Tonys and random sh*t

It's almost Tony time people. Closeted Midwestern teen boys, their unknowing hags and of course, yours truly, will be glued to their sets Sunday night. At the moment, I'm scheduled to be at the CDC theatre (again!) all day Sunday working on that damn trolley. Fingers crossed we'll be done in time to catch the opening number which is supposed to be a medley of pop tunes performed in current Broadway shows. This obvious attempt by CBS to make the Tonys, and by association, Broadway, more hip has “disaster” written all over it. I mean, pop songs sung by Broadway voices in little snippets out of context and in possibly ridiculous costumes may well just kill Broadway for good. Give it up already, CBS. Tony viewers are a niche audience. Your typical, beer-guzzling, football-loving, Ohio blue collar dude will not be tuning in because some unknown actor is doing a cover of a Green Day song. I’d like to keep my Tonys elitist, nerd-centric and totally gay.

Due to some recent replacement casting announcements, I may have to bite the bullet and pay for return trips to some current shows. Brian d’Arcy James, who I caught off-Broadway, is back for the Broadway run of Next to Normal. I’m hoping to find a date where Ripley’s out because I don’t know if I can take a another whole evening of her raspy, under-pitched singing. Girl can act, but her voice is a wreck (and I used to love it back in the Side Show days). Then I’ll probably have to go back again to see real husband and wife team Marin Mazzie and Jason Danieley take over the lead roles in July. That’s a lot of crazy in one month.

I may also have to suck it up and buy full price tick’s to A Little Night Music once Bernadette and Stritchie (that’s Bernadette Peters and Elaine Stritch for you straight people) start their run in July. I’m wet just thinking about it.

I also just subscribed to the Public Theatre for the first time ever so I can secure priority tickets to … wait for it … a 6 1/2 hour, 2 intermission adaptation of The Great Gatsby where the full text is read. I know, I’m a total masochist, but it sounds so crazy I have to be a part of it. Even crazier is that fact that it had a sold out run earlier this year in Boston!

Lost weekend...

It seems I must resign myself to a weekend-free life. Per usual, I spent this past weekend in the Cranford, NJ sweatshop known as CDC theatre. Remind me again why I toil in third world conditions for just pennies an hour? Ah, yes, for the love of the thea-tuh! And in this case, love stinks - both literally and figuratively. We’re talking rainforest-like heat and humidity and lethal levels of black mold and mildew [insert long, self-pitying sigh here].

Free time in general seems to be a rare commodity for me lately. Having just spent months in rehearsals and the last three weekends in performances of The Wedding Singer, I had hoped for at least a brief respite from all things Jersey [insert second long, self-pitying sigh]. Every night last week I commuted to NJ for rehearsals of our Young Artist’s production of Donizetti’s Elixir of Love. Unfortunately, there’s this little thing I do during the day called “a job” that has a pesky habit of getting in the way. I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. I do appreciate the steady paycheck and commensurate lifestyle it affords, but that damn NJ/NYC/Queens commute does me in. I may just have to bite the bullet one of these days and relocate to at least west of the East River. It will pain me to give up my New Yorker status, but…oh God, I just can’t think about it right now. It’s like considering a move to Siberia.

Anyway, the opera went as well as can be expected for a 90 minute reduction of a 3 hour opera translated into English performed by grade school kids and accompanied by an orchestra of three (violin, flute and me on piano) sight-reading the score. Given the unfortunate overlap with Wedding Singer, poor Val was stuck with the mammoth task of producing and rehearsing this one on her own. Despite the reduced rehearsal time, the kids still managed to pull their sh*t together in time to make us look good.

So after a week of tech hell, two performances (our final Saturday night performance was pre-empted by the Westfield HS prom!), how do I choose to spend the rest of my weekend? Luxuriating at an Upper East Side spa? Enjoying the services of a high-priced rentboy? No, silly. At the theatre, of course!

