja moves for me. But for this farce, once again I am a black-clad shadow scuttling stealthily backstage with props and costumes, ringing phones and knocking on doors.
The weekend was exciting as more and more of the new company members trickled in. It’s like Christmas for me at the first rehearsals to see and hear what people can do, how they act – watching all the energies come together onstage. They aren’t a Company yet, but the more they dance and sing, they more they’re starting to gel.
I wish I could video tape some of the rehearsals. Just as the set goes from tape marks on the floor, so goes the blocking and dancing from mechanical moves by actors in sweatpants and jazz sneakers to Characters in costumes telling a wonderful story. The transformation is so gradual that we forget everything that went into it sometimes.
Of course, that and rehearsals are just plain entertaining. My very own unending reel of live, hysterical bloopers.
There’s just no going back to a normal job…
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