A Peek Behind the Curtain - Part 7

by Stephen Sondheim

Produced by Circle Ensemble Theatre and Co-sponsored by the Morton Theatre Corporation

July 12th and 13th at 7:30 pm and July 13th at 2 pm

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Part 7

            According to my readers, both of them, I ventured away from actually giving a peek behind the curtain in the last blog entry.  Feel free to excoriate me anonymously via the Internet.  That’s why Al Gore gave us this gift/curse in the first place.  But, I do humbly apologize for veering off the path, even though veering off the beaten path is what “Into the Woods” is all about, on multiple levels.  Still, let’s go back behind the curtain and see what’s happening. 

            At this point, the pressure is on.  It’s in the air.  There are less than three days left before the curtain rises at the historic Morton Theatre.  The nuts & bolts come out now, literally and figuratively. 

           The blocking has been worked out.  I did say in an earlier blog that I’d describe blocking.  Blocking---stage movements by actors, including entrances and exits, and any steps taken in any direction across the stage.  It’s the figuring out where you need to be on stage relative to the other actors and the props—except it’s even harder than that--especially in an ensemble play with this many characters and moving parts.  The whole thing is drinking Jengaesque--it could collapse at any time, but the good folks of the Circle Ensemble Theatre Company are very good at drinking games (metaphorically at least).

            OK, that was our last bit of old business.  They worked out the blocking weeks ago.  I just forgot to mention it.  My tangents into places of awe and stunned, stammering stupidity at the genius of Lapine and Sondheim made sense to me at the time.  Also, stumbling off the path you thought you wanted is a big part of the plot of this show.  Come to the Morton in a week and you’ll see what I mean.      

           That was then.  At this point, we’re beyond that.  The rehearsals now involve multiple props, elaborate costumes, harmonizing the various interlocking songs (it’s a complex musical), and doing the entire play without a break.  The set is just about finished.  The director is pulling out her hair.  Luckily, theatre people have wigs.  The actors are beating themselves up when they blow a line at rehearsal.  The action doesn’t stop when there’s a tiny mistake, like it did a month ago.  At this point there are two well-used lines that can best describe what is going on when things don’t happen in an ideal manner:

1---THE SHOW MUST GO ON

2---WE’LL MAKE IT WORK

            Everyone knows that first one.  Unless Honey Boo Boo has come up with something catchier, “The Show Must Go On” is undeniably the most famous behind-the-scenes summary line for live performance.  “The Show Must Go On” is more than just a cliché.  It’s a mantra that permeates the rehearsal process, and is true, unlike other adages that people say, like “Your baby is adorable” and “Sure, one ply is just as good as two.”  It’s just the way it is.  The show must go on.  People have already bought tickets.  The crew is coming together to work out the technical aspects of the show.  The Show Must Go On. 

            The second line is just as big and all-encompassing as the first.  “We’ll make it work.”  I heard that sentence at least thirty-five times in rehearsals, and that’s just counting last night’s rehearsal.  “We’ll make it work” seems to be the essence of the magic.  Despite being consummate professionals, the Circle Ensemble Theatre Company, like ninety-nine percent of the theatre companies out there, operates on a shoe-string budget.  That’s just one of the many reasons that their choice of this show is particularly bold.  They could’ve chosen something with one easily-constructed set, minimal lighting, modern garb and five actors.  They’re talented, so they could’ve re-enacted an episode of The Dukes of Hazard and made it socially relevant (except the last season where Bo and Luke left and the producers tried to pass off Coy and Vance as acceptable substitutes).  They could’ve chosen a show that many of them had done before.  They could’ve made thousands of different decisions along the way to make the last month and a half of their lives easier.  But they didn’t.  They chose to mount a production that would raise their blood pressure, and they turned down that sponsorship offer from Anheuser-Busch.  They chose to entertain.  They chose this knowing full well that it wasn’t going to be easy, but they knew that they could “make it work” for the people in this community.

