Toma por el Pueblo de Calabaza! (Drink for Pumpkinville!)

It's our last night here in beautiful western New York, and despite the lack of population, the scenery is absolutely gorgeous. Totally idyllic early fall foliage. I'm loving it.
We had two really great shows at Salamanca High School/Middle School, and for the first time, we went out in the hallway after the show to say goodbye to all the kids. They seemed really excited to see us. We were like rock stars!....for very short, brightly colored groupies.
Today also marks the second time we've been graciously fed by the school's cafeteria, and let me tell you...MY high school's cafeteria was nothing like this.

We loved it. We had lunch with the school's drama/band teacher, who introduced us to a student of his as "professional actors from New York". The student's reaction was priceless, like we were the suddenly so important. Too cute.

We got our itineraries confirmed through November 10, so if you want to check it out, the calendar posted on the "News" section of my website: http://www.barrielinberg.com/News_JJKE.html

Our load-out is getting quicker, which is a huge relief. It's no fun doing two shows after building the set, then get all higgeldy-piggeldy when we're already tired, trying to load the van again. We'll have it down to an art soon enough, I'm sure!
After the shows today, Carl Michael, McBee, and I were plannign on going to Alagany to take a walk, but instead decied to go to Pumpkinville, which had been recommended to us by almost all the locals. Being a huge fan of freshly-pressed apple cider like I am, I was all kinds of on board from Day 1. It was a really cute, nice place, with hay rides, products for sale, apples, squash, and tons of pumpkins, plus a fun corn maz that took us a good 40 minutes to navigate. I bought some hommemade jam, a bumper sticker for my laptop, and half a gallon of cider that had been pressed on Saturday. MONEY.

Tomorrow, we have one show in Arcade, NY, then it's a loooooong haul back to NYC for two days off before we REALLY hit the road. We'll be gone from Oct 2 til just before Thanksgiving!! Time to pack!

Quote(s) of the Day, from 9/25

"You need to take a Wawa chill pill." -Caro, to Melissa
"All my straight friends are married. Or gay." -Tony
"It some kind of Jesus shit...with an R...REDEMPTION!"- Danny

"Estuviste en el espectáculo de Dora?" ("Were you in the Dora play?")

And so it begins...

We had out very first show day yesterday, at Floral Park Bellerose School in Floral Park, NY (in Queens), at 10a and 1p, for an estimated 500 kids (?) and teachers. Let me begin this post by saying that I am grateful for this job, and it is a truly rewarding experience to share what I love with The New Generation, many of whom have never seen live musical theatre before. I know--and love, may I add--that in the life of a theatre performer, there will always be uncertainties and surprises. That being said, I find it therapeutic to share not all only the good and brilliant, but the frustrating and ugly bits of my strange and beautiful life.
So.
I was up at 5, to make it to the parking garage in Harlem at 7. We were running a little late, but the commute to the school was pretty uneventful (although I did have my first run-in with NYC toll booths. Who knew you had to STOP for the arm to come down in the FASTPASS lane? Not me, as it turned out. I didn't hit it, but it was an adventure for everyone in my van!). When we got to the school, we discovered that the theatre (which is beautiful, btw) was only accessible through a series of hallways, stairs, and one (much appreciated) elevator. So our load-in became an episode of Legend of the Hidden Temple, only with big/cumbersome/numerous set pieces. This being our first show, we haven't quite gotten our set-up down to a fine art, so it was a little rough, plus we were on a time crunch from leaving later. We pulled it together like the champs we are, and the first show was a lot of fun, and the kids really seemed to enjoy it. It was a new experience having the sound system set up in a real hall, and it turns out we were WAY oversinging, thinking that we weren't coming through the system as well as we actually were. *learning experience!*

