Well, the critics have spoken, and the general consensus seems to be positive. More specifically, according to seasoned theatergoer Joey, age 7, "It was the best akting and singing show that I have ever seend befor and it was very, very funny too. It was the best show I have ever sen."
Yes, we finally got letters. From second graders who had seen our show and then wrote to us all about their favorite parts and such. My life is complete.
Some other choice excerpts, with spelling intact:
"Amber Brown and Justin made that huge bubblegum ball. I wish I had alot of gum to make one a thoes. I guess I have to save up."--Alex
"I REALLY LIKED THE SHOW!!!!!!!"--Olivia
"It was the best in my life."--Mike
"I like when Justin moved away"--Megan
"I like Hannah because she is neat like me and my mom and sometimes my dad."--Jenna
"That was probably the best show I very saw in my intiyr life."--Luke
"My favorite charater was Amber because she was funny and nice and a good freind to Justin she is just like me nice and a good friend."--Noor
"When they singed it was coolest thing in the show."--Raphael
"I love how they sang in the show and I think they are proud of ther self."--Leslye
"I got something else to say, you ROCK!"--Erin
"It was the best acting in my hole life. P.S. you guys are alsome."--Kiely
"I love it so much."--Aleia
Since my last post, we celebrated Halloween in Florida with some last-minute, thrown-together costumes (none of us thought to pack Halloween stuff when we were leaving NYC.) I was Waldo's girlfriend, Wenda, because I had a red striped dress and pulled some big old glasses from our show costume selection. Liz went to Target and bought a banana split costume meant for a dog. Stacie was Snooki because she's from Jersey. During the last week of our five-week tour chunk, we all went a tiny bit crazy. Knowing that we were so close to our own beds and to having significant human interaction with people besides each other made us impatient. But after show stops in Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina, we finally made it back to New York City for the first time. I got to have a glorious weekend of seeing friends, having adventures, and eating delicious food.
And then we went out again! After a delightful stop in Syracuse, we moved on to Dover, Delaware. In Dover, I met one little girl who told me, after watching the show, that she liked the movie, and another who informed that it was her birthday and asked me, "Are you coming?"
Now we're in upstate New York again (they really seem to love us here.) Stories of Niagara Falls, sketchy vans besides our own, and more to come next time I write! Sometime in the near future, hopefully.
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Our journey to the land of sunshine and wizards
Most important:
The cute little kid quote of the week goes to a four-year-old who, in the middle of one of our performances, turned to her teacher and asked, "Are they human?"
Second most important:
Our theater company has a Halloween costume contest, pitting all the different tours they send out against one another. This is our entry. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uI6cLzdl4qo
Everything else:
I was kind of sad to leave Michigan but Indiana was fun, with another big old theater (where awesome Equity stagehands loaded in our set for us) and a casino! Almost immediately, I won $1.75, gambled away 75 of those cents, and then quit for the night with my dollar's worth of winnings. Stacie and I spent the next hour watching Jeremy gamble away $20, 10 cents at a time, on the slots. It was hypnotic.
Next stop was Watertown for four days, where nothing of interest happened except laundry and a trip to a nearly empty gay bar. And then we drove. And drove. And drove. Three days of sitting in a big white van, hurtling down highways, caused us to get creative. We decided to decorate for Halloween with the supplies Liz had bought, and stretched fake green cobwebs all across the back of the van. We tangled mini plastic rats and multicolored skeletons all throughout the green fluff. Endless driving had turned us ruthless. We twined cobwebs around the skeletons' necks and hung them, relieving our boredom by watching them bounce up and down as we drove.
But then, the nicest thing happened! On our second day of driving, my dad called and suggested that we take a minor detour to my house in DC for dinner. So we pulled off the highway, and I got to see my family! It was the first home-cooked meal we'd all had in a while, and it was a really good one. My dad even baked brownies for us, and we demolished the entire pan. Being in the midst of a month of hotel-hopping, it was weird and lovely at the same time to be in an actual home. I wished that I could have spent more time with my dad and brother, but we had to move on to our Virginia hotel for the night after a much too short visit.
And now we're in Florida! Hallelujah! It is warm and beautiful. Our meals have been really delightful here, fresh and exciting and not too expensive, a very nice change from the endless diners we were doing towards the beginning of this trip. In St. Petersburg, we ate in this restaurant called The Garden and actually sat out in a garden, in the shade of palm trees and with little lizards running around. It was awesome.
We've had two performances here so far, our first one in West Palm Beach at this absolutely incredible theater. It sat 2,200 people, and we had at least 1,800 kids come to watch us at a single performance. That is so many children. It felt a little like we were the High School Musical stars or Justin Bieber or something whenever they all clapped and cheered at the same time. Seriously, it was deafening. But the weird thing that happened was that they kept clapping at really inappropriate times. Around the midpoint of the show, I clap to the beat during a certain upbeat song. Sometimes kids in the audience will clap along with me, which is exciting and cute. But the kids in this particular audience seemed to think that, because they clapped during this one song, they should clap along during all the rest of the songs in the show. The problem is that most of the songs in the second half are kind of sad or pensive. So there I was, ten minutes later, singing this really intense song about how everyone in my life leaves me and I just want someone to stay, with 1800 children loudly clapping along. It was really distracting. I kept thinking that maybe if I just looked sadder and sadder, they would shut up. But no. They clapped along until the end of the show. After the performance, we stood by the theater exits to say goodbye to everyone leaving, and I must have high-fived about 1,000 children in half an hour. My hand was sore.
