Improv class #8: On with the show!
Last class--and our big show! *fanfare, please*
We didn't have to be there until 10 AM--we'd run through some sketches, then on with the show!
Mom and I arrived to find the glass panes looking into the room had been covered over with black garbage bags. I didn't get that right away, but Paul wanted the room to be dark when the lights were off, much like a regular theater. Unfortunately, though he'd done the taping the night before, it had all fallen down! When we walked in, Paul and older Haley were taping up the large viewing window by the hallway. Mom and I set to taping the viewing window looking into an adjoining room. The window in the door had already been done. But the whole taping part was an improv in and of itself. One of the moms walked in and asked, "How long do you think the show will be? My mom said, "About a week." Nice. But after trying to hold up the garbage bag and tape it--not myself, not my sweater--to the window frame, it felt like we'd already been there a day. Even the lights were a problem; Paul taped them up but they weren't working that well. Even when the building was renovated to accommodate the theater, the electrical lines were messed and Paul didn't discover that until last week. There wasn't enough time to fix them. He had to rig up a lighting system.
(Sidenote: Mom asked, "Is this duct tape?" Yes, mom, glad it only took you 50 years to discover what duct tape is.)
Because we couldn't be in the audience, we were sequestered in the hospitality room and the dance studio. The layout of the studio is like this:
(South) Dance studio - Hospitality room/Office - Small backstage area/Hallway - Stage/Theater (North)
When we practiced the scenes, we still stayed in the rooms to the south/left. Paul set up the mats in the dance studio, so the kids were tumbling on those when they weren't needed for a scene.
While we were rehearsing, Paul's wife Cynthia came in with their daughter, Gracie. She's just over a year and cute. She was just a really happy kid who made happy baby squealing sounds. Cynthia stayed in the dance studio with her during the show so she wouldn't disrupt anything.
Paul was pretty stressed. I don't think he's put on a show like this before, particularly with little kids in his very own studio, so understandably he was short-tempered. Not super-short, like he was yelling at everyone, but a bit snippy. Surprisingly, the kids were behaving better than ever. Either Paul got through to them about the stage being the "magic place," or they were freaked out about performing--or both.
Cynthia made up programs for us with our names in them and everything. Only one skit changed; in the program it said the first sketch was "A Movie"...(Performers) All. In rehearsal, though, Paul said to do the scene at an ice cream shop that we'd done a couple weeks ago. Brianna was a little upset that she wasn't mentioned in the "Stinky Diaper" scene, but I told her she had a cameo--a little surprise appearance. And, whenever Kyle's name appeared, next to it in parenthesis was Frank. :)
Having a program with everything listed was great for us; we knew when everyone was going on stage and in what order. Yay!
The house was packed. Granted, it's a small house, but everyone's parents were there, plus siblings and even someone's grandparents. I think they overall liked the show, but it wasn't quite what Paul had hoped for. Still, there were some funny scenes. Wayne thought the bed scene went over pretty well. I thought the space shuttle scene went okay, but it was different than in the past. We had a little reception afterward in the hospitality room, so we stood around talking for a while. I discovered that Brianna takes gymnastics. She had been flipping around on the mats before the show, so I asked if she did it for fun or if she took lessons. She said she also took piano and acting and some other stuff--what a busy kid! She was hoping to start horseback riding lessons, too. She's a nice girl who reminded me of myself at that age.
It was nice to do a show, but I would have liked more actual classtime. Maybe Paul could increase the timeframe to ten weeks--eight weeks of classtime and two weeks to prepare a show. I also liked having just the adults, not that I had a problem with most of the kids. But the dynamic is so different when you have just adults versus adults and kids, especially when some of the kids are so young.