Month: May 2022

due to the state of my country and events that have absolutely shattered my capacity for humor or joy or even baseline feelings of anything other than sorrow and anger, i’ll be taking this week off.

Need to catch up?

• What is The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp? 
• The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Prologue
• The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter One
• The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Two
• The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Three
• The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Four
• The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Five 
• The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Six 
• The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Seven
• The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Eight 
• The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Nine
• NSFW! The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Ten

For every single musical I’ve been in (and I’ve been in a super lot), the first rehearsals are always music rehearsals. The first week of Beauty and the Beast rehearsals for me covered two particular songs: “The Mob Song” and “Belle.”

I get to sing my favorite line!

In “The Mob Song” I’ve always loved the line, “We don’t like what we don’t understand/in fact it scares us/and this monster is mysterious at least.” Whoo hoo, my friends, whoo hoo, first sopranos sing on that line. One of my favorite things about being in an ensemble is that you often to get sing the most iconic songs. Also, sometimes having a featured role is pretty lonely; when we did The Wizard of Oz and I was the Emerald City Guard, I sang “Merry Old Land of Oz” and got some good laughs, but I was only in a few scenes and most of them were with The Four (our director’s shorthand for Dorothy, Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Lion), who had their own bond. The ensemble had their own relationships, too, so I always felt a little like the odd man out during that show. Not many rehearsals, no real chance to “hang out” with the rest of the cast, it was kind of isolating. This time around, I don’t have the spotlight, but I do get to have fun with my castmates and sing the songs that were the most fun to sing when I was a kid.

“Oh, Alan.”

Some of us in the cast are fresh off Sister Act: The Musical, which was also composed by Alan Menken. And during Sister Act, I had some real feelings about the music that, while incredible to listen to, was total ass to sing. For example, this was just one of my notes as Sister Mary Patrick:

During rehearsals, the musical director and I would often shake our heads and say, “Oh, Alan.” This has continued on into Beauty and the Beast, due to having the same musical director.

My cheese dreams were dashed.

Another fun aspect of theater is finding out which lyrics you’ve misheard over the years. But not this one. Oh, no. Not this one.

For years now, I’ve thought that in the end of “Belle,” someone was asking for, “some cheese/10 yards.” When I say years, I mean like THIRTY. For three decades, I’ve been periodically consumed with the idea of ten yards of cheese. Thirty feet of cheese, yous all. Imagine it. It’s absurd, but also admirable? And like… goal?

Well, guess what? The line isn’t, “some cheese/ten yards.” It’s “some cheese/a pound” and someone else just happens to be having a conversation at the same time that involves “ten yards” of something.

My world is irreparably shattered.

I made a new friend!

Of course, I don’t remember his name. Danny, maybe? I probably shouldn’t guess right here because I might accidentally use his real name and I said I wasn’t planning to do that. Drew? I don’t know. Anyway, I asked him if he was wearing eyeliner and told him that if he wasn’t, I wouldn’t be happy for him. He was wearing eyeliner, so now we’re friends. He might not know that. The thing is, I was trying not to collect any more handsome friends because my friend Handsome Jack (real name, that I call him) once looked so spectacularly handsome that I didn’t know how to react and I spiked my phone like a football, right onto the parking lot pavement. I don’t have the kind of dough to just keep replacing phones.

A missed rehearsal

I should honestly say “the first missed rehearsal.” This theater is really good and nice about working with people with disabilities, so when I’ve been ill or having a bad pain day and I have to call off from rehearsal, I don’t feel like anyone will be shitty about it. I try hard not to miss rehearsals, but inevitably my disability interferes.

Of course, due to covid, we have people quarantined now. There were only two covid cases during Sister Act and considering the cast size of like, forty people or whatever? That’s pretty impressive. Also, neither of us got infected at rehearsals; we could both confirm exposure to infected persons/groups. It was totally wild. From what I understand, we go by the same protocol as Opera Grand Rapids, and it seems to be working for them and for us. I just very much appreciate that the organization is worried about keeping us safe.

Pancake Pre-Game

I’m not good at making smart choices. I am good at dragging otherwise smart people along with me on my bad choices. “I want pancakes,” I told my friend Anastasia (that’s a real name, she doesn’t care). “I’m going to have pancakes before rehearsal. Wanna come?”

Now, keeping in mind that my friend Anastasia is a PROFESSIONAL OPERA SINGER, for some reason she AGREED. And went to pancakes with me. And the pancakes were glorious.

But you know what wasn’t glorious? Trying to sing with a stomach full of pancakes. During warm-ups, I looked over to Anastasia and silently mouthed, “I’m gonna puke.”

I didn’t puke. But I did learn a lesson.

If I’m gonna eat a bunch of pancakes right before rehearsal, I have to remember to just pretend to sing.

See also: benefits of being in the ensemble.

The other day, I was thinking about the highs and lows of the recent production of Sister Act: The Musical that I was in (I was Sister Mary Patrick and I was fabulous) and how I wasn’t bright enough to write any of it down in my journal.