Our other performance took place at a prep school in St. Petersburg, and there were a few exciting things about this performance:
1. The sound was awful, and started making really loud feedback noises all the time.
2. A gumball gets thrown around a few times throughout the course of the show. During this performance, Jeremy almost smacked Stacie in the face with it. And then I threw it way too wildly and it went into the audience. Jeremy hurtled off the stage and grabbed it, but we were laughing too hard to really get out the words to the song we were singing at the time. At the end of the show, we had a Q&A, and one of the first questions we got was, "When the ball went off the stage, was that supposed to happen?"
No, random child, it was not.
3. I morphed into a five year old and accidentally called Liz "Mommy" instead of "Mom."
And the last really awesome Florida thing, at least for now? WE WENT TO HARRY POTTER WORLD AND I DRANK BUTTERBEER AND FLEW AROUND INSIDE HOGWARTS. AHHHHH.
Okay, Universal Studios has more than Harry Potter. We also went on this really strange E.T. ride, where half of it actually corresponds to what happens in the movie and then the other half takes you on this crazy, hallucinogenic ride to E.T.'s home planet where there are a lot of mushrooms and flower aliens. I don't really understand why they designed it like that.
The cute little kid quote of the week goes to a four-year-old who, in the middle of one of our performances, turned to her teacher and asked, "Are they human?"
Second most important:
Our theater company has a Halloween costume contest, pitting all the different tours they send out against one another. This is our entry. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uI6cLzdl4qo
Everything else:
I was kind of sad to leave Michigan but Indiana was fun, with another big old theater (where awesome Equity stagehands loaded in our set for us) and a casino! Almost immediately, I won $1.75, gambled away 75 of those cents, and then quit for the night with my dollar's worth of winnings. Stacie and I spent the next hour watching Jeremy gamble away $20, 10 cents at a time, on the slots. It was hypnotic.
Next stop was Watertown for four days, where nothing of interest happened except laundry and a trip to a nearly empty gay bar. And then we drove. And drove. And drove. Three days of sitting in a big white van, hurtling down highways, caused us to get creative. We decided to decorate for Halloween with the supplies Liz had bought, and stretched fake green cobwebs all across the back of the van. We tangled mini plastic rats and multicolored skeletons all throughout the green fluff. Endless driving had turned us ruthless. We twined cobwebs around the skeletons' necks and hung them, relieving our boredom by watching them bounce up and down as we drove.
But then, the nicest thing happened! On our second day of driving, my dad called and suggested that we take a minor detour to my house in DC for dinner. So we pulled off the highway, and I got to see my family! It was the first home-cooked meal we'd all had in a while, and it was a really good one. My dad even baked brownies for us, and we demolished the entire pan. Being in the midst of a month of hotel-hopping, it was weird and lovely at the same time to be in an actual home. I wished that I could have spent more time with my dad and brother, but we had to move on to our Virginia hotel for the night after a much too short visit.
And now we're in Florida! Hallelujah! It is warm and beautiful. Our meals have been really delightful here, fresh and exciting and not too expensive, a very nice change from the endless diners we were doing towards the beginning of this trip. In St. Petersburg, we ate in this restaurant called The Garden and actually sat out in a garden, in the shade of palm trees and with little lizards running around. It was awesome.
We've had two performances here so far, our first one in West Palm Beach at this absolutely incredible theater. It sat 2,200 people, and we had at least 1,800 kids come to watch us at a single performance. That is so many children. It felt a little like we were the High School Musical stars or Justin Bieber or something whenever they all clapped and cheered at the same time. Seriously, it was deafening. But the weird thing that happened was that they kept clapping at really inappropriate times. Around the midpoint of the show, I clap to the beat during a certain upbeat song. Sometimes kids in the audience will clap along with me, which is exciting and cute. But the kids in this particular audience seemed to think that, because they clapped during this one song, they should clap along during all the rest of the songs in the show. The problem is that most of the songs in the second half are kind of sad or pensive. So there I was, ten minutes later, singing this really intense song about how everyone in my life leaves me and I just want someone to stay, with 1800 children loudly clapping along. It was really distracting. I kept thinking that maybe if I just looked sadder and sadder, they would shut up. But no. They clapped along until the end of the show. After the performance, we stood by the theater exits to say goodbye to everyone leaving, and I must have high-fived about 1,000 children in half an hour. My hand was sore.
Our other performance took place at a prep school in St. Petersburg, and there were a few exciting things about this performance:
1. The sound was awful, and started making really loud feedback noises all the time.
2. A gumball gets thrown around a few times throughout the course of the show. During this performance, Jeremy almost smacked Stacie in the face with it. And then I threw it way too wildly and it went into the audience. Jeremy hurtled off the stage and grabbed it, but we were laughing too hard to really get out the words to the song we were singing at the time. At the end of the show, we had a Q&A, and one of the first questions we got was, "When the ball went off the stage, was that supposed to happen?"
No, random child, it was not.
3. I morphed into a five year old and accidentally called Liz "Mommy" instead of "Mom."
And the last really awesome Florida thing, at least for now? WE WENT TO HARRY POTTER WORLD AND I DRANK BUTTERBEER AND FLEW AROUND INSIDE HOGWARTS. AHHHHH.
