Unlike most of the civilized world, my weekends are not a time to rest and recuperate from the daily grind of the week.  Enjoy a Sunday afternoon stroll through the park?  A leisurely brunch at a cozy cafe?  A lazy Saturday on the couch catching up on missed TV?  Yeah, right.  How's this for leisurely - Friday, work eight hours in the office and then commute to NJ to play in the pit for Little Women; Saturday, spend the morning building sets and then play a matinee and evening performance of Little Women;  Sunday, rehash elementary school memories papier mache-ing dock posts and painting sets at the CDC Theatre and then lead a 3 hour Carousel rehearsal.

After a weekend like that, sitting in my comfy, ergonomic desk chair with nothing more strenuous to do than type on a keyboard and answer a phone seems like a day at the spa.

I can only fantasize about those lazy weeks in June when all I'll have to do is work one full-time job and not have to double commute mid-week for a rehearsal in Jersey where I'll be on time, yet everyone else will be late even though my commute is time twice as long and I'm relying on public transportation.

God, I'm bitchy these days, right?  Maybe I still haven't recovered from Oprah canceling The Rosie Show.  Though two lesbian day-time talk show hosts (Ellen/Rosie) does seem like overkill.  More likely, it's because the annoying Big Brother team hasn't yet been eliminated from The Amazing Race.  I just want to strangle that Rachel with one of her ridiculous sequined tank tops every time she starts whining about how tired or frustrated she is.  Oh, and can you believe how fierce Michelle Obama looked on The Biggest Loser?

Or maybe I just watch too much reality TV.

Once, Finally...

The longer I put it off, the less I'll remember, so here are my thoughts on Once:

Though Broadway's had its fair share of musician/actor casts trod the boards in recent years, this cast tops them all as quadruple threats (singing, acting, dancing and playing instruments).  By the nature of the score (pop/folk) and the contemporary story, the musician/actor paradigm doesn't seem as gimmicky here as it has in some recent productions.

I don't love the score, though the Grammy-winning hit song, "Falling Slowly," has grown on me after repeated listening.  In general, the music has a sameness to it that, truthfully, makes me a little sleepy.  It doesn't help that it's almost all ballads, lovely as many of them are.  But after a few listens on my iPad, I've decided the score works better in context.

The leads are incredibly charming and charismatic (Steve Kazee is super dreamy) and are probably the reason the show works so well despite the thin plot.  I foresee many an interminable evening when this show hits the regionals with less than ideal casting.  Cristin Milioti's quirky Czech character verges on annoying, but the actress somehow manages to add enough heart and humanity to pull the character out of cartoon territory.

The real star of the show is the director and choreographer who have created a fluid, dream-like evening that is gorgeous to the eye (thanks also to fantastic lighting design) and ear.  Their creative use of movement and space have added a depth and import to what on paper probably appears to be a somewhat slight narrative.  There's nothing wrong with simplicity, of course, but trimming to a 90 minute intermission-less evening would probably have greatly improved the pace.  The songs, too, sometimes don't lend themselves to a theatrical setting and aren't necessarily specific to character or situation.  Some are diegetic (look it up) and some are merely just extended emotional responses to what's happening onstage.

Once is a cute little show that possesses a unique charm, but I'd be hard pressed to pay for a second viewing with so many other shows opening this spring.  I'm thinking it probably works better in a smaller venue anyway, like where it started downtown at NYTW.  The kind of intimacy required to pull of this material just doesn't transfer to the nosebleeds where Trish and I were seated.  It seemed there was a lot of sniffling and tears in the orchestra section, but I was oddly unmoved (though thoroughly entertained).

Liked it, but didn't love it.

On a side note, we bumped into our favorite dancing cowboy, Todd Roman, in the lobby before the show.  Mr. Moneybags had row F center orchestra seats.  Well, excuse me! 

Anyway, I'm now off to Port Authority for tonight's opening of Little Women at APA.  If you're in the North Central Jersey area, come check it out and wave to me in the balcony where they've relegated the orchestra in their pit-less black box theatre.  I'm playing keyboards.

Week from hell

This week's heinous work schedule has made me question whether the Pinedas are supremely ambitious artists or just plain stupid.  I'm actually leaning toward the latter, as would many who have worked with us in the past. Oh, the things you can learn from facebook.

Thankfully, NJ Transit now has a strict "no donkey" policy, making my long commute much more pleasurable.

