Saturday, October 28, 2006
Feeling it
Just an update on "Inside the Writers' Minds": we're Tired.
Having spent 11 days straight doing nothing but rewriting, we have to say we're a little crispy. We're very excited about everything we've done (even the big dance number that I spent the better part of a day writing that we've pretty much now decided to scrap), but each morning, it's a little harder to leave our cozy apartments and head back to the rehearsal hall. We're just now tackling some final bumpy patches, getting rid of clunky, old-fashioned transitions, newsboys yelling headlines (please stop, already, I have a headache), identifying places we need underscoring, etc. Nothing major, but it's hard to accept that the end is in sight, that we won't actually be rewriting this show until we're 50.
Today we staged the only new number we've added since we've been here, and it's making everyone cry, so I'm pretty sure it's a keeper. And, more exciting yet: I spent much of the last two days making the orchestra parts up-to-date with all the little changes we've made, and they're 95% done and being printed to give to our players this weekend! We'll be using a four-piece band: piano, bass, drums and mallets (xylophone and vibraphone), which is a combo we've used before and gives just enough period color without trying to sound like a full orchestration. We'll be adding six more players at Ford's, which is when we'll pull out all the stops.
I should get back to doing something useful, like keeping an eye out for leaks: it's raining in such torrents, the gentle babbling brook that runs under the rehearsal studio has turned into a class 5 rapids.
-Andrew
Having spent 11 days straight doing nothing but rewriting, we have to say we're a little crispy. We're very excited about everything we've done (even the big dance number that I spent the better part of a day writing that we've pretty much now decided to scrap), but each morning, it's a little harder to leave our cozy apartments and head back to the rehearsal hall. We're just now tackling some final bumpy patches, getting rid of clunky, old-fashioned transitions, newsboys yelling headlines (please stop, already, I have a headache), identifying places we need underscoring, etc. Nothing major, but it's hard to accept that the end is in sight, that we won't actually be rewriting this show until we're 50.
Today we staged the only new number we've added since we've been here, and it's making everyone cry, so I'm pretty sure it's a keeper. And, more exciting yet: I spent much of the last two days making the orchestra parts up-to-date with all the little changes we've made, and they're 95% done and being printed to give to our players this weekend! We'll be using a four-piece band: piano, bass, drums and mallets (xylophone and vibraphone), which is a combo we've used before and gives just enough period color without trying to sound like a full orchestration. We'll be adding six more players at Ford's, which is when we'll pull out all the stops.
I should get back to doing something useful, like keeping an eye out for leaks: it's raining in such torrents, the gentle babbling brook that runs under the rehearsal studio has turned into a class 5 rapids.
-Andrew
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
The little things
It's the morning after our day off, and I'm exhausted because I decided to do almost nothing but work yesterday. A glimpse into the difficult and weighty decisions that plague us today: coming up with some new material for the Colonel, including a long discussion about what's a funnier item in a list of things he disdains: tie pins? tie tacks? tie clips? bow ties? Of course, the answer was: poodles. Poodles definitely funnier.
Saturday, October 21, 2006
Cybercast
Rehearsal break in the green room.
Clockwise from top left: Victoria Huston-Elem, Mark Sanders, David Anderson, Nicole Mangi, Monique French, Jaron Vesely, Rachel Clark.
Ann & Beany
Work space
Here's Eddie at one of about a dozen "workspaces" we've created around the rehearsal complex. This bar has a "Bergdorf Goodman" logo on the front, for some reason. Other workspaces include the back "Waterfall" room (not soundproof, so hope the chorus isn't singing anything loud), the stage management office, the green room, and the music offices across the street.
Friday, October 20, 2006
Andrew's day
Today was a busy day, and pretty representative, so I thought I'd lay it out:
Got to the rehearsal room at 10AM, put in the changes to the new number we're working on for Mother ("What Could Be The Harm?"), so that it could be copied and distributed to the actors for a read-through at 11. Then I put in the rewrites to the reprise that I discovered I had never written at the initial read-through, so that could be taught in the afternoon.
We got a few actors together to read through the new Mother scene a couple times, and we agreed we'd talk about it over lunch. After that, we realized we had a problem with "Money Talks".
"Money Talks" is a number for Colonel and Beany that Eddie and I wrote last January at our writers' retreat at TheatreWorks Palo Alto. It's a fun uptempo number that has gone through a couple versions, and that's where the problem comes in. The original version of the song was written in 3/4, which we discovered the first time we heard it in CA was not funny. So I reset the entire number in 4, with the exception of a slow 3/4 strut section near the end. This was the version we used at Carousel and at the Hartt School. In August, however, the consensus among all the other creative staff (except Karma, who wasn't at the meeting) was that even that much 3/4 was too odd, too off-center, and the number wasn't landing. So I gave in and spent several days coming up with a rock 'em sock 'em straight-ahead ending that was VERY show-biz-y. This was the version our actors here have learned.
Just before staging the number today, however, we realized that Karma had never heard the new ending, and was about to stage the number based on the old version. I played everyone the new, 4/4 ending, and.... everyone wanted the old version back. The show biz ending was too much pizazz, and they missed the "edge" and "quirkiness" of the original. Of course, now I had no idea what I thought, because I had given up my attachment to the original and moved on, and now I was hearing all my arguments for the original given back to me. So, after an hour of beating my head against the wall, I had written a version that incorporates both the 3/4 strut and a squarer tag, hopefully having my cake and eating it. People seem to like it... for now...