Okay, Universal Studios has more than Harry Potter. We also went on this really strange E.T. ride, where half of it actually corresponds to what happens in the movie and then the other half takes you on this crazy, hallucinogenic ride to E.T.'s home planet where there are a lot of mushrooms and flower aliens. I don't really understand why they designed it like that.
Thursday, October 21, 2010
I say Yes! To Michigan!
I'm really into Michigan. We spent the past few days staying in a hotel right outside of Ann Arbor. Like in Illinois, we had some time off. Unlike in Illinois, those days were interesting.
Liz is from the Ann Arbor area, so after we dropped her off at her house, the remaining four of us checked into our hotel, where Jeremy decided that it would be a great idea to force me and Stacie to watch "Paranormal Activity" with him. To put it lightly, horror is not my favorite film genre. In fact, I don't know if, prior to this trip, I've ever really watched a horror movie all the way through. Sometimes I get scared just reading summaries of horror movies on Wikipedia.
I spent much of "Paranormal Activity" with my hand over my face, wondering when it would end. Stacie and I had already realized that one of Jeremy's great passions in life is scaring people. He likes to hide in various locations and jump out at random times. So as soon as the movie was over and Jeremy went back to the room he was sharing with Katie, we locked our adjoining door, knowing that he would seize any opportunity to capitalize on how freaked out we were. We watched a couple of happy videos online to distract ourselves from thoughts of demons and death, and then I started to get blocked calls on my phone. Whenever I answered, I was met with complete silence on the other end. I wasn't scared because I knew they were from Jeremy, but he kept calling and calling (about 20 times in 5 minutes) so finally Stacie and I opened the door to tell him to stop. When we opened the door, he came into our room to talk to us for a bit, and then told us that we should come into his room to watch a funny video that we "just had to see." So we went, and ended up watching stuff on his bed for about 15 minutes while he supposedly went into the hall to talk on the phone. Eventually, Katie said that she was going to bed (it was now about 3 in the morning) so Stacie and I walked back into our room with growing suspicion. Together, we undertook a thorough search of the room, looking under tables and behind curtains. Finally, we advanced towards the bathroom. As we opened the door, Jeremy jumped out from behind the shower curtain, and it was terrifying.
Turns out that when he came into our room to talk to us after the phone calls, he sat down next to our key and pocketed it. Thank goodness that we checked the room before going to bed, because if we hadn't found him, his plan was to wait until we had turned out the lights, and then stand over our beds for a little while before jumping on us.
Other exciting events from Michigan: We went horseback riding! Liz took us to this national park outside of Ann Arbor, where we got to ride on this absolutely beautiful trail through the woods. The day was perfect, with the leaves in full autumn turning mode. I haven't ridden a horse except for once at a birthday party in elementary school, so I was a bit nervous (especially when I had to sign my life away.) But my horse, Danny, was big and gentle and very methodical about going up and down hills. All the horses had done the trail so often that they seemed to be on auto-pilot, even seeming to know when the lady leading us was going to have us trot (kind of painful but also super-fun.) After the hour on horseback, we played around on the swings and just enjoyed the weather and being outdoors, out of a city. Other activities included bowling, poking around vintage shops in Ann Arbor, and attending a Grease sing-a-long replete with goody bags and a costume contest.
But the most wonderful part of Michigan was, without doubt, the theater in which we got to perform. The Michigan Theater, located smack-dab in the middle of Ann Arbor, doesn't necessarily look like much from the outside. At first I thought it was just a cute, old-style movie theater with a big old marquee out front. But then I walked into the gigantic lobby, with its open staircases leading to the balcony, chandeliers, and high, high ornamented ceiling. This theater is gorgeous, covered in gold patterned designs. Also, it's freaking huge, easily seating over 1500 people. AND! They have an organ, painted gold and red, that raises up to stage height so that, before shows, an organist can sit there and play beautiful music while people file in! Before our show, the organist played a whole bunch of classic showtunes which just added to the old-time theater-y feel of it all. While I do actually (surprisingly?) enjoy performing in school gyms, it was so nice to be on a professional stage. And they even printed lovely programs for us and put us on the marquee! We had some minor freak outs of joy when we saw "Amber Brown Is Not A Crayon" listed all over this big old marquee while walking down a major city street. If you want to see pretty pictures of the theater, here's their slideshow: http://michtheater.org/about.php
After the show, we went out to meet the kids and sign autographs. They were, as always, really adorable. Some were super-shy while others just barged right up to us and started chatting away about their favorite parts and their favorite colors and their lives in general. In the midst of all the craziness, I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned around to see a woman holding her daughter by the hand. She asked me if I could please explain to the little girl what it meant to be an actor, and that the play wasn't actually real. At first I thought that she wanted me to explain because her daughter was interested in acting, but then I realized that the little girl was sobbing. She thought that my best friend really was moving away, and that devastated her. I tried to tell her that it was just make believe and that, even if he did move away, we would still stay best friends. But nothing could console her. And then I realized that her mom was crying a little bit too, hating to see her daughter upset. Part of me felt kind of guilty that we'd caused this girl to be so sad. But the more selfish part of me was excited to see proof that we'd actually made people feel things. Sometimes during the show I worry that the kids stop paying attention as soon as we move past the worms and the chewing gum and into the more serious parts, that we're just up there acting for children who would rather be elsewhere. This was a nice reminder that, even if some kids bounce up and down in their seats, others do care (maybe, as in the case of this little girl, too much.)
