Let's play a game called guess where that song is from. You win if you said Dirty Dancing...that's where I worked on Friday!!!!
It was such a blast! I did their stage right plot for the first show and then for the second show i sat on book with the DSM calling the show. The first show was interesting because there was this huge panic all of a sudden and I realized that the girl (an ASM in costume) driving the car on the stage (literally the size of an actual car, looks like one too!, operates like a golf cart) had hit the LED board, which is this huge rounded board of 1 foot by 1 foot LED boards that basically form projections (not like the kind of LEDS you would imagine in the High School Musical logo) and i later found out each of these 1 foot boards costs 250,000 pounds which is half a million dollars....and i'd say there were definitely over fifty of them...in a rounded cyc shape about 6 or 7 feet high and maybe 6 foot radius of the curve/circle if there was one...anyway. Sorry to bore those of you who don't care about the logistics of the set and my awful way of explaining it without sketching or using my hands when I talk...that's just for the few who might want to know and for me to remember. :) Anyway to end the suspense she hit the LED board and the person on automation's only dep in was Liz, who was being an ASM for the night (she does ASMing, Sound and Automation depping!!!! whoa) and so she had to run down to see what damage there was and so other people had to cover her plot and so they were all kind of frantic for a few minutes and kind of left me with a few jobs which was cool haha they were easy and soon enough all was back to normal in literally less than 3 minutes and the LED board thankfully did not suffer at all. However, Jenny, the girl driving it will probably not hear the end of it for a year or so from the cast and crew about her driving skills. :) They were joking that I should drive the car for the second show since it's an American car but I was like (ummm suree but you mayyyy not want me to...) haha but i knew I wouldn't end up doing it...too much liability involved, me just working there could be a whole thing in the first place, let alone driving a car around millions of dollars of equipment...plus mix that with my driving skills....yeah didn't happen, I knew they were just joking around and I didn't exactly go into details about my skillful driving abilities. :) Plus those are not great first impression stories to tell....
Anyway I spent the rest of the show moving scenery and props (it is a VERY prop heavy show, many of which are food props) so a lot of it was just cool to look at the props close up and see how they were made, etc. and the girl, Liz, or Yeates as they called her since there were two Liz's on stage management and Yeates is her surname, was very helpful in trying to keep it relevant to me and to design and props and all so that was really great of her. The second show I basically watched, sat with the girl Jenny who happened to be covering book that night (that means calling the show, what I sat with Sarah for two shows in the booth and did) and she pointed things out to me and it was cool cos I could watch all five monitors, see the script, hear the cues, and see the actual live show because she calls it from the wings, as I found out most west end shows do, Hairspray is unique in that way. So it was a lot to watch and learn and piece together from what tasks I had done during the first show. Overall just great fun working on it and seeing another West End show. Most of all comparing the three is really interesting (Hairspray, Never Forget, and Dirty Dancing), and I can say for sure that everywhere you have to climb loads and loads of stairs to get anywhere and that no matter how much you do it, it never gets shorter or easier! And that every job has told me that sentence exactly!
Saturday I actually had the day off which I think I said in the last blog but if you missed it, I got the day and night off since they were training 8 (eight?!!!! crazy!!!) people on DECK!!! which is a ton. so they needed the extra room even of just one little body (me). So, when I got home on Friday I ran into my friends Natsuki (pronounced Natski) and Beth, and Beth said she didn't have anything to do the next day and might fancy a day trip, which was good cos I was looking for a companion other than my intense camera! So we made last minute plans and got on the 10am train from Paddington station the next morning! After spending a little more than our guide book told us we would have to on train tickets, we got to Bath about 11:30am and just kind of hopped on one of those city tours! The first one was the "skyline" tour, more scenic, which happened to get rainy about halfway through, the second was the city tour which was not rainy at all. Both were really nice and it was a quick and easy way to see most of the beautiful city of Bath, England. Some of the things we saw were Jane Austin's home, the History of Fashion Museum, The Roman Baths, the Abbey, and some other stuff! We had a good time and it was nice to see another part of England and take one last day trip!
We planned on getting back for a show, but when we got to We Will Rock You, tickets were too expensive, and we went to Mousetrap, which we had the absolute wrong tube stop for, and by that time it was past showtimes. So then we tried to see Mamma Mia the movie, but the one that had a good showtime for that was where it premiered so it was super expensive. And all the other places didn't have later showtimes and we hadn't eaten dinner so we somehow ended up very shattered and in Chinatown, where we ate dinner and then headed home with some Haagen Daas ice cream and watched the London episode of Friends that I have with me and then totally crashed...exhausted from running around especially the last few hours...we ran to catch our train from Bath, then ran back and forth from theatre to theatre and trying to find the correct address for Mousetrap, then around to the Mamma Mia Odeon movie theatres...craziness. but all in a days work here in England :)
Then today, oh today I woke up and headed to the Globe Theatre to see King Lear! It was good and standing was not that bad! it's like a big pit with only seating in the balconies, which are thrust style-ish but in an arch shape and kind of obstructed view on the sides if you know what i mean. Anyway I got there about 12:15 and stood in line so i got a good spot leaning right at the foot of the stage! To summarize, lots of blood guts and gore, I liked to watch for when they squeezed their blood packs (I was that close...I could see the stitching on the costumes, they were inches away at some points!) The stage was slightly less than 5 feet tall I would guess from standing right next to it for three hours!!! which actually was not as painful as i thought it would be, standing in the same spot...I guess if you think about it i stand for Hairspray every night and all, although I am moving around and stuff a lot more. Anyway got to see eyeballs ripped out rather realistically, looked away only a little...a good sword fight, and it was overall very enjoyable! I brought a brunch from Cafe Nero with me, food allowed inside and everyone sits on the ground who has standing room during the interval. Afterwards, I headed home to change and decided since it was so gorgeous outside (perfect for the globe show since it's not an indoor theatre, no mics or stage lights!) that I would go for a run in Hyde Park! So I got my stuff together so I wouldn't need to carry anything but my iPod and headed over, ran for total probably an hour, with commuting back and forth! Hyde park connects with Kensington Gardens and is at least twice the size of PSU campus in width. I ran some circles around one part of Hyde park, then ran through it kind of windingly all the way to the end of Kensington Gardens to Knightsbridge tube stop where Harrods is!!! That's really far. I did pretty well I thought, for not running in over two months, and ran home, but the water on for my pasta, jumped in the shower, and got ready for the Mamma Mia movie in a half hour total! Record time for cooking and eating dinner, showering and changing!
Anyway about Mamma Mia! I will tell you. First off. Meryl Streep rocks my world she is brilliant. Second, that movie must have been such a blast to film and be a part of. A lot of it was wonderful. The things that weren't were: some of the vocals, which were okay, but not fantastic by any means, including Sophie's, and the cinematography and if you don't know the ending it is kind of not that great either, but I expected that cos I know the musical. Also was disappointed in the lack of impressive dancing/choreography, but the dancers seemed to be well trained, just not given good stuff. BUT. If you do not expect fabulous deep things from it, it is a spectacular night to forget about reality and have a blast, really. And in the end, isn't that what entertainment (movies and theatre mainly) are all about anyway? So go see it if you like musicals and have a blast, I sure did.
It is WAYYY too late and I need to go to bed. Going shopping and chilling with Rosi in the afternoon and who knows what else tomorrow has in store. Oh and back to Hairspray which I haven't been since Thursday afternoon and I've missed it so so dearly! Five shows left!!!!! :'(
Cheers to making the most of my last week here....
Sam
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