Picture a rectangular
narrow room. On the right side is a stage facing
the wall on your left. In
fact, it almost reaches the other side. In front of that stage is one row
of chairs.
This is the stage. The wall is immediately to your left.
This is a reverse shot of man sitting in chair in front of stage.
Just above that one row of
chairs is a balcony which leans out almost over the stage itself. On that
balcony are two and three rows of church pews (with cushions), sharply
raked. The top row is near the ceiling.
This is where the audience sits.
Looking down at stage from row two.
Looking at balcony from stage.
I've never seen anything
quite like it. At first our hearts literally sank and we just stared at
each other. What is this? The Old Globe? I grabbed Kris Stewart, the director
of NYMF and I don't know what I told him. I just kept saying it was crazy.
That this was an insane space. That it was the worst possible choice for
a show like ours.
He smiled sweetly and said
that even though it looks weird, there has been some very powerful and
interesting theatre done there.
Well, I'll say this, there
won't be much space between the audience and performer. I hope people like
their shows delivered literally in their laps cuz that's where we'll be
playing.
We met our lighting designer,
Traci. She was really gracious and seemed really smart. I have to send
her a script. And we met two women associated with another musical sharing
The Belt with us called [name of show] -- a musical about people
writing a musical for a festival. (And yes, "[name of show]" in brackets
is the name of the show.)
One good thing about having
the audience above us is that my googly eye will look less googly since
it's always kind of looking up all the time anyway (thus giving me my angelic
look).
We are thinking, also, of
doing the show without body mics. The space is small. The acoustics seemed
"alive." (I'll still need to use an electronic keyboard for staging reasons).
So, it was a bit shocking
at first to see the space. But we can make it work. Who knows? It's so
unusual it might start a new trend! It's like we're in a gladiator pit.
I guess I'll have to get my Russell Crowe impersonation going.
Anyway, we were recovering
from the initial shock when Jimmy suggested we visit his old church, St.
Malachi's, the "church for actors" which is nestled right in the middle
of the theatre district.
That's when it happened.
A sign from above.
I swear this actually happened.
And when it happened, we stopped dead in our tracks, thinking we were going
absolutely insane, but clearly we were being sent a message.
We round the corner of 49th
Street, we see St. Malachy's...
...suddenly the church bells
starting ringing through the evening air. How lovely the church bells.
What's that they're playing?
Hm. Sounds familiar.
No.
It cannot be.
We both looked at each other
at the same time. A shiver went down our spines.
The church bells were ringing
"There's No Business Like Show Business."
Ethel Merman was calling
to us from beyond telling us to just have faith. Thank you, Ethel. We hear
the Big Voice.
Loud and clear.