And then, we moved on! Stories about Indiana and more upstate New York adventures to come soon...
Liz is from the Ann Arbor area, so after we dropped her off at her house, the remaining four of us checked into our hotel, where Jeremy decided that it would be a great idea to force me and Stacie to watch "Paranormal Activity" with him. To put it lightly, horror is not my favorite film genre. In fact, I don't know if, prior to this trip, I've ever really watched a horror movie all the way through. Sometimes I get scared just reading summaries of horror movies on Wikipedia.
I spent much of "Paranormal Activity" with my hand over my face, wondering when it would end. Stacie and I had already realized that one of Jeremy's great passions in life is scaring people. He likes to hide in various locations and jump out at random times. So as soon as the movie was over and Jeremy went back to the room he was sharing with Katie, we locked our adjoining door, knowing that he would seize any opportunity to capitalize on how freaked out we were. We watched a couple of happy videos online to distract ourselves from thoughts of demons and death, and then I started to get blocked calls on my phone. Whenever I answered, I was met with complete silence on the other end. I wasn't scared because I knew they were from Jeremy, but he kept calling and calling (about 20 times in 5 minutes) so finally Stacie and I opened the door to tell him to stop. When we opened the door, he came into our room to talk to us for a bit, and then told us that we should come into his room to watch a funny video that we "just had to see." So we went, and ended up watching stuff on his bed for about 15 minutes while he supposedly went into the hall to talk on the phone. Eventually, Katie said that she was going to bed (it was now about 3 in the morning) so Stacie and I walked back into our room with growing suspicion. Together, we undertook a thorough search of the room, looking under tables and behind curtains. Finally, we advanced towards the bathroom. As we opened the door, Jeremy jumped out from behind the shower curtain, and it was terrifying.
Turns out that when he came into our room to talk to us after the phone calls, he sat down next to our key and pocketed it. Thank goodness that we checked the room before going to bed, because if we hadn't found him, his plan was to wait until we had turned out the lights, and then stand over our beds for a little while before jumping on us.
Other exciting events from Michigan: We went horseback riding! Liz took us to this national park outside of Ann Arbor, where we got to ride on this absolutely beautiful trail through the woods. The day was perfect, with the leaves in full autumn turning mode. I haven't ridden a horse except for once at a birthday party in elementary school, so I was a bit nervous (especially when I had to sign my life away.) But my horse, Danny, was big and gentle and very methodical about going up and down hills. All the horses had done the trail so often that they seemed to be on auto-pilot, even seeming to know when the lady leading us was going to have us trot (kind of painful but also super-fun.) After the hour on horseback, we played around on the swings and just enjoyed the weather and being outdoors, out of a city. Other activities included bowling, poking around vintage shops in Ann Arbor, and attending a Grease sing-a-long replete with goody bags and a costume contest.
But the most wonderful part of Michigan was, without doubt, the theater in which we got to perform. The Michigan Theater, located smack-dab in the middle of Ann Arbor, doesn't necessarily look like much from the outside. At first I thought it was just a cute, old-style movie theater with a big old marquee out front. But then I walked into the gigantic lobby, with its open staircases leading to the balcony, chandeliers, and high, high ornamented ceiling. This theater is gorgeous, covered in gold patterned designs. Also, it's freaking huge, easily seating over 1500 people. AND! They have an organ, painted gold and red, that raises up to stage height so that, before shows, an organist can sit there and play beautiful music while people file in! Before our show, the organist played a whole bunch of classic showtunes which just added to the old-time theater-y feel of it all. While I do actually (surprisingly?) enjoy performing in school gyms, it was so nice to be on a professional stage. And they even printed lovely programs for us and put us on the marquee! We had some minor freak outs of joy when we saw "Amber Brown Is Not A Crayon" listed all over this big old marquee while walking down a major city street. If you want to see pretty pictures of the theater, here's their slideshow: http://michtheater.org/about.php
After the show, we went out to meet the kids and sign autographs. They were, as always, really adorable. Some were super-shy while others just barged right up to us and started chatting away about their favorite parts and their favorite colors and their lives in general. In the midst of all the craziness, I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned around to see a woman holding her daughter by the hand. She asked me if I could please explain to the little girl what it meant to be an actor, and that the play wasn't actually real. At first I thought that she wanted me to explain because her daughter was interested in acting, but then I realized that the little girl was sobbing. She thought that my best friend really was moving away, and that devastated her. I tried to tell her that it was just make believe and that, even if he did move away, we would still stay best friends. But nothing could console her. And then I realized that her mom was crying a little bit too, hating to see her daughter upset. Part of me felt kind of guilty that we'd caused this girl to be so sad. But the more selfish part of me was excited to see proof that we'd actually made people feel things. Sometimes during the show I worry that the kids stop paying attention as soon as we move past the worms and the chewing gum and into the more serious parts, that we're just up there acting for children who would rather be elsewhere. This was a nice reminder that, even if some kids bounce up and down in their seats, others do care (maybe, as in the case of this little girl, too much.)
And then, we moved on! Stories about Indiana and more upstate New York adventures to come soon...