With the Summer Conservatory just around the corner, Val decided we should get a head start building the set for Meet Me in St. Louis, one of the summer shows we’re producing with the high school group. But not before a celebratory Thai feast (we de-virginized Chris Grimm, yeah!) and making a drunk supply run to Home Depot. So armed with paint brushes and Egg McMuffins, we found ourselves right back at the theatre at 9am on a very hot Sunday morning trying to build a Victorian Mansion and full-sized working trolley car on the miniscule CDC stage.

Luckily, we had forced our brown and white sons - Greg and Chris respectively - into slave labor and hired our trusty paintress, Christy, to add her artistic flair to St. Louis. After ten hours of continuous labor we had painted most of the side stages, constructed half a trolley car and built various random pieces of Victorian furniture. Thanks to some creative dumpster diving, Greg was also able to find us some nifty trellis pieces. I love that the Westfield trash is better quality than what I have in my own apartment.

TDF weekend

Since Wedding Singer held my evenings hostage for the last several months, I’ve not been able to get my regular theatre fix. So how do I spend my first mullet-free weekend of 2010? In Broadway immersion mode, of course. Thanks to TDF I saw three shows in two days - Sondheim on Sondheim, Next Fall and Everyday Rapture. Oddly, all three have religion as a central theme (if you count Sondheim as a religion, which I do) and are super gay. How’s that for irony?

Though word of mouth has been decidedly mixed, I enjoyed the uneven quirkiness of Sondheim on Sondheim (May 28, 8pm). I’m a confessed Sondheimite (not to be confused with a Sodomite, though the two groups naturally share an overlapping membership), so I guess it’s no surprise. Don’t get me wrong, it’s far from perfect. The staging is often bland and pointless. One of the director’s favorite “staging” devices is having the cast aimlessly wander the stage in random formations, regardless of context or lyric. And its ballad heavy format nearly kills the second act. What saves the show from crossing into college lecture territory is the music, the performances (why is Norm Lewis not a star?) and the video clips of Sondheim describing his writing process. Why see it? Steve divulges some great dirt about his private life (damn, his mom was a c*nt!), Vanessa “Dorian Gray” Williams shows off her voluptuous rack and Barbara Cook demonstrates how old school charisma trumps our current cookie-cutter Broadway star blandness.

To be honest, I decided to see Next Fall (May 29, 3pm) because it contains two of my favorite things - cute boys and a tragic death scene. Sadly, the boys weren’t all that cute and the death wasn’t all that tragic. I was so looking forward to a good “Love Actually” cry (dreamy Colin Firth proposing in broken Portuguese gets me every time). But was left disappointingly unmoved. I guess the play had some controversial subject matter (gay Christians, partner rights, etc.), but came off like a very good Lifetime movie only without the awesome cheese factor of a Valerie Bertinelli or Meredith Baxter Birney. I was never bored, but I didn’t really care all that much for the characters. They were all pretty much assholes or losers.

Sherie Rene Scott’s semi-autobiographical Everyday Rapture (May 29, 8pm) is like a really great cabaret act on steroids AND crack. Granted, the unintelligible first number (I did not understand a single lyric in the opening) could easily be tossed or replaced. But what follows is a subversive, funny and personal account of how religion, morality and fame effect people in different ways. If you do not appreciate sarcasm or parody, stay away. Scott’s dry wit and delivery is nothing new to a jaded New Yorker, but will leave more naïve audience members confused and probably offended. Is it a Broadway show? Not really. And I think some of the show’s inherent intimacy is lost on that big, empty stage and ugly set. Extra props to Scott for the funky song choices and for featuring some curvy gals as her Mennonettes.

Highway to Hell

How long does it take two Filipinos, a couple boxes of vintage 80’s costumes and a bag of dirty laundry to travel by car from Scotch Plains, NJ to Astoria, NY on a Sunday night?

a) 1 hour
b) 10 minutes
c) Over 6 hours
d) All of the above

If you guessed “c,” congratulations, you’re probably a jaded bitch who feeds off of the bilious snark and hyperbole of sad old queens like me. If you guessed “d,” well, you’re just plain stupid. Regardless, my personal Trail of Tears began with a dignity-stripping emergency potty break on the side of the interstate and ended with Trish and I thumbing for a ride with our belongings (boxes and all) on a deserted industrial stretch of Long Island City roadway.