At the lunch meeting, we discussed the new Mother scene we'd read through, and agreed that although it's very sweet and theatrical, it pulls the story away from Ann for too long. Eddie and I agreed to find a way to keep Ann in the mix and shorten the whole thing.
Afternoon was spent with a run-through of everything that's been staged, then I switched hats and did a revisit to the end of the show, adding back some lines from a previous version, writing some new lines, all based solely on the table read, but which I think are smoother.
These rehearsal days, by the way, go by very quickly. I feel like I've just gotten started and it's lunch, then an hour later it's dark and we're going over the schedule for the next day.
See you tomorrow!
Got to the rehearsal room at 10AM, put in the changes to the new number we're working on for Mother ("What Could Be The Harm?"), so that it could be copied and distributed to the actors for a read-through at 11. Then I put in the rewrites to the reprise that I discovered I had never written at the initial read-through, so that could be taught in the afternoon.
We got a few actors together to read through the new Mother scene a couple times, and we agreed we'd talk about it over lunch. After that, we realized we had a problem with "Money Talks".
"Money Talks" is a number for Colonel and Beany that Eddie and I wrote last January at our writers' retreat at TheatreWorks Palo Alto. It's a fun uptempo number that has gone through a couple versions, and that's where the problem comes in. The original version of the song was written in 3/4, which we discovered the first time we heard it in CA was not funny. So I reset the entire number in 4, with the exception of a slow 3/4 strut section near the end. This was the version we used at Carousel and at the Hartt School. In August, however, the consensus among all the other creative staff (except Karma, who wasn't at the meeting) was that even that much 3/4 was too odd, too off-center, and the number wasn't landing. So I gave in and spent several days coming up with a rock 'em sock 'em straight-ahead ending that was VERY show-biz-y. This was the version our actors here have learned.
Just before staging the number today, however, we realized that Karma had never heard the new ending, and was about to stage the number based on the old version. I played everyone the new, 4/4 ending, and.... everyone wanted the old version back. The show biz ending was too much pizazz, and they missed the "edge" and "quirkiness" of the original. Of course, now I had no idea what I thought, because I had given up my attachment to the original and moved on, and now I was hearing all my arguments for the original given back to me. So, after an hour of beating my head against the wall, I had written a version that incorporates both the 3/4 strut and a squarer tag, hopefully having my cake and eating it. People seem to like it... for now...
At the lunch meeting, we discussed the new Mother scene we'd read through, and agreed that although it's very sweet and theatrical, it pulls the story away from Ann for too long. Eddie and I agreed to find a way to keep Ann in the mix and shorten the whole thing.
Afternoon was spent with a run-through of everything that's been staged, then I switched hats and did a revisit to the end of the show, adding back some lines from a previous version, writing some new lines, all based solely on the table read, but which I think are smoother.
These rehearsal days, by the way, go by very quickly. I feel like I've just gotten started and it's lunch, then an hour later it's dark and we're going over the schedule for the next day.
See you tomorrow!
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
The set!
Ann & John
Our fearless principals, Donna Lynne Champlin and James Moye.
We have props!
The amazing Goodspeed staff has already started creating our world.
Just add apple pie
Where the magic happens
A view of the rehearsal studio, set up for our first read/sing-through. Spot the bagel crumbs.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
So THAT'S what we're doing
From Andrew:
Today was the first day of rehearsal, and aside from the rain, was terrific. Reading and singing through the entire show (which went amazingly well for having had zero rehearsal) reminded us what the show really feels like, and things that need tweaking were (as always) crystal clear; before dinner, I set an entire reprise lyric for the Ensemble which I had somehow overlooked (oops), and Eddie and I cut about 50% of one scene and came up with an idea for a new number for Mother (the lovely Melanie Vaughan).
Another notable achievement: I'm riding back and forth to the rehearsal studio on the bike I found covered in spiderwebs on my little patio area, and I have not yet killed myself. This may not seem like much, but as I ride a bike about once every five years, and there's a treacherous little bridge with no sidewalk on the way, and it was raining (a little), I consider it a major triumph. Eddie tells me it's a girls' bike (something about the crossbar) but I'm not buying it. When I'm on it, it's a boy's bike; no, a MAN's bike. So there.
Today was the first day of rehearsal, and aside from the rain, was terrific. Reading and singing through the entire show (which went amazingly well for having had zero rehearsal) reminded us what the show really feels like, and things that need tweaking were (as always) crystal clear; before dinner, I set an entire reprise lyric for the Ensemble which I had somehow overlooked (oops), and Eddie and I cut about 50% of one scene and came up with an idea for a new number for Mother (the lovely Melanie Vaughan).
Another notable achievement: I'm riding back and forth to the rehearsal studio on the bike I found covered in spiderwebs on my little patio area, and I have not yet killed myself. This may not seem like much, but as I ride a bike about once every five years, and there's a treacherous little bridge with no sidewalk on the way, and it was raining (a little), I consider it a major triumph. Eddie tells me it's a girls' bike (something about the crossbar) but I'm not buying it. When I'm on it, it's a boy's bike; no, a MAN's bike. So there.