Friday, October 15, 2010
Days off! (Otherwise known as sleeping 10 hours a day and watching a lot of TV)
I realize that, in my last post, I forgot to include my (almost, not really) near-death experience in Watertown! After our attempted kitten rescue, I started to get back into the van which, by the way, seems abnormally high off the ground to my short legs. I have to grab onto something and hoist myself in. Just as I had begun the hoisting process, with one leg in and one leg out, the van began to drive away. I guess Katie was a little distracted by the fact that we needed to hurry to our next show, and thought she had heard all of the doors slam shut. The rest of us frantically screamed "Katie! KATIE! KATIEEEE!" for what seemed like a very long time but was actually only about three seconds until she turned around and realized that I was halfway out of a moving vehicle.
Anyways, besides that and the greenhouse incident and nearly running out of gas, our driving has been relatively uneventful, even though we've been doing a lot of it. Surprisingly enough for a tour, we've only performed on one day out of the last week. The others have been spent driving from New York to Illinois to Michigan, and hanging out in various hotel rooms. I am now quite familiar with continental breakfasts (these places really love their make-your-own waffle machines) and hotel pools.
On October 7th, we had our first day off! In Watertown! To celebrate, we all stayed in bed until noon. Eventually, I felt like I should leave the Econo Lodge, so I took a run to explore. It was actually really beautiful, finally sunny after we'd had nothing but rain for the entirety of the tour up to that point. We decided to take advantage of the weather and went apple picking! We didn't really have the room to carry around a whole bunch of apples and didn't exactly have the proper facilities to bake them into a pie or anything. So we only picked a dozen, and spent the remainder of our time at the orchard taking Snow White-inspired pictures, playing with the goats, and looking at delicious baked goodies. We also bought six miniature pumpkins to represent each of us (the sixth pumpkin is Gunther, our stuffed animal pig that plays a starring role in the show) and decorated them with sharpies. They now live on our dashboard and occasionally roll around while we're driving.
And then we proceeded to drive for two days, without much of note happening. I watched a lot of "The Office" on my computer. The second day, we did see signs for "Lincoln's Cabin" as we drove around Illinois and so, excited to see the famous log cabin where Honest Abe was raised, we followed them off the main highways, down back country roads, to.... a recreation of the cabin where Abe's father, Thomas, lived later in his life. Not quite what we were expecting. But still, it was pretty awesome to look around. We even came across Thomas Lincoln himself, sitting on a log and whittling! I attempted to become best friends with him by asking what he was doing, but he simply grunted, "Making a powder horn" and didn't talk to me anymore.
From October 10-13th, we attempted to find interesting ways to kill time in Mt. Vernon, IL. The hotel's continental breakfast ended at 9 every day, so I got into the habit of waking up at 8:45, trudging downstairs in my pjs, eating a biscuit, and then going back to bed until noon or one. Other highlights included going to a $5 movie theater to see "Easy A" and "The Social Network," eating lots of pasta, wading in a pretty lake (because for some reason, it was freakin' 85 degrees out there), and marveling at Mt. Vernon's recreation of the Washington Monument. Seriously, they have a model of the Washington Monument next to the movie theater, for no apparent reason. It's probably about 20 feet tall. I don't understand.
And then, hallelujah! We got to perform again! After three days of total leisure (I wonder if these sorts of tours always have so much free time, or if the economy is bringing down the amount of actual performance time), we had three shows in one day, at this lovely performing arts center. I think these performances were some of the best we've had so far. The kids were attentive and laughed a lot, and the show felt fresh again since we'd had such a long break. At one of the Q&As, the children gasped when we revealed our true ages. One of them told me she thought I was 10 years old. Another one asked if Liz, who plays my mother in the show, is actually my mom in real life. Liz is 24, and looks like it. I love hearing little children talk about their totally skewed perceptions of age.
And now we're in Ann Arbor, about to head off to dinner!
Anyways, besides that and the greenhouse incident and nearly running out of gas, our driving has been relatively uneventful, even though we've been doing a lot of it. Surprisingly enough for a tour, we've only performed on one day out of the last week. The others have been spent driving from New York to Illinois to Michigan, and hanging out in various hotel rooms. I am now quite familiar with continental breakfasts (these places really love their make-your-own waffle machines) and hotel pools.
On October 7th, we had our first day off! In Watertown! To celebrate, we all stayed in bed until noon. Eventually, I felt like I should leave the Econo Lodge, so I took a run to explore. It was actually really beautiful, finally sunny after we'd had nothing but rain for the entirety of the tour up to that point. We decided to take advantage of the weather and went apple picking! We didn't really have the room to carry around a whole bunch of apples and didn't exactly have the proper facilities to bake them into a pie or anything. So we only picked a dozen, and spent the remainder of our time at the orchard taking Snow White-inspired pictures, playing with the goats, and looking at delicious baked goodies. We also bought six miniature pumpkins to represent each of us (the sixth pumpkin is Gunther, our stuffed animal pig that plays a starring role in the show) and decorated them with sharpies. They now live on our dashboard and occasionally roll around while we're driving.
And then we proceeded to drive for two days, without much of note happening. I watched a lot of "The Office" on my computer. The second day, we did see signs for "Lincoln's Cabin" as we drove around Illinois and so, excited to see the famous log cabin where Honest Abe was raised, we followed them off the main highways, down back country roads, to.... a recreation of the cabin where Abe's father, Thomas, lived later in his life. Not quite what we were expecting. But still, it was pretty awesome to look around. We even came across Thomas Lincoln himself, sitting on a log and whittling! I attempted to become best friends with him by asking what he was doing, but he simply grunted, "Making a powder horn" and didn't talk to me anymore.