You may remember the infamous "Chewbacca" incident of several years ago. Though not quite as dramatic, this “ride” - and I use the term loosely - lasted just as long as the Richmond trip, only this time we covered a mere 30 miles (as opposed to 340). So for all you aspiring mathematicians, this trip definitely supplied a better “bang-per-mile” ratio.

To provide some context to our evening, Trish and I had spent five hours earlier that day in the moldy CDC basement sorting sweat-stained costumes, picking up dirty socks and t-shirts and wiping down crusty make-up stations. Wedding Singer closed the night before and we were looking forward to a magical evening at home with some Chinese take-out and the DVR. Trish was anxious to finish packing for her six-week-long trip to the Philippines. Since she’d only have one full day at the apartment before heading to Newark, she wanted to have one last relaxing evening at home.

But alas, ‘twas not to be. With the GWB just within our sights, the car’s temperature gauge began a mocking monotone buzz. Of course, with cement walls to both sides of us and no shoulder, options for pulling over were severely limited and we decided to push onward despite the warning. Push on, that is, until the pretty, white plumes of smoke began seeping through the hood. With traffic barely moving and the car threatening to self combust, we decided to risk imminent collision and stop right there on the slow lane of I-95.

Call #1 to AAA - we are connected to something called the GWB Authority for a tow. Fine. Except that I’ve had about a gallon of liquids since we left Juan and Val’s and I will very soon wet myself. With no shoulder and no obvious discrete hiding place, I decide that waving my member out the door for discharge is too gauche even for this demure flower. Instead - as suggested by my resourceful sis - I cut the top off an empty Poland Spring bottle, hop into the back seat, wrap one of Trish’s fashionable scarves around myself for privacy and….aah…relief. Of course, a full, lidless bottle of urine is not something you want or need sitting around a steaming car, so despite the threat of a $500 littering charge, I dump the bottle and contents to the side of the road. Shhh - don’t tell anyone.

A tow truck pulls up and we are temporarily elated. The driver informs us he’s not with AAA. He just happened to drive by, notice our distress and that for cash, he’ll tow us off the highway for much cheaper than AAA. We decide he looks a bit too much like a child molester and wave him off.

Call #2 to AAA, one hour later - Like the first call, the operator transfers us to The Authority (I’ll use this abbreviation for “GWB Authority” going forward since to me, it sounds both menacing and dangerous - but in a sexy, military sort of way). The Authority explains that since they own this stretch of highway, we must use their towing service to get moved off the highway and from there, we can call AAA. Again, fine. But The Authority isn’t going to outsmart us this time. We take their direct number to avoid further wait times and transfers.

Call #3 to The Authority, one hour later - Still no sign of a tow and it’s now dark out. The traffic continues to lurch along slowly. In the last two hours, two good Samaritans have stopped to offer help. No offense to you Caucasian readers, but both helpful souls are minorities. Not that that means anything, but where’s the love from whitey? I’m just saying. Anyway, The Authority now explains to us that we’re actually not on their property. Instead, we need to call the NJ State Police who will set up a tow off the highway and then we can contact AAA. What the f*ck?!?

Call #4 to NJ State Police, 15 minutes later - The state police are extremely helpful and quickly take our location and information. They’ll have a tow truck to us within 30 minutes.

Voila! 15 minutes later a tow truck magically materialized out of the traffic. We’re saved. Except this driver wasn’t dispatched by the state police either. He’s another random passing truck. We’ve been on the side of the highway for over 2 1/2 hours and Trish says, “f**k the police, we’re getting off the road.” For a nominal fee (cash, of course), he is going to tow us to a gas station where we can finally contact AAA.

Call #5 to NJ State Police, 15 minutes later - Trish explains our current situation to the dispatcher. The police won’t take responsibility if we use an unauthorized tow. We don’t care. We are then whisked away to a gas station somewhere in Fort Lee, NJ. It’s closed, but at least now we don’t have to worry about getting rear-ended by a semi.