            I’ve got a lot of examples of “making it work,” but here’s a big one:

            I was called upon to help construct some of the set the other day (and by “help” I mean scowl to make people think that I’m busy while pretending to work and mainly staying out of the way of the people who know what they were doing).  The main man behind the scenes is Rich Dunham.  He’s a professional behind-the-scenes, make-it-work, theatrical Wizard of Oz guy.  The guy knows his stuff and has been doing and teaching it for years.  But, he just broke his arm.  A week before the show, right when his expertise is needed the most, he fell off a ladder and broke his hand and his arm.  Even with his right arm in a sling, doped up on pain medication, he still managed to draw a working model of Little Red Ridinghood’s Grandmother’s House and explain to those of us with currently functioning limbs what to do to build it.  That’s a professional.  The “Show Must Go On” and soon, so “We’ll Make It Work.”  He told the stage manager Richy what to do.  Richy, along with Drew Doss (who plays The Baker and teaches theatre in Oconee County) guided a group of the ensemble members in constructing and painting a few of the major set pieces this morning.  It didn’t even take all that long, and it looks good. 

            They call this week before the curtain rises, “Tech Week.”  It’s when the Wizard of Oz collects all of his minions (apologies to all who find the flying monkey reference offensive—I think it’d be pretty cool to be a flying monkey), arranges the set, gathers the tools, and directs the crew until they know what they’re going to be doing during shows as well as the actors.  In yet another of those common theatrical happenings, I’ve noticed that the crew isn’t a uniformed group of the same people, all knowing their roles and interacting like The Wonder Twins.  Unlike Hollywood, there aren’t a bunch of surly Teamsters hanging around eating cream-and-unfocused-anger-filled doughnuts.  Though Circle does employ Equity actors, it’s not like TV where each union has the rules so set-in-stone that there’s one guy who buys the light bulbs, another who screws them in, and a unionized light bulb tester (Shiners Union, Local 412).  In the theatre there are people like Rich who’ve been doing this for decades.  There are people who grew up backstage, because their parents acted or designed sets.  There are experienced hands, but there are also people like me.  I’ve been rubbing elbows with Circle for seven weeks.  I can kind of hammer a nail, if I have a spotter.  What I love is that, despite my own preconceived notions, there really aren’t massive egos at work here.  If you know what you’re doing, you do what you have to do.  If you’re new, you learn.  No matter who you are and what you’ve done up until where you are, you know that “The Show Must Go On,” and so you “Make It Work.”

            I won’t be able to talk to you again before the show.  Is there a tear drop emoticon?  If I didn’t hate emoticons, I’d find out or design one with an O and some punctuation mark used only in Romance Languages.  Is it really that difficult to type out “laugh out loud?”  I just did it and I’m fine.  I veered off the path again without a plan to get back on track, another tangent, but I’m going to keep it in the blog for two reasons: one, I really do hate emoticons, and two (like I’ve said many times) that is what this show is about.

          “Into the Woods” is all about having a dream, pursuing that dream, and, ultimately, finding yourself in unfamiliar territory, in a dark and scary place.  I don’t want to give too much away but some of the other topics tossed around in this amazing play are dealing with disappointment, catastrophe and death, the politics of marriages, the advantages and disadvantages of growing up, the nature of evil, and well, I could go on and on.  We eventually learn that, in real life, not every adventure ends "happily ever after".

            This play leaves you with ideas and questions to go along with the catchy songs, cool props, beautiful costumes, expert acting, and some answers.  If you want to be able to talk to me after the show, there’s one thing you’re going to have to do----

GO TO THE MORTON THEATRE ON JULY 12TH and/or 13TH AND SEE CIRCLE ENSEMBLE THEATRE COMPANY’S PRODUCTION OF “INTO THE WOODS.”  

            Then we can talk.           

Another P.S.:  Some generous people in town deserve a mention:  Central Presbyterian Church came through for the group when they needed a large space to rehearse in for multiple days without moving all their gear around and every one of the talented musicians in the pit orchestra, sitting down there in the heat for hours on end playing very difficult music, all so you might be enchanted this weekend.  Trust me. I’ve heard them. You will be.