From October 10-13th, we attempted to find interesting ways to kill time in Mt. Vernon, IL. The hotel's continental breakfast ended at 9 every day, so I got into the habit of waking up at 8:45, trudging downstairs in my pjs, eating a biscuit, and then going back to bed until noon or one. Other highlights included going to a $5 movie theater to see "Easy A" and "The Social Network," eating lots of pasta, wading in a pretty lake (because for some reason, it was freakin' 85 degrees out there), and marveling at Mt. Vernon's recreation of the Washington Monument. Seriously, they have a model of the Washington Monument next to the movie theater, for no apparent reason. It's probably about 20 feet tall. I don't understand.
And then, hallelujah! We got to perform again! After three days of total leisure (I wonder if these sorts of tours always have so much free time, or if the economy is bringing down the amount of actual performance time), we had three shows in one day, at this lovely performing arts center. I think these performances were some of the best we've had so far. The kids were attentive and laughed a lot, and the show felt fresh again since we'd had such a long break. At one of the Q&As, the children gasped when we revealed our true ages. One of them told me she thought I was 10 years old. Another one asked if Liz, who plays my mother in the show, is actually my mom in real life. Liz is 24, and looks like it. I love hearing little children talk about their totally skewed perceptions of age.
And now we're in Ann Arbor, about to head off to dinner!
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Tour so far...
October 4th:
Day one of our five week journey of driving around in a big white van and (hopefully) delighting and teaching children all over the Midwest and East Coast! I'm currently touring around with a children's theater company, playing Amber in their adaptation of the kid's book, "Amber Brown Is Not a Crayon." It's about a little girl whose best friend is moving away and how she learns to accept that. It involves a ball made of chewing gum, dead worms, and swordfights with chopsticks. I put my hair in pigtails and wear a huge, neon green shirt with khaki cargo pants. It's a pretty awesome play, and lots of fun to do. Three other actors (Liz, Jeremy and Stacie), the stage manager (Katie), and I will be spending a lot of time together from now until December 10th, when the tour is totally over. On November 6th, we get to go back to New York for a few days before heading back out on a more sporadic basis. But until then, there's no home, just lots of hotel rooms and diners.
We gave the tour a sort of “test run” last week, going to upstate New York for about three days and doing four shows before returning home for the weekend. Highlights from that trip included almost running out of gas in the middle of nowhere in the pouring rain with no cell phone service, drinking from natural springs, and performing for a bunch of kids who were way too young to understand the show and proceeded to have conversations with each other during the more serious parts of the play.
But it didn't really feel like we were in it for the long haul until the 4th, when we all tossed our heavy suitcases into the back of the van and set off for Old Forge, NY, ready to follow the directions of our trusty Tom-Tom GPS.
Except Tom-Tom is awful. We must have driven about 45 miles out of our way before Katie (our primary driver) noticed that the mileage we'd gone according to Tom-Tom hadn't budged. Adding to our stress at that particular moment, the woman who coordinates all the tour stuff called to tell us that, since a performance in Iowa had been canceled, we'd be heading back to the city for the weekend. Normally, I'd be super-excited about getting more time in my apartment with my roommates and such, but I had just sublet my apartment (as had a few of the other people on the tour.) We'd also packed huge suitcases that we weren't looking forward to lugging around the city any more than we had to, and had all mentally prepared ourselves for five weeks on the road, saying our big goodbyes already. So we had a few moments of unhappiness and weird, unmoored emotions until it turned out that we weren't going home after all. Now, it turns out, we'll be spending three days off in the hopping Mt. Vernon, IL, where one of the major employers listed on the city's website is Walgreens. But actually, it has a big movie theater. That's all I need. And I'm pretty excited to explore/sleep.
With all the stressful stuff squared away, we made it to the Adirondack Lodge by nightime, played some pool volleyball (we're all pretty sporty people, being actors and such), and set out in search of dinner. I wasn't hopeful, as our meals on the first leg of our tour had mainly come from places like IHop and Taco Bell. Liz found this place called Sister's Bistro, which looked promising, and we decided to check it out.
All of my food snobby assumptions about the quality of meals in this tiny town were blown away. I don't know if I can adequately describe how awesome this restaurant was, but I'm going to talk about it forever anyway. First of all, the restaurant itself was beautiful, located in an old house with a winding staircase. We ended up sitting at the bar with the friendly, full-bearded bartender. For an appetizer, Liz and I split something called "The Gourd," which consisted of radiccio bowl filled with cubes of pumpkin and feta cheese, flavored with vanilla. Then I had cider-roasted salmon with figs and mixed greens, and Baked Alaska for dessert. We all shared with each other, and nobody got a meal that was anything less than delicious. 90% of their ingredients are locally grown, the service is incredibly friendly, and the story behind the restaurant is really sweet: Two sisters lived far apart, one in Old Forge and the other in Michigan. When the Michigan sister came to visit, they realized that they missed each other way too much. She decided to close the distance gap by moving to Old Forge but needed something to do, so together they opened this restaurant.
Whew. I promise that I won't normally spend that much time describing my meals in detail. But I feel like that may be the best I eat on this trip, so I wanted to memorialize it.