Call #6 to AAA, 5 minutes later - Trish excitedly speaks to a representative who instantly rains on our parade. Because we are at a gas station attached to a garage, we must prove to the tow truck driver that we do not have any outstanding unpaid charges due to the station. Of course, it being 10:30 pm on a Sunday night in Fort Lee, the garage is closed and we have no way of proving anything. We ask if we can move (push?) the car off the property, but are told that it’s already been documented so we might as well stay put and wait. F*ck you, AAA!!!

Trish now has the same problem I had two hours earlier and walks around the dark property looking for a squat spot. She returns a few minutes later hoping she won’t wake up in the morning with a nasty rash on her dainty bits. For the next 90 minutes or so, I nap and compulsively binge on the only food source in the car, Danish butter cookies and Sun chips. Mmmm, healthy.

It’s just after midnight when the bright beams of our salvation round the corner. Thankfully, this driver has never heard of the “prove-your-not-stealing-this-car” policy that AAA had explained to us just hours earlier. We refrain from kneeling down and kissing his well-worn work boots, jump in the front seat of the truck and direct him to our mechanic’s garage.

It’s now nearly 1 am and we are a block away from Salamis. As we approach, we notice that all the lights are off and the metal gate is stretched across the office door. Did I mention the garage is supposed to be open 24 hours? And that it’s located on a deserted, dirty, industrial stretch of Long Island City? Our friendly tow truck driver declines our tip. He’s probably grateful to get rid of two sweaty passengers and drive away from the likely location of a soon-to-be mugging and double murder.

Call #7 to Salamis, 90 minutes later - Standing just outside the locked office, we hear the ring of the office phone taunt us on the deserted street. Miraculously, someone answers. Tony has been sitting in the darkened office manning the garage phone. Apparently, just their towing service is 24 hours, the garage, however, is closed for the night. Yeah, whatever, just take our car keys and fix the damn thing.

Call #8 to Executive Car, 15 minutes later - Our new best friend, Tony (I made that name up. I don’t have a clue what his name is, but he looked like a Tony), calls us a car. Of course, Trish is leaving for the Philippines in less than 48 hours and has all her dirty laundry in the van as well as two huge boxes full of Wedding Singer costumes that need to be mailed back to the warehouse. We stand on the deserted street corner with all our bags and boxes, serenaded by Tony’s Brooklynese chatter, waiting for our car. Finally, Akmed (I made that name up, too - and yes - I’m racist) pulls up. We load all our belongings into the trunk and back seat of his Lincoln Town car.

“Are you moving?” he asks. “Shut the f*ck up and drive, bitch,” I want to say. Instead, I give a fake chuckle and say, “No, it’s complicated.” He doesn’t pursue it further. He sees by my glare that I’m mentally imbalanced and might possibly stab him through the back of his leather seat cushion with a machete.

We finally get home at around 1:30 am. I carry the boxes up the stairs and immediately head to bed knowing I’ll have to be at the office in seven hours.

(Almost) no rehearsal this week OR Fausto has too much time on his hands because he's writing on that damn blog every single f*ckin' day!

So all I do is bitch and moan about how busy I am. Finally I get a couple of days off and I’m bored. I’m not saying I’m thankful that I had to trudge out to NJ for the brush-up rehearsal last night - and thanks to the MTA for making me miss my bus - but I guess I’m just the kind of personality that needs constant amusement, like a cat or a 3 year old.

Don’t get me wrong, I have plenty to do. My bathroom is disgusting and don’t even ask me how long it’s been since I’ve changed the sheets on my bed. But rehearsals, work and commuting have been a great excuse to put off other, probably more important tasks like cleaning up that lethal black mold city growing in the shower and getting rid of that three week old plastic bag of white and green fuzz in the fridge. And don’t even get me started on the DVR list. I guess I just have to wrap up in my snuggie, order a pizza and have a Fringe, Survivors (BBC series, not the reality show), and Glee marathon. Honestly, I enjoy Glee for the musical numbers (when are they going to have a Sondheim episode? And before you say it, I know, I know, nobody outside musical theatre cares about Sondheim, but a girl can dream), but quite frankly, it’s pretty badly written. I mean, every single character is a scheming two-sided bitch. Even Mr. Shuester isn’t that sympathetic a character. Oh well, maybe it needs some time to find it’s rhythm. I mean, those early episodes of Sex and the City were pretty inconsistent. Remember Carrie’s asides to the camera? Scary. And wait, what was the point of this paragraph? Oh yeah, I’m a procrastinator and use my “busy” life as an excuse to live in filth. Who needs a therapist?

