BBAJ Week 8: Hell week!

Hell week is so-called because we're in the theater every day of the week until opening night and it's usually a very stressful week. Usually. This hell week actually wasn't that back.

Day 1 (Saturday) was the "Cue-to-Cue." Starting at the top of the show, the actors stand in every spot they're in for every scene throughout the show so that the lighting designer can work out what lights are needed where and when. This is always the most tedious "rehearsal," but a smartphone sure can make the time fly! Our 1 and 1/2 hour show took 4 hours to do the cue-to-cue. Not too bad!

Day 2 (Sunday) was the "Sitzprobe," which is German for seated rehearsal. It's the first time that the actors sing with the full band/orchestra. Usually you just run the songs in the show, but BBAJ has so much underscoring that we also ran a lot of the dialogue too.

Days 3-5 (Monday-Wednesday) were spent running the show once each night with full props and costumes. Many shows will have just one "dress" rehearsal, but we started wearing costumes ASAP because the costume changes come fast and furious in this show. In fact, for one scene I'm still having to come on stage while buttoning up. And, there's really no way to speed it up. Yikes! After each rehearsal we would change out of our costumes and sit in the theater is receive our notes from Scott. Thankfully, the notes were usually few and minor, but these three nights were the latest nights of any of our rehearsals.

FYI, here are my notes (which are probably nonsensical to anyone not in the show) exactly as I typed them into my iPhone:

Monday: Line up during CB.

Tuesday: No pause before "injuns." Cough at end of ghosts. Throw Nick after terrible life lines. Other side of Dowdy at end.

Wednesday: Logs enunciate. Desk at backyards and driveways.

Looking back through all of my notes from the entire rehearsal period, I found this classic from Scott: "Hold the mic like it's a dick."

Day 6 (Thursday) was our first preview! None of us were exactly sure how the show was going to run in front of an audience, especially a small one, which is typical for the first night. We had 45 people in the audience. My thought was that a couple of them would probably laugh at each joke, but that the audience as a whole would mostly be quiet, not sure what to think of this really weird show. Thankfully, I couldn't be more wrong: the audience was really responsive throughout the whole thing! It is so gratifying to hear laughter when you're on stage!!!

Tonight is OPENING NIGHT! Hope to see you there!!!