October 5th:
We got up at 6 am, because the theater company's policy is that cast members need to be at any given theater/school two hours before a performance to have enough time to load in and set up the set, get into costumes, etc... while allowing a grace period in case of traffic or other unforseen circumstances. Our performance was at 9:45 at a school roughly 45 minutes away from the hotel. It's no fun getting up when it's still dark outside. We got to the theater, loaded everything in, and then decided to go get breakfast quickly in the time we had left before all the elementary school kids came in.
But while backing out of the school's parking lot, we suddenly heard this horrible scraping noise coming from the back of the van. Turns out that we had just banged into the school's greenhouse, tearing off a big old chunk of plastic from the side. After a moment of hesitation, we decided to just continue on our way to get breakfast and deal with it when we got back. But when we got back, the school doors were locked. Ultimately, we got back in and had less than 20 minutes to get into costume and make-up. The show itself was a bit of a disaster in parts. Our music is prerecorded, and somehow we got off at one point. I broke the chewing gum ball by throwing it way too wildly for Jeremy to catch it (I'm telling you, my sports skills are just fantastic!) and again, it seemed like a lot of the kids were too young to get the play. But somehow we got through it without too much damage.Then we somehow had to drive back to Old Forge (40 minutes away in the best circumstances) and load in for a 12:50 show. Keep in mind that we finished our first show at around 10:50 and weren’t able to finish loading everything into the van until about 11:20. Then, we had to wait for the maintenance man to come around and talk to Katie about the greenhouse.
Him: Wow. You took a big chunk out of that.
Us: We’re so sorry.
Him: How does that happen? Were you looking?
Us: We’re sorry.
Him: You know, you have mirrors on your van.
Us: We know. WE'RE SORRY. WE NEED TO GO.
Anyways, once he’d finally stopped repeating the obvious, we sped off to our next destination, reaching the school at around 12:15. Our performance was in school's gymnasium, so we set up makeshift wings with gym mats and storage boxes. But I actually really liked performing in the gym, because unlike in the theaters we'd been at previously, you could actually see the children's faces. I get to talk to the audience a lot, so I basically got to spend a fair of time looking out at adorable little children only a couple of feet away, smiling at me.We had a Q&A session afterward, with one little boy who raised his hand just because he wanted to wave to us.
We ate lunch at 3:30 (first real meal of the day!) at a diner, then drove to Watertown, NY. Our bartender at Sister's Bistro warned us that Watertown was a big gang activity place. But it seemed pretty nice, so we settled into our Econo Lodge and fell asleep almost immediately.
October 6th:
Another two show and two location day. This time, we were in school gyms for both performances. More opportunities to interact with super-cute kids! We had another Q&A after our morning performance. When we asked if anyone had questions, about half of the kids raised their hands eagerly. A few of them had actual questions (i.e. "Were the worms real?" "Was that really chewing gum?") but a far bigger number didn't really seem to know the definition of "question." Instead, they said things like, "I liked the play." So I'm not complaining.
My personal favorite was one little boy who had been vigorously raising his hand in the air the whole time. When we finally called on him, he said "Um... I read books."
After that, we had to load out of the gym while a bunch of the kids were having class, and they kept running up to us and giving us hugs and waving and doing similarly adorable things. On the way to our second performance (also in a gym), we tried to rescue a homeless kitten on the side of the road. Ultimately, we didn't know what to do with it so we knocked on a random door and gave it to the man who answered.
Okay, there's much more to say about the past few days, but if I don't get this posted now, I don't think I ever will.
Day one of our five week journey of driving around in a big white van and (hopefully) delighting and teaching children all over the Midwest and East Coast! I'm currently touring around with a children's theater company, playing Amber in their adaptation of the kid's book, "Amber Brown Is Not a Crayon." It's about a little girl whose best friend is moving away and how she learns to accept that. It involves a ball made of chewing gum, dead worms, and swordfights with chopsticks. I put my hair in pigtails and wear a huge, neon green shirt with khaki cargo pants. It's a pretty awesome play, and lots of fun to do. Three other actors (Liz, Jeremy and Stacie), the stage manager (Katie), and I will be spending a lot of time together from now until December 10th, when the tour is totally over. On November 6th, we get to go back to New York for a few days before heading back out on a more sporadic basis. But until then, there's no home, just lots of hotel rooms and diners.
We gave the tour a sort of “test run” last week, going to upstate New York for about three days and doing four shows before returning home for the weekend. Highlights from that trip included almost running out of gas in the middle of nowhere in the pouring rain with no cell phone service, drinking from natural springs, and performing for a bunch of kids who were way too young to understand the show and proceeded to have conversations with each other during the more serious parts of the play.
But it didn't really feel like we were in it for the long haul until the 4th, when we all tossed our heavy suitcases into the back of the van and set off for Old Forge, NY, ready to follow the directions of our trusty Tom-Tom GPS.
Except Tom-Tom is awful. We must have driven about 45 miles out of our way before Katie (our primary driver) noticed that the mileage we'd gone according to Tom-Tom hadn't budged. Adding to our stress at that particular moment, the woman who coordinates all the tour stuff called to tell us that, since a performance in Iowa had been canceled, we'd be heading back to the city for the weekend. Normally, I'd be super-excited about getting more time in my apartment with my roommates and such, but I had just sublet my apartment (as had a few of the other people on the tour.) We'd also packed huge suitcases that we weren't looking forward to lugging around the city any more than we had to, and had all mentally prepared ourselves for five weeks on the road, saying our big goodbyes already. So we had a few moments of unhappiness and weird, unmoored emotions until it turned out that we weren't going home after all. Now, it turns out, we'll be spending three days off in the hopping Mt. Vernon, IL, where one of the major employers listed on the city's website is Walgreens. But actually, it has a big movie theater. That's all I need. And I'm pretty excited to explore/sleep.