The cast seemed pretty upbeat at today’s brush-up rehearsal. I was afraid people would show up all attitude-y since a brush-up was never included in the original rehearsal schedule. But hell, if you want to maintain “the best dancing that’s been seen on the CDC stage in years” you have to crack the whip, LOL! I don’t mean to make light of a wonderful review in this week’s Westfield Leader (and Ms. Dougherty, if by some weird reason you’ve found this blog, please stop reading) but technically, praising the dancing is a compliment to the dancers not the choreographer. She never actually says that the choreography is any good, although I think that’s what she means. Or does she? In a veiled way is she saying that the choreography sucks and that the poor talented dancers rise above it? Is she trying to sabatoge my career? Does Ms. Dougherty not think I would see through her charade? Mama, am I pretty? Ok, maybe I do need therapy.

Is that a tomato in your pocket or are you just glad to see me...

Like Frankie says, “Relax.” Well, sort of. After months of rehearsals (granted, only a couple of times a week), The Wedding Singer finally opened Friday night. Truth be told, I’m relieved to finally get the show up and running. I haven’t taken the lead - choreography and co-directing - in a big, dance-heavy show like this since Millie years ago and my old, rickety bones and fat ass weren’t exactly an asset in this particular instance.

With all the press, the color pic in this Sunday’s New York Times NJ section and a visit from local boy Matt Sklar (who happens to be the show’s composer!), I think we’re on our way to another big seller for the CDC. I smell a Tony - LOL. And yes, I will take a moment to pat myself on the back, since the last two critical and box office hits at the theatre have also been Pineda productions - last year’s High School Musical and Oklahoma! a couple years back.

The crowds have been wild and vocal (in a good way) and ticket sales are chugging along briskly. It’s nice to see the cast finally relax into their roles and find their timing with a live audience. For better or worse, the f-bomb doesn’t seem to offend much anymore and the sex seems almost quaint nowadays. The reaction that caught me off guard is the huge ovation that greets the first act gay marriage proposal (on both nights). It’s funny how topical that moment is now even though the show was written years before Prop 8 or any of the recent gay marriage debate. And already, several audience members have confided to me that their favorite number in the show is “Single.” Really? I mean, the men certainly sell the sh*t out of it and it’s a great number, but a show favorite? - unexpected. Just goes to show that audiences connect with characters and not difficult dance moves.

On the cast gossip front, I hear (since it spanned well past this old man’s bedtime) that the Saturday night cast party took a turn into college dorm territory with an interesting game of “Truth or Dare,” emphasis on the “Truth.” Hmmm, I might have to take a power nap before next week’s party so I can stay up with the kids and listen in.

And while we're on the subject of not sleeping, I'll soon head into opera territory with Val and the opera company's Young Artist's production of Elixir of Love in a week or so, playing keyboards and helping out with some set painting. From there, we figure out how to build (and store!) a freakin' trolley backstage for the Conservatory's summer production of Meet Me in St. Louis. Vacations are for pussies!

And for those of you in the know, my Big Boy and German Johnson are doing just fine despite the cold weather, thank you very much.

After tonight’s final dress of The Wedding Singer, I feel a bit more secure about tonight’s opening night performance. The invited audience of mainly senior citizens defied my expectations by embracing (or maybe just overlooking) the f-bombs and overt sexuality written into the script. Grandma and grandpa were even up shakin’ their groove thangs during the curtain call!

I’m not saying the run was perfect by any means, but no train wrecks. I’ll have my usual notes and last minute blocking changes. Honestly, it wouldn’t be a Pineda production without me changing the choreography for at least one number during the half hour call tonight.

What I’m most looking forward to about opening tonight? - not having to commute to NJ next Tuesday for rehearsal. My fingers are crossed for many broken legs tonight.

