not an update

One of these days I'll update with fun-ness from Hartford and Baraboo. In the meantime, check out the article linked here, with interviews by Mr. Mancheski and Mr. Kaplan :)

Also, check out what a rockstar I am when I wear Bill's sunglasses (I have a habit of NEVER bringing mine on the road with me)

Stoughton

Ah, Stoughton... what a beautiful theater! This was the first stop all week that we actually got to stay at for more than a day, so load-in and out were for once NOT on the same day. It's about time, as that schedule becomes very exhausting after a while.

The Stoughton Opera House was quite the unique little setting for our skit though. Built in 1898, it's a gorgeous, very cute space... that unfortunately is in the second floor of city hall... in a building in which there is no freight elevator. Our roadboxes and shanty walls just BARELY fit onto the elevator, one at a time, of course. Meanwhile, our show deck did NOT fit, and was definitely too heavy to be carried, so we did without it in Stoughton. And, as you can see, this meant that we did without our ice holes, as well.

Once the roadboxes were unpacked, they had to go back onto the truck, which had to be parked several blocks away. Normally we can just leave them backstage, but here, not only was there no space for them backstage, but there wasn't even a way to get them TO stage. We unloaded them from the back of the house... it wasn't the most efficient of load-ins, but I think we did great given what we were up against!

Because the theater is so old, it had a lot of charming characteristics. Many of the walls backstage and leading to the dressing rooms were graffitied with signatures from previous shows, many of them dating back to the beginning of the 20th century! The seats, although they certainly don't look as comfortable as many other seats, have the added bonus of top-hat holders, as you can see on the bottom of this seat. I thought perhaps I should be weary of backstage ghosts, but was instead told that I should be more worried about bats... the building literally has bats in the belfry!

On Monday, we had plenty of time to kill before Hotel check-out and show call, so Kathi, Bill, Craig and I drove down to New Glarus for the afternoon, wanting to hit up the Brewery Tour there (they make Spotted Cow, one of my favorites). The town itself is a wonderful little Swiss town; I felt like I had stepped into Europe. There were certainly plenty of cowbells hanging around, and all of the shops on the main street were a great diversion.

We had a smooth second show that night, followed by load-out. This took a bit longer than

usual as you may be able to imagine, seeing as

how we had to bring all the road boxes back from the truck to the second floor, pack them, then send them back down again!

Meanwhile, back at the hotel, we were impressed by both the security system and fitness center. I'm not sure that my picture captures just how sad this little camera was (doesn't it look shy and a bit timid?)... and please note, there WAS NO exercise equipment!

Finally, just so you know, if your laundry detergent ever freezes, a hair dryer will do the trick!

A few more pictures of the week can be found here.

Fun night in Manitowoc

The Capitol Civic Centre, our next stop on the third week of touring, is an old restored movie theater; a lovely space! It's deceptively large, too, seating over 1000 people (and yes, we were sold out).

Load-in was not as smooth as it sometimes is due to the unique lighting situation here (side light? who needs it?), but in the end we took less than 4 and a half hours, and had time for a great Thai meal just across the street. It was HOT, and good!

Lots of visitors came up to Manitowoc, including about 30 members of Doug's family, Steve's mom, Kathi's family (and dogs!), Annie, and Drew... so obviously lots of fun was had that night, back at the Holiday Inn's hotel "lounge". It was a late night, and a fun one!

There and Back Again

Middleton the Second:

As predicted, load-in went super fast and smoothly as we returned to the Middleton High School PAC for a second time.

This third week and crazy schedule is starting to take its toll on the crew (including me!) who are resorting to Burger King bobble-heads and traffic cones as a source of entertainment now. If you were with us, you'd understand ;)

Our hotel in Middleton was nice, although about 20 minutes from the theater... it was actually in Madison. We enjoyed the hot tub here though, and getting hit on in the computer center late at night is always a good time, too.

As for load-OUT, having already experienced the out before, our PAC helpers were quicker than any I've witnessed yet!