See, the thing is, between auditions for that show and the beginning of rehearsals, my BFF Jill died. And it sucked. And I stopped writing in my journal entirely and I didn’t want to go to rehearsals and I very much considered dropping the show completely. Cooler heads prevailed and I stayed in the show and I’m glad I did, but all those fun, quirky little things that happened during rehearsals that I would love to remember are gone now, lost to the holey memory fog of grief.

I’m still not ready to open up my journal and get back to it; it was a brand new, totally awesome notebook and I’m furious that Jill died only a few pages in, but even those few pages I did write were written by a person who used to be me. I’m still in that phase of trying to figure out who I am now, so there’s no point in ruining another notebook with a false start.

But then I was like, hey. You have a blog. And people who’ve never been in a show might really enjoy reading about what it’s like. And people who have been in shows might be interested in seeing what it’s like at my theater.

So, I’m gonna dump all my theater stuff here. With a few caveats. Unless otherwise noted, I’m not using the real names of any performers or staff or crew. And I’m not going to put a lot of juicy gossip or anything like that in here; I’m generally peripheral to off-stage drama. I’m the person people come to when they want to vent about someone else, and I don’t want anyone to worry that I’m going to put it on the blog. But I will talk about how I feel about things realistically and mention, you know. Appropriate stuff to mention.

Last night was the first cast meeting. You know how I just said I’m not going to say negative stuff? I’ll say negative stuff about cast meetings. I don’t care what theater I’m at, I loathe the cast meeting and I refuse to make it a secret. I especially loathe cast meetings that include a script read-through because a) we will be reading the damn script every night for like six weeks and b) let’s just get into it, I’m ready to go. Luckily, last night’s meeting didn’t have a read-through. It was the standard Center Stage Theater welcome night, where things get explained to newcomers and reiterated for people who’ve been there a while. We cover stuff like how nobody is allowed to be a dick, we’re a queer and disabled safe-space and your ass will get booted if you don’t respect that (not in those exact words, of course), and various fundraising and ticket-selling opportunities we’re doing to publicize the show.

I hate meetings sooooooooooo much. Generally, I take it as an opportunity to get some crochet time and zone out. That’s not to say I don’t care about my friends on all the various committees who speak at the meeting and put in some hard work, but the noise and fidgeting and heat and closeness of about two-hundred people crammed into a church basement is sensory hell. I don’t think anyone faults me for having a total shut down to cope.

Why are there so many people? Because CST casts every person who tries out, so long as they’re over six years old. It doesn’t matter if you’re disabled or neurodivergent, it doesn’t matter if you’ve never done theater before, it doesn’t matter if you’re 100 years old and someone needs to remind you that you’re currently on stage in a play, Mabel. If you audition, you’re in. We will find a way to put you on stage if you want to be there (and you’re willing to put in the time and effort).

One-hundred and eighty people auditioned for this show. As of last night, we had a total cast of like a hundred and twenty-eight. Some of those people are kids who have parents and guardians so. You know. It was crowded, and I knew that it would be going in and everything turned out fine if exhausting from an over-stimulation point of view. I’m not sure what size cast we’ll actually end up with; I know at least one person dropped after last night’s meeting because they hadn’t realized what an enormous time commitment it was going to be.

People drop for all sorts of reasons. Some of the original one-hundred-eighty couldn’t be cast due to conflicts late in the rehearsal schedule. Some had their hearts set only on one particular role and asked not to be cast in anything else. Some maybe saw the cast list and were unhappy with it. One teen I know and have worked with several times dropped not because of anything to do with the cast list or the production but because she’d been doing back-to-back-to-back shows since our production of Moana Jr. back in October and, despite getting a named role with featured solos, she’s just too exhausted to tackle something as big as Beauty and the Beast as her fourth consecutive show (her last one closed on this past Sunday, the day before our rehearsals start).

There are so many reasons that people fall away from a cast between the posting of the list and the first rehearsal, but there’s also a bittersweet, psychological component some performers can’t get past: what if you’ve always dreamed of playing a particular role, finally got your chance to audition for it, but ultimately have to watch from the ensemble as someone else lives out your dream? For some people, that’s not a hurdle they can get past.

Performers get a bad rep for being divas or egotistical, especially in local theaters. And I’m not going to pretend some people aren’t divas or egotistical. But other times, loss of interest in a production when one doesn’t get the role they wanted is simply a matter of disappointment that has to be nursed from afar. In a town as small as Kalamazoo, big, splashy musicals bring out lots of talent (and it doesn’t help that there are two colleges with notable performing arts programs located right in the heart of the city), but you might only have one chance in your entire lifetime to reach for the bucket-list role you covet. Most theaters operate on a ten-year-plus wait time between repeating shows, and some simply don’t get repeated. My first role at the Kalamazoo Civic Theater was in a production of Rags back in the 1990s, and I’ve never heard of another local theater doing it ever again. Missing out on a local community theater role really can feel like closing the door on your dreams, because you never know if you’ll get the chance again, or, if that chance comes, if you’ll still be the right fit for the role.