Carousel rehearsals are in full swing with just a month until opening night.  We're also heavy into tech week of Little Women which opens at the performing arts high school this Thursday and we just finished callbacks and sent out notification letters for our summer production of Legally Blonde.  

 For any full-time theatre artist, working on three shows simultaneously would be considered an ambitious feat.  So what the hell am I doing committing to all these projects now that the theatre is just an elaborate "hobby" for me?

As a recently turned corporate zombie and slave to the 1%, I have sold my soul for the luxury of a regular paycheck and health insurance.  Can you blame me?  A decade's worth of dignity crushing auditions and the degradation of serving hors d'oeuvres to snooty NYC socialites between the occasional acting gig will do that to a person.  Ironically, now that I've "retired" from the business, I'm busier than ever with directing and choreographing gigs. 

Since last Friday, I've slept in my apartment twice.  Everyday this week I'll head to my 9-to-5 and then run to Port Authority for a Jersey-bound bus for a rehearsal, run-through or performance of some kind.  I'll then turn around for the lovely commute back to my wreck of an apartment in Queens - getting home after midnight - for a couple of hours of sleep and to throw my unopened mail onto an ever growing pile on the kitchen table.

Speaking of my kitchen table (left), did you know that fisherman chic is the latest trend in interior design?  Not.  Those are just some fishing nets I've tea-dyed on my stove and hung up to dry.  You guessed it, I'm also the scenic painter, set designer, and set dresser for Carousel. FYI two-liter soda bottles make dandy fishing buoys with just a little creative papier mache-ing and craft paint!

Did I also mention my parent's are visiting and staying in my apartment for a couple of days?

I know, I know - I still owe you all a Once review.  Well, you'll just have to keep waiting.

Double checking your work

The Music Man opened last night at APA, the performing arts high school in Union County, NJ.  This is the first fully-staged musical the school has produced.  Ever.  Can you believe that?  A performing arts school that's never done a musical?  Anyway, for some background, when APA decided they needed to produce a musical, they hired Juan and Val as guest artists.  Of course, hiring one Pineda means you've basically hired the staff of Pineda Conservatory, so Señor Chris and I were jobbed in for choreography duties and Trish was lassoed to do hair, make-up, costumes, photography and any other random crap that might get overlooked. 

Happily, the students acquitted themselves nicely.  For a first effort, it was actually quite impressive and the sold out crowd seemed to enjoy themselves.  There were no major flubs or disasters and the show timed in at a reasonable 2.5 hours even with the intermission.  I mean, the cast shaved about a minute from "Rock Island" alone given the craz-azy tempo they set.  Seriously, it was like they all did lines of coke before boarding that train.  But they pulled it off and we didn't even have to stab anyone in the heart with adrenaline. 

Given the show's extremely limited rehearsal time, I just barely finished choreographing "Marion the Librarian" the week before tech.  In fact, I had to leave it up to the cast to finish up the number since I literally ran out of rehearsal time.  Since I was also recruited to play keyboard in the pit, I hadn't really watched the show (I was trying sight read the damn score during the last two run-throughs) until last night.  And thus the title and moral of today's blog:  Always double check your work. 

Looking up to admire my brilliant choreography during last night's performance, I realized that perhaps I hadn't explained my concept for the library scene quite as clearly as I had thought.  Suffice to say, there will be an early dance call before the matinee on Saturday.  Sorry kids, art isn't easy. 

Of course, we haven't even closed Music Man yet and we're already rehearsing our next project, Die Fledermaus, with Pineda Lyric.  I've adapted the script for our kids and hopefully I've made the convoluted plot and dialogue a bit more palatable.  I mean, it's still cheesy, but at least I was able excise some of the more dubious jokes. 

It's fascinating to see how political correctness has aged both Music Man and Fledermaus.  Both shows literally use disabilities for laughs - Music Man has a lisping child and Fledermaus has a stuttering lawyer.  At yesterday's performance, you could feel the audience squirm uncomfortably when Amaryllis first makes fun of Winthrop's lisp.  I could see the communal thought bubble rise above the audience's head, "Do not laugh at the lisping boy." 

I guess it's all in the set-up.  I mean, the audiences at Book of Mormon are convulsing with laughter at the line, "F*ck you, God, in the ass, mouth and c*nt."  In comparison, lisps and stutters don't seem so bad.

I'm now off to see my accountant.  Hopefully I'll get a nice juicy return this year.  Then three more Music Mans this weekend and I can collapse on the couch with a pizza, a pint of Ben & Jerry's and my DVR remote.