South Milwaukee

So close to home...yet so far! Another one-day stand, we once again did the "drive, load-in, perform, load-out" schedule. We had a pretty great crew helping us out at the high school's performing arts center here, so things in South Milwaukee might have been described as "uneventful"...the most exciting thing that happened was that I go to drive Bill's truck to the hardware store!

And, as evidenced in the photos, we found some fun hats in the scene shop and couldn't resist trying them on...
Here are some shots of the PAC itself... the one of the House only includes about half the seats, as it is a very wide theater.

Highlights from Middleton

...pictures will follow our SECOND trip here in a week...!

So, some important highlights from today:

Today I woke up to find that not only was my cell phone dead, but it would no longer hold a charge! A tour manager without a cell phone hitting the road again is a VERY SAD tour manager. Luckily, Craig and Bill and I arrived in the Madison area with enough time to hit up a Verizon wireless kiosk at a nearby mall and get me a new battery! This new battery is now happily charging away in my hotel rool.

For the first time today, our cast members were asked if they could do autographs after the show. Only a few audience members were able to catch them, but I'm sure that they could be persuaded to do some more on Friday when we're back in town.

We've got a new fancy load-in schedule, which consists of 4.5 hours rather than the previously schedule 4. This makes us feel much more human and less pressed for time, and I think it's safe to say that 4.5 hours are a GOOD thing. On Friday, when we come back, we won't need to re-focus the lights, so really, load-in should take about an hour and a half. Won't that be nice?

Kathi will say funny things over headset when the system gets unplugged JUST before she's about to call a cue. Funny to me, not so much to her ;) Craig also often has the potential to send everyone on headset into 5-minute laughing fits during the show.

Finally, Joe Bu was here at the show tonight and that was a personal highlight for me. It's great to see familiar Rep faces out on the cold roads of Wisconsin!

Speaking of which... today we did loaded everything back onto the truck in balmy -2 degree weather. I really love my gloves.

More on Middleton in a few days.

Hitting the road again, Jack

After a week off in Milwaukee, tomorrow it's time to hit the road again for a fun little line-up, consisting of:

-Middleton, Wednesday night

-South Milwaukee, Thursday night

-back to Middleton, Friday night

-Manitowoc, Saturday night

-and Stoughton, Sunday and Monday nights.

Manitowoc in particular promises to be rather exciting, especially considering the Ice Shanty contest they've got going on! We'll arrive in town a day too late to participate in the voting, but the winner WILL be announced during our show! Here's a preview of the fun they're having up in Manitowoc right now:

Wausau!

Lobby displays...

The beautiful Wausau Grand Theater - 1200 seats with 3 sold-out shows!

And after the shows, we found a gift from the local Leinie's distribution center!

Eagle River

Welcome to Eagle River - the snowmobile capitol of the world! Notice the event going on the same weekend as us, the Female Snowmobile Derby - "Women on Snow"!I'm not going to lie; I am now FASCINATED by all things snowmobile! Appropriate, I suppose, for working on a show in which one of the most popular songs is called "Ode to a Snowmobile Suit".Okay, now on to the theater itself. We performed at Northland Pines High School, which we could see from the hotel parking lot! It's a beautiful, brand-new renovated theater, very sqeaky and clean and shiny and new.

And finally, check out Steve Kolling's get-up for his curtain speech!

Long-Overdue Ladysmith Update

Our first LONG drive warranted
a first stop to fuel up! Diesel fuel is costly, but it's fun that you can pump from both sides of the truck at the same time!



Here's a shot of the afore-mentioned bluffs that I was able to get a quick shot of as I drove past them.

We performed at Ladysmith High School, which is a true high school auditorium-type space. There were lots of scenery pieces from West Side Story in the backstage area, which were fun to navigate around.

At first, we thought the dressing room area would be the band room, but last-minute they realized that the pep band would be performing across the hall that night! This would, of course, entail high school students wandering in and out of the room to collect their instruments, so we moved the costumes to the band director's office.

We enjoyed our hotel very much, especially the fitness center! It had one exercise bike :)

However, dinner at El Rancho was not QUITE as enjoyable. (Jimmy is a very helpful model for dipsplaying pleasure and displeasure alike)






Thank you, Ladysmith!