Wedding night jitters...

I can’t believe The Wedding Singer is finally opening tomorrow night after only three months of rehearsal. In case you didn’t get it, that’s sarcasm, folks. Granted, we only rehearse a couple of times a week, but it seemed like a lifetime.

This week was particularly trying as the usual personality flair ups and hidden egos emerged from formerly docile individuals under the stress of the dreaded TECH WEEK. I, myself, am guilty of losing it a couple of times over the past few days, mainly for messy choreography. Unfortunately, my “extremely angry” is other people’s “mildly irritated.” Which I guess is probably slightly confusing for the cast, since I rarely raise my voice unless I’m screaming out counts. The day after my “tantrum,” I had to explain to a couple of cast members that I was, in fact, very angry at a certain individual, even though it seemed like business as usual. Which probably means I’m going to snap one day and murder an entire cast for some trivial mistake - “I said kick on ‘two’ not ‘three.’ Die biyatches!” And curtain.

My other flip out this week was over costume changes. We had a few people complaining about the unreasonable amount of time they had for changes. I don’t know where these people have worked before, but to me, a “quick” costume change is under 20 seconds. Anything over that is basically a spa day. I’m especially unsympathetic when you complain after only trying the change once or twice without giving us the opportunity to work it out. Hello - that’s what tech week is for. It’s especially laughable knowing we had a 15 second full costume change in our last show at CDC. Seth has a fun section about quick changes in his Broadway 101 show - it’s also only 15 seconds and even has a wig change!



I think Trish (our costumer) has finally worked out all the kinks and everyone will get onstage fully clothed. Well, if they’re supposed to be, anyway. Tonight we do our first performance for an invited audience of mainly senior citizens. Scary, I know, considering the show is squarely in PG-13 territory with some questionable sexual content. But, hey, senior citizens deserve a little excitement in their lives as well, right? I feel some walk outs coming.

La Cage…ewww…foul…

Thursday, April 29, 8:00 PM performance

Personal hygiene is not optional if you want to be an active participant in the modern world. How is it that we can govern small countries from our cell phones, but can’t get everyone to use soap? The foul stench emanating from a fellow audience member seriously hampered my enjoyment of the current Broadway revival of La Cage. For most of the second act, I had my jacket pulled up to my nose as a makeshift gas mask. Obviously, I couldn’t quite give my full attention to the action on the stage.

That said, I still wasn’t totally overwhelmed by this British import. My biggest disappointment was the choreography. The production numbers lacked a sense of style and exoticism. I want my drag queens glamorous and fabulous, damn it, and the Cagelles seemed a bit rough and unsophisticated. I guess that might have been a directorial concept, but come on, this is La Cage, I want to see rhinestones, feathered headdresses and high kicks! Enough with these “pared down, gritty” re-thinking of the classics. Producers should just admit they’re cheap and get on with it. And while we’re talking about cheap, the orchestra (and I use the term loosely) sounded like a couple of kazoos and a washboard. Sad, just sad.

Frasier…er…Kelsey Grammer was impressive in his Broadway musical debut. He can carry a tune well enough and is convincing as the butch half of the central couple. The jury’s still out for me on Brit Douglas Hodge’s take on the flamboyant Albin. Although he had some hysterical line readings and has a wonderful gift for physical comedy, his singing voice is almost unbearable. A.J. Shively is a boring Jean-Michel who doesn’t sing or act especially well. His love interest, Anne, was saddled with an ugly Donna Pescow wig a la “Angie.” I kept waiting to see Maureen McGovern’s head poke out past the proscenium and belt out “Let the time flow, let the love grow…” (anyone…anyone? Am I that old?).


I loved Robin DeJesus in In The Heights, but the set’s covered with his bite marks. He hijacks “Anne in My Arms,” upstaging Shively at every turn. Although I’ll bet this blocking is intentional, given Shively lack of voice and charisma. Hopefully, I just saw him on an off night.

Still, the revival had its moments and the chemistry between Grammer and Hodge is always believable. I only wish the production around them reflected the same glamour and finesse. Please, no more Broadway-on-the-cheap.

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