With all the stressful stuff squared away, we made it to the Adirondack Lodge by nightime, played some pool volleyball (we're all pretty sporty people, being actors and such), and set out in search of dinner. I wasn't hopeful, as our meals on the first leg of our tour had mainly come from places like IHop and Taco Bell. Liz found this place called Sister's Bistro, which looked promising, and we decided to check it out.
All of my food snobby assumptions about the quality of meals in this tiny town were blown away. I don't know if I can adequately describe how awesome this restaurant was, but I'm going to talk about it forever anyway. First of all, the restaurant itself was beautiful, located in an old house with a winding staircase. We ended up sitting at the bar with the friendly, full-bearded bartender. For an appetizer, Liz and I split something called "The Gourd," which consisted of radiccio bowl filled with cubes of pumpkin and feta cheese, flavored with vanilla. Then I had cider-roasted salmon with figs and mixed greens, and Baked Alaska for dessert. We all shared with each other, and nobody got a meal that was anything less than delicious. 90% of their ingredients are locally grown, the service is incredibly friendly, and the story behind the restaurant is really sweet: Two sisters lived far apart, one in Old Forge and the other in Michigan. When the Michigan sister came to visit, they realized that they missed each other way too much. She decided to close the distance gap by moving to Old Forge but needed something to do, so together they opened this restaurant.
Whew. I promise that I won't normally spend that much time describing my meals in detail. But I feel like that may be the best I eat on this trip, so I wanted to memorialize it.
October 5th:
We got up at 6 am, because the theater company's policy is that cast members need to be at any given theater/school two hours before a performance to have enough time to load in and set up the set, get into costumes, etc... while allowing a grace period in case of traffic or other unforseen circumstances. Our performance was at 9:45 at a school roughly 45 minutes away from the hotel. It's no fun getting up when it's still dark outside. We got to the theater, loaded everything in, and then decided to go get breakfast quickly in the time we had left before all the elementary school kids came in.
But while backing out of the school's parking lot, we suddenly heard this horrible scraping noise coming from the back of the van. Turns out that we had just banged into the school's greenhouse, tearing off a big old chunk of plastic from the side. After a moment of hesitation, we decided to just continue on our way to get breakfast and deal with it when we got back. But when we got back, the school doors were locked. Ultimately, we got back in and had less than 20 minutes to get into costume and make-up. The show itself was a bit of a disaster in parts. Our music is prerecorded, and somehow we got off at one point. I broke the chewing gum ball by throwing it way too wildly for Jeremy to catch it (I'm telling you, my sports skills are just fantastic!) and again, it seemed like a lot of the kids were too young to get the play. But somehow we got through it without too much damage.Then we somehow had to drive back to Old Forge (40 minutes away in the best circumstances) and load in for a 12:50 show. Keep in mind that we finished our first show at around 10:50 and weren’t able to finish loading everything into the van until about 11:20. Then, we had to wait for the maintenance man to come around and talk to Katie about the greenhouse.
Him: Wow. You took a big chunk out of that.
Us: We’re so sorry.
Him: How does that happen? Were you looking?
Us: We’re sorry.
Him: You know, you have mirrors on your van.
Us: We know. WE'RE SORRY. WE NEED TO GO.
Anyways, once he’d finally stopped repeating the obvious, we sped off to our next destination, reaching the school at around 12:15. Our performance was in school's gymnasium, so we set up makeshift wings with gym mats and storage boxes. But I actually really liked performing in the gym, because unlike in the theaters we'd been at previously, you could actually see the children's faces. I get to talk to the audience a lot, so I basically got to spend a fair of time looking out at adorable little children only a couple of feet away, smiling at me.We had a Q&A session afterward, with one little boy who raised his hand just because he wanted to wave to us.
We ate lunch at 3:30 (first real meal of the day!) at a diner, then drove to Watertown, NY. Our bartender at Sister's Bistro warned us that Watertown was a big gang activity place. But it seemed pretty nice, so we settled into our Econo Lodge and fell asleep almost immediately.
October 6th:
Another two show and two location day. This time, we were in school gyms for both performances. More opportunities to interact with super-cute kids! We had another Q&A after our morning performance. When we asked if anyone had questions, about half of the kids raised their hands eagerly. A few of them had actual questions (i.e. "Were the worms real?" "Was that really chewing gum?") but a far bigger number didn't really seem to know the definition of "question." Instead, they said things like, "I liked the play." So I'm not complaining.
My personal favorite was one little boy who had been vigorously raising his hand in the air the whole time. When we finally called on him, he said "Um... I read books."
After that, we had to load out of the gym while a bunch of the kids were having class, and they kept running up to us and giving us hugs and waving and doing similarly adorable things. On the way to our second performance (also in a gym), we tried to rescue a homeless kitten on the side of the road. Ultimately, we didn't know what to do with it so we knocked on a random door and gave it to the man who answered.
Okay, there's much more to say about the past few days, but if I don't get this posted now, I don't think I ever will.
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