Tony's mic and my mic both cut out intermittently through the end of the first show, so when we came back from lunch (at a very tasty local pizza joint!), McBee got to work on fixing our mic packs. Tony's was a quick fix, but mine was a whole different matter. A bum cable, as it turned out, and all our replacement cables were duds as well. We kept my shaky cable in, and I proceeded to do the entire show singing as close to people's faces (and mics) as possible, to pick up off their microphones. With my garlic breath from lunch, I'm so grateful for their fortitude. :) I missed my quick change with Melissa (Dora) in the opening scene, while I was doing pre-sets and preparing for my scene after the scramble to get my mic fixed. Not an excuse, but DAMN did I feel stupid, and Melissa was a true pro and made it work. I owe that girl a beer. Or twelve! The show was hectic, but I think we did a great job, and the kids responded pretty well.
It had started raining at lunch, and it didn't let up by the time we had to load our set back into the van. So, back through the Hidden Temple, then waiting for the kids to be released from school, then loading the van was a long process. BUT! While toting our peices through the hallways, tons of kids kept waving to us, clapping, and just wanting to talk to us. The best was when we were in the theater, toward the end up breaking everything down, and a whole horde of kids were released into the theater to wait for their parents, and they EXPLODED into applause, chanting our (character's) names. What a great feeling. Hopefully some of these kids will remember us fondly and maybe even a few will pursue the arts, the way I did after seeing Les Mis when I was four. Not that I'm necessarily comparing a Broadway touring company of Les Miserables to our rag-tag bunch of artists, but even so...
We finally got back to the Harlem garage at 5:30p, exhausted (but revived from our gas station ice cream!), but happy. We tried to hop on the 1 train, but it stopped at 92nd street (probably because of the UN conferences going on downtown. The jerks.), so we found other ways of getting home, which for me involved walking through Central Park with Carl Michael and Carolina, catching a cab to Grand Central, and finally getting home on the 7. I. Was. POOPED.

Best night of sleep, EVER.

Travel day tomorrow, to Olean, NY, then three shows in the area Mon-Wed!! Bring on the free continental breakfasts!

¡Vamos ya! (Let's go!)

Had a great, busy, luxurious day off today.

Tomorrow is our first show, in Floral Park, NY. Van call at 7am in Harlem. Eek. Let's play "How Many Strange People are Riding the 1 Train With Me at 6am?" !!

Agujas son divertidos! (Needles are fun!)

today was our first run-through with an audience of people! People who have never seen the show! People who need people! They seemed to really enjoy it, and it was so nice to hear the sound of laughter and applause, as opposed to the scratching of our AD's pen as she jotted down yet another fudged blocking formation, or another "Oh" instead of "Ah". Not to say that these things aren't important, but sometimes we get so bogged down in the mechanics and details of a show that we forget WHY and FOR WHOM we're really doing this, why we do what we do. It was a great feeling, if not the most flawless of shows. Dev (our director)'s godson even came, along with his mother, Andrea Burns, who originated the role of Daniela in IN THE HEIGHTS on Broadway. It was kind of fantastic to perform with someone like that looking on, but to be honest, I completely forgot she was there two minutes into the show, I was just so focused on the job at hand. After the show, she and her son congratulated us, and she made a point to tell me that she was impressed with my performance. Grain of salt or no, that feels good. Muy muy bueno.
During our lunch break, I went to the Chelsea Sports Medicine Clinic to be seen by the doctors there, who would determine exactly what is wrong with my shoulder. After much poking, prodding, twisting, and pushing by the (rather attractive) doctors, they concluded that I haven't done any crazy damage to my rotator cuff, onyl strained it, a condition which should be remedied by anti-inflammatories and PT. They did suggest that some prolotherapy injections could help relieve the pain (after an initial couple of days of more soreness), but that he generally didn't go that route until after PT results had been seen. I stressed to the doc that I would not be physically in NYC consistently enough to follow a PT plan, and we agreed to go ahead and try the prolotherapy now, in addition to going through as much PT as I could while in NYC. I got 17 injections along two major tendon/muscle lines, which HURT and STUNG like crazy. The shock caused me to hyperventilate and convulse, and I had to lie down for a hot minute before dragging my butt up and jelly-legging it back to rehearsal, where I proceeded to do yet another run-through (the one that Ms. Burns attended).

I suffer for my art.

After the run through we had some music brush-ups with our Musical Director, the same who told me to belt the F in my song "Powerless". I belted the D that precedes it, and he seemed pleased, but encouraged me to "push myself" to get to the F. I suggested that that is perhaps not the healthiest choice, considering I only have one more rehearsal day left, and no travelling vocal coach to make sure I'm using a brand-new singing technique correctly and safely. Still not sure what I'm oging to do about that. it turns out  my director assumed that I was merely makring through the song this entire rehearsal process, and that I secrely possesed the ability to belt an F and was simply choosing not to. C'mon, seriously?? I go full-out on everything else, why would I hold back on that if I had it in me? So now I feel bad that with my current skill set, I am disappointing my bosses, but also angry that I am expected to pull this feat off without any help. I may be La Bruja, but I'm no Wizard.
Anyway, later, we broke down the set, and I stumbled back to Queens for some well-deserved chicken curry and wine. We have one more rehearsal tomorrow, then a load-in of the set to the van, then a BLISSFUL day of rest....then our first show on Friday! Here we goooooooooo!

