We Told The Story

For out of what we live
And we believe
Our lives become
The stories that we weave.
-Why We Tell The Story
Once on This Island

Last Sunday we sunk the island. Our show closed. After that long run, I still love the show and everyone I worked with. I'm sad to see it end. I was always glad to come to work. This show is in the top 5 of shows I've done. Actually, more like Top 3!

A week before we opened, Hurricane Katrina had hit. It almost seemed like life was imitating art. Here's an article from the Snohomish version of The Seattle Times where our director and actors speak of it.

We got the cutest letters from a 6th grade class that had come to see one of our student matinees. They were all typed and they drew pictures as well. One of the letters started "Dear Cast and Help." Which meant crew. We were introduced as "crew: the people that you don't see who help make this show possible." So from then on we referred ourselves to "The Help."
In the Everett theatre, the sound board is out in the house. During one show, the house manager tapped me on the shoulder to tell me something. I gave her the "just a minute" hand sign. We did this routine about three times before she finally gave up. I really didn't have a moment to speak to her. Later, she talked with my stage manager. She said that she's never seen anyone work so hard at the sound board before and why did I still have to move all those faders up and down when all the actors were already on stage? My response: "No one understands my job". (which is not true, but sometimes it feels like it). And we actually did have actors coming on and off stage during that time, they are just so smooth at it, plus some were speaking in to others mics (phase cancellation or other bad things if I wasn't careful).
Lead Deck timed the book scene: one minute, fifteen seconds.

Ahhh the memories:
Theme Nights; no hos in their nets?; Island Ball; stop calling me Shirley; caaaar waaaash; why aren't they singing?; Island Girls Gone Wild; Tag and Mad-Libs - who's steering the island?; Spot 5 standing by; The Watchers; Anyone know why we tell the story?; Bitter & Judgemental; Creepy Hug; Ah, the Samba Whistle; The frogs are my favorite; YMCA; Say my name. Say it again; Where dreams are - stage left; Magic safety-pins; Timothy's Green Room shows; The 'trip' at the ball;
And many others. (Most of) what is said on headset stays on headset.

During a put-in rehearsal I finally got to play the role I always wanted. We only had a few actors show up for it. Us crew members stood in for the rest. So this little white female got to play Papa Ge - sly demon of Death! I also played Daniel and Andrea. I was following Daniel's track during Beuxhomme but left it briefly to do the one part that I fit: "And he wed a fine lady, so pale and so blonde." It was so funny that that morning when we did the matinee I thought 'I wonder how much you can see through that mask?' Then a few hours later I was wearing it (answer: not much).

My day job ended on Friday. I'm not petsitting this week. So this Monday was the first day I've had off since August. It did start to get a little crazy. I had to schedule in getting gas. So this week I haven't been working, just trying to catch up on everything. It's already Friday and I still haven't caught up.

As I was getting ready to go out after the show Friday, I noticed something as I was putting on eyeliner. "My eyes have turned green!" My friend confirmed that indeed they were very green. Usually they are gray, sometimes looking green-gray or blue-gray. But this was a straight on green-green. And I was even wearing a gray shirt at the time. When I'm depressed for awhile (we're talking days) they go dark blue. But I didn't know what green meant. I've never seen them this green. And I like having gray eyes. Saturday they started to turn back to gray. Sunday they started to head back to green again. (For an update, they are back to gray). So the only mood-eyes color code I can figure is that both days were filled with sentimental good-byes and endings.

Explanations of pictures:

1. 
   Production Photo. "Mama Will Provide." Asaka's Song (Goddess: Mother of the Earth)
2. 
   Kurchta, lead deck. She wore two safety pins on her sleeve every performance because Marlette's (Asaka) petticoat kept ripping. Marlette would always check to make sure she had them, even though once Kurchta started wearing them, the petticoat stopped ripping. On our very last show, she decorated herself in safety pins for Marlette.
3. 
   Between shows on Saturday, Todd (Ton Ton) surprised the girls with Root Beer Floats. You can see some of the letters from the kids pinned on the board behind them. I couldn't figure out what looked odd until I realized that Todd hadn't taken out the fake gray in his hair.
4. 
   What Corebeast had to wear backstage. It was a raked stage and had fiberglass insulation underneath it to soak up sound. She had to crawl underneath it, hence the elbow pads, kneepads, and mask.
5. 
   Timothy (Agwe) and I. I told him we have to have our picture taken together because this is about the fourth show we've worked on together and there is no proof that we even know each other. He is such a talented actor, so versatile. And as a person, very funny and all around great guy.