One actress, disappointed with the casting of Beauty and the Beast, confided in me that she couldn’t find it in herself to congratulate the person who ultimately won the role that she’d had her heart set on since the season was announced. “Does that make me a bad person?”

I don’t think it does. Maybe if that actress holds onto that grudge for ten years, it would. Maybe if she treated the person differently from here on out, being cold and snide and terrible about it? Sure. But being unable to be hyped-up and happy for someone who got the thing you wanted immediately after they got it and you lost it? To me, that’s understandable.

What I don’t understand are the people who do act shitty toward folks who get bigger parts. A few years back, I went into a first cast meeting and greeted someone I considered a theater friend. She turned away, pointedly and obviously starting a conversation with someone else to drive home the point that she was ignoring me. We’d both been called back for the role that I got, and though later she apologized for her actions and I told her I understood… I kinda don’t. It wasn’t my call, it was the director’s, and there was no need for the nastiness.

Another time, an actor who’d had the lead in the previous show was upset to be given a featured, but not lead, role in the next. He accepted it, then for several weeks either turned up to rehearsal in a terrible mood, refused to expend any effort in the rehearsal process, or just didn’t bother to show up at all. After a few no-call/no-shows, his part was recast and he went on to bad mouth that theater to anyone who would listen. He hasn’t been back and frankly… good riddance? Nobody needs that kind of attitude and negativity around. Which is one of the things I really, really like about my current theater: everybody puts on their big kid underoos and gets to work, and the people who don’t like a positive atmosphere tend to drift away.

There have been many a company meeting that I’ve attended, holding back a chest-burster of disappointment and tears because the finality of how everything shook out finally hit (being called back for, but not being cast as, Maria in The Sound of Music was all-time emotional theater low for me and I almost did quit that cast at the first company meeting). Last night wasn’t one of them, though I was pretty bummed to lose out on Le Fou, the role I received a callback for. I knew I was a longshot because, hey, AFAB and turning forty-two on the second weekend of performances, so while not getting the role stung a little bit for a couple days, I’m perfectly happy being Milkmaid in the opening number, “Belle.” I get to say a “Bonjour,” so what else can you ask for?

Plus, I gotta be honest, it was about time for me to be in the ensemble, just for fairness sake. In the past four shows, I’ve had featured roles: the above mentioned Sister Mary Patrick; Hunyak in Chicago; the Emerald City Guard in The Wizard of Oz; Mrs. Gloop in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. It was starting to feel a little uncomfortable and greedy on my part.

My kid gets a big time to shine in this one, as well. She’s been cast as the Sausage Curl Girl in the opener, and she’s thrilled. We’ve done several shows together and, she’s quick to point out, this is the first time she’s had more lines than I do.

The first cast meeting and all the emotions that go with it is in the bag. Now the hard work starts.

Not to complain, but I feel like a lot of us are having a few weeks in a row here where it’s like… this is something you blame on astrology. This is what people mean when they say Mercury Retrograde or Neptune is in Uranus or whatever. I don’t know a lot about astrology, and I slept through most of astronomy. But what I mean is, it just feels like time and events are intensely weird.

Does it just seem like there’s more of everything? I’m sitting here in my bed, typing this up, feeling terrible because I somehow feel like I’m not doing anything.

I don’t have any deadlines.

I don’t generally work super hard on Mondays.

I had to drive my pet rat to the crematorium this morning because I came home from a disappointing Marvel movie and found him dead, so from now on, I’m blaming Benedict Cumberbatch for the death of my pet.

But for some reason, I feel like I’m dropping the ball because I’m sitting in my bed and not at my desk.

And I know that it’s not just me. It seems like everyone is in a constant state of feeling like they might have left the oven on. That includes people who don’t usually struggle with their mental health. Even they’re feeling like they must be forgetting to do something.

I’m constantly sure I’m the only one who isn’t “back to normal” while realizing how absurd that sounds. There is no normal anymore, not even for a few seconds, because everything is in a swift state of change. Things are moving too fast and everyone feels too slow.

Maybe not everyone. I see Facebook posts from people doing their gardening or going on tropical vacations and they’re smiling and it looks exhausting. Am I supposed to be back to that kind of thing? It’s an impossible climb. I haven’t returned pop bottles this whole time and yet I buy more pop. I don’t know what to do with them. They’re just sitting in my garage. If we go to war and there’s a scrap metal drive, I will be crowned your king and your god.

So, is everyone back to normal? Am I the lazy one? Are all the other people out there talking about how they feel this exact way only feeling that way because they’re overachievers and actually everything in their lives is fine?

I had losses this week both human and animal and I don’t even have time to feel sentimental. I’m too busy feeling like I’m running behind or dropping the ball. I’m too full of other grief to add more on top of the grief I’m trying to ignore. Again, I’m not alone; a million people in my country have died from Covid, and for every one of those people there are the people who knew them and grieve them and that’s just a lot of grieving people probably dealing with their grief in unhealthy ways.

But there’s so much other stuff to worry about, stuff that’s moving fast. How can I keep up if I can’t keep up with my life on a normal slow day?

It’s not just me, right?