Light and Frothy: Singin' In The Rain @ Leavenworth Summer Theatre

Show: Singin' In the Rain; book by Betty Comden & Adolph Green, lyrics by Arthur Freed, music by Nacio Herb Brown

Theatre: Leavenworth Summer Theatre; Leavenworth, WA

Tickets: Comp

Date & Time: Thursday, July 21, 2016 @ 8pm

First, let me lay out the why of seeing this show. I headed to the little Bavarian town east of Seattle to support my friend, Phil Lacey, in the lead roll of Don Lockwood. As he put it, I was being given the opportunity to see a rare treat as he has more recently transitioned to working primarily as a director.

Now that you know why I drove three hours to see a show, it's also fair to admit that I went into the evening with low expectations. In part because the last time I saw a production of Singing' in the Rain was at a community theatre in Rockwall, TX, starring a bunch of teenagers. But also because Leavenworth Summer Theatre is true summer stock theatre. With a cult-like following among the returning artists, the three shows produced every summer are rehearsed and performed in grueling repertory in three different locations that LST has the fortune of renting from the Parks Department. As you may be able to tell from my photo above, Singin' in the Rain is performed on a covered stage at the Leavenworth Fish Hatchery run by US Fish and Wildlife. The audience sits on folding chairs that are arranged on a gentle slope. Other than the folding chair part, the opportunity to sit outside, surrounded by the beautiful backdrop of hills and evergreen trees as the sun goes down in midsummer is pretty special. Which I'm sure contributes to why the house was packed. For instance, the two families that were sitting beside me were taking a break from their camping vacation. The family to my right had been coming to LST for many, many years and were convincing another neighbor to be sure to catch The Sound of Music as it was "the best year yet." As a newbie to the LST experience, the utter lack of cynicism that you often catch snippets of sitting in the Seattle theatres was refreshing and downright infectious.

Low expectations aside, the show was really quite enjoyable. The stage version was adapted from the 1952 movie staring Gene Kelley, Donald O'Connor, and Debbie Reynolds. Without a big budget and technically advanced theatre space, creating the scenic world of Singin' in the Rain is a difficult task.The show jumps between interior and exterior locations ranging from "outside Graumann's Chinese Theatre" to "An Empty Soundstage" to "Hollywood Boulevard." The stage version feels shoe-horned into the musical conceit of in-one scenes to allow for scene shifts to happen upstage of a curtain or scrim. This particular production relied on wagons that were changed out upstage of a red curtain. And, most importantly, they had the requisite rain during the titular song that closes Act 1. (The show I saw in Rockwall, TX relied on a mylar rain curtain.) I also have to mention that I was downright floored by some of the costumes that walked on stage. On that stage was proof that there are some really well-maintained stocks that can give the big rental houses a run for their money for one of the hardest parts of costuming a musical: matching chorus costumes.

If we take Singin' in the Rain for what it is--frothy entertainment--and put it in communities like Leavenworth built around charming the pants off tourists with the faux-Bavarian facades, then my evening was a success. I got to see my friend tap dance "in the rain" and to congratulate another talented actor, Morgan Bader, who I worked with on South Pacific on yet another hilarious turn on the stage. And, as I overheard one woman in the audience, it's refreshing to just enjoy affordable theatre rather than feeling fleeced by the ticket prices in Seattle for shows that leave you feeling meh. Next time I hope I'll have more time to enjoy Leavenworth and take in LST's crown jewel: Sound of Music set atop the ski hill.

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And now, some stats:

# of Actors: 24 (approx)
# of Female Characters: 5 named (+ 8 ensemble)
# of Non-white Characters/Performers: 0

# of Artistic Team Members Listed on Title Page of Program: 15
# of Female Artistic Team Members: 9
(including: Director, Assistant to the Director, Choreographer, Assistant to the Costumer, Scenic Artist, Sound Board Operator, Light Board Operator, Props Master, and Costume Mistress)

Rhythm, Rhyme, Reason

Okay, so I have been trying to find a schedule that will allow me to post more. Ha ha. We are in the midst of the Summer Repertory at CTC and just opened Around the World in 80 Days last Friday and will open A Servant of Two Masters this Friday... so yes, schedule sh-medule. But, hey, we now have a chair! Which makes sitting down to write easier.

Well, the things that I have been thinking about to write about are the following:

1. Weekly schedules are not the best, but can be dealt with. However, getting the calendar less than 24 hours in advance of the beginning of that week makes it difficult to deal with. :( And not having a full day off, super :( .

2. The reason it is nice to have a paint/design assistant is not really to have someone fetch your coffee or do the grunt work, it's nice to have the company. Last night I had to stay to line the stage (AGAIN!) and was by myself. It was very lonely. Especially in a mostly dark theatre (because I didn't want to have to go to the booth to turn off the lights). I kept thinking about my awesome assistants in the past and how much I miss them for their help and company (and input).

3. Being a scenic painter for someone else is hard. I already knew that, but this summer really hit that home with me, in part because the designer is only around a few times a week. So I have to make decisions (without complete renderings) so I can continue and move on, hoping that when the designer is around, I didn't waste my time. I vow to be a more available designer, or, barring that, have complete renderings available.

4. Children's theatre is interesting. I have more to say about this, but I need to get my head around the best way to talk about the importance of the genre compared to the stigma and quality often associated with it. So more on this later.

On that note, it's my first full day off in 14 days. Time to go get my oil changed and go grocery shopping. Woot. Such a life.

PS. CT is employed!!

CTC's publicity photo for Around the World in 80 Days:

The Trouble with Summer

Ack! I missed posting last week. My apologies. It might have something to do with the fact that though I am out of school, my life is a whirlwind of too much to do.

This summer I am in the process of realizing 3.5 designs and working on another. I was hired to design costumes and scenery for two upcoming shows in the Cabaret space at Triad Stage in conjunction with UNCG's Theatre 232. The two pieces, The Actor's Nightmare and Sister Mary Ignatius Explains it All to You are performing back to back, which is why the design is 3.5 rather than 4. The set is essentially the same for both, with a few details changed. But the costumes, boy-howdy (as my mother likes to say). They are proving difficult and a pain.

But really, what overwhelms me is having to wear two different hats at the same time. I don't know how those European designers do it. Well, I have my theories (assistants!) but even still, my brain seems so jumbled with all of my lists of things to do. And then, as I said, I'm in design meetings for a completely different production, Oklahoma!, which will open UNCG's 2010-11 season. The professors here have said on a number of occasions how overlapping designs is not out of the ordinary, but I wonder about this process.

I'd also like to state for the record that summer work is bullocks. I do not understand why the theatre shuts down for the summer, and we all scramble for summer-stock jobs where we get paid infinitely too little for a jam-packed, insanity-inducing process that spans 2 months. Was this kind of season created to follow the agrarian calendar (like schools) or to give us time off because we're ever so burnt out (sarcasm)? I commend theatres like Triad Stage, mentioned above, that still close down in the summer, but not for as long. Currently they are wrapping up their season with a new work by artistic director Preston Lane called Providence Gap. It wraps up July 4th weekend and then rehearsals, etc restart in August for The Glass Menagerie. Somehow that makes a little more sense to me than taking May to August off. But to each theatre their own.

Nevertheless, my summer job is plugging away and Oklahoma! is shaping up nicely (perhaps scans of my designs will hop up here as soon as they are [mostly] finalized). Personally, though I like time off in the summer, I'd rather a little more stability in the job market and a little less stress about getting to my September pay check.