El final del camino está en vista (The end of the road is in sight)

Is it Saturday? Where am I? Who are you people and why do I have castanets in my hands?

I can't believe our rehearsals are almost at an end! Only four more days until they set us loose on the world, and while I am excited to begin performing for the kids, we still have a good amount of work to do. We started doing run-throughs a few days ago, and HÍJOLE is it hard to keep up my energy like that for an hour straight! If I'm not on stage, I'm doing a quick change, or backing up harmonies, or setting props for the next scene, etc. Never a dull moment! Blissfully, every run--flawless or otherwise--becomes the one solid hour of the day  in which I am incapable of thinking about the things going on in my life I'd rather forget. So despite all the physical and mental stress that are part of this process, I am thankful. So, so thankful.
Anyway...
The show is coming along great, and our costumes are fabulous, and I hope to get some pictures up soon. There are four other TheatreWorks shows in rehearsal at Chelsea Studios (Charlotte's Web, Junie B Jones, Skippyjon Jones, and Seussical), and it's been really interesting to hear snatches of songs from the other productions, as well as chat with some of the other performers.
Tomorrow is our producer's run, where The Powers That Be will sit in on our run and pass judgment on us mere mortals. Eek! It will be our first time with microphones!! Then we'll have our invited dress rehearsal on Tuesday, then on Wednesday we load the van, and then Thursday off, and then we have our first show on Friday!
I have our itinerary up through October 13th posted in the "News" section of my website, and if any of you out there would like to see a show, let me know, and I'll figure out how to make it work!
In other news, I have to figure out which storage facility I'm going to use to store my stuff while I'm on the road, since I'm moving out of my apartment on September 30. Gah! When it rains, it pours, right?

Hasta la próxima vez..

¿¿Ya es una semana??

¡Caracoles!
Has it seriously been 6 days since we started? I feel like today was my 2nd day of rehearsal, at most. The time has gone by so quickly, and we've made so much progress...my concept of time is waaaaaay off. I think I speak for all my castmates (and SMs, directors, and choreographers) when I say that brains have been FRIED this week. We've done some great work, no doubt, but damn. Information overload. Whoo!! Looking forward to our day off tomorrow (except that I have a bunch of errands to take care of, so it's not quite as relaxing as I'd like it to be...ah well, no rest for the wicked!!)

We should be finished putting up the show on Tuesday, after which time it'll just be drill drill drill until we have this show down pat. We have a producer's run on Sunday, so there's a certain amount of pressure to have it gorgeous by then, but I know we'll do fine. We should have our official schedules for the first four weeks of tour no later than Wednesday, and I can't WAIT to have a more clear picture of where we'll be. I posted a tentative calendar on My Website if you'd like to see a rough outline of where we're going, but be sure that I'll have the solid schedule up as soon as I can. I can't wait to start this journey!

Despite being exhausted, it feels so incredible to be back in a rehearsal room, reviewing choreography, stressing over word-perfect lines, getting frustrated when wigs aren't fitting correctly...this is my happy place, and I wouldn't trade it for the world.

¡WEPA!

El Primer Día

And so it begins...

We started the day off with a meeting with an Equity rep who explained all the ins and outs of being an Equity member and what being a cast member of a Theatreworks show entails, plus all the benefits, costs, co-payments, fees, dues, 401(k)s, and Actor's Fund resources that are available to us. By 10:30 my brain was close to exploding. I'll have to sort it all out later, but at the end of the day, I am a member of a worker's union! Hooray for labor laws!
Immediately following we had a safety meeting with a therapist from a performing arts clinic in the city, teaching us about good nutrition while on tour (buy stock in trail mix and baby carrots!) as well as how to not blow out our backs while lifting set pieces. Forget sick dance moves, I'm more at risk moving the magic mirrors!
The rest of the day was music, music, and more music.

This show is FILLED with fabulous music, and while I'm not on stage the whole time, I'm singing a lot of the harmony parts offstage, usually while setting up set pieces and helping with quick changes. "No rest for the wicked" takes on a whole new meaning...
My cast mates are fabulous, talented, and legitimately Latino, which makes me the sole honky in the cast.

STAY IN SCHOOL, KIDS! AND LEARN ANOTHER LANGUAGE! You'll stay employed!! Today was busy busy, but thank goodness for our fabulous musical director Zach who was patient and positive through it all.
And then the skies opened up and rained like a champion, and all my music got wet.
So thank goodness also for hair dryers.

¡WEPA!