March 26, 2009

After much adrenaline and not much sleep, I have come out of my fog to deliver the post-mortem.

For those who have wondered, Cheyenne Jackson had hoped to play the role of The Policeman (not the stripper) but had to bow out a few days before the show because of his commitments to "Finian's Rainbow" at City Center that starts tonight. So Mark Waldrop got Todd DuBail to play The Policeman and he was excellent. (Todd can be seen here in the first photo on this link. Wow!) Dashaun Young, sweet and sexy, played Boom-Boom the stripper. Dashaun is currently playing Simba in "The Lion King" on Broadway.

Monday morning I got the word that Whoopi was sick and would not be appearing on The View that day, and would try to get to the theatre at 6:30 p.m. (Rehearsal was scheduled onstage at 1:00 p.m. Dinner break was scheduled for 6 to 7. House open at 7:30.) I didn't see how this could work, and found it disheartening. But when I thought about the fact that Lisa Estridge, Whoopi's "rehearsal proxy," was well-rehearsed, and that the costumes could be altered to fit her, I took heart again.

I couldn't find my cell phone that morning, so I wasn't hearing from the car service. They had my land line number but weren't using it for whatever reason. I did finally hear from them and arrived at the theatre about seven minutes late. But because of the construction across the street, and the fact that the driver wasn't thinking fast enough, he wasn't able to stop in front of the theatre and had to drive all the way around the block again. Then when he got to the intersection of Sixth Avenue and 42nd Street he couldn't make a left turn! So he went east several yards and made a U-turn that was probably illegal. I got to the theatre at 12:15 and thankfully Kimothy Cruise was waiting for me and helped me with all my stuff. (If I didn't have so much stuff to transport, car service or taxi wouldn't be necessary.)

Charles was already in the dressing room. I unpacked my things and we started putting on our microphones with the help of a very nice sound guy named Andy who works with Matt Berman. That was all easy enough. Dashaun rehearsed his number at 1 p.m. and they were ready for us at 1:30 as scheduled, with Charles, Bryan and me in costume. We started at the beginning and steadily worked our way through the show. Around 4 pm we got the word that Whoopi would not be doing the show and Lisa was taken downstairs for the alterations. We continued to work without her and when it was time to stage the bows, she was brought back wearing her first dress inside out because that's the way they were marking and pinning it for the alterations (she's smaller than Whoopi). The bows were staged and the only thing left to do was for me to rehearse my number (Charles was to have a number, too, but he decided to cut it).

There was a sound problem that had to be worked out, and I saw Roma Torre and Donna Karger waiting in the audience, so I introduced myself to them. Donna and I had met briefly before; she's very shy. And very chic in person. Tiny and thin like a model. Roma is also a very lovely woman, and not shy at all. These two ladies were part of the surprises we had planned. They both appear on a popular theatre program on the local cable television news channel we have in New York called NY1. It's on channel 1 on Time Warner Cable, and their show is called "Onstage." Donna is the host of "Onstage" and Roma is a theatre critic. I'm going to brag and say it was my idea to have Donna come onto the stage at the end of intermission and make the usual kind of introduction she makes on "Onstage" and then introduce Roma who would give her fake review of the first act of "Legends!" Her fake review would segue into a pitch for Friends In Deed. This all worked beautifully, and the next day NY1 ran a short segment about it that you can see right here. It's amazing how the media loves to feed off of, and plug, itself!

The sound was fixed. I rehearsed my number with the sound and the follow spot (that I had to put my foot down repeatedly to get, behavior I hate to have to exhibit; I wasn't raised to stick up for myself and it doesn't come easily to me) and then it was time for a bite to eat a little after 5:30.

In the dressing room, Louis Braun the makeup guy had set himself up. Just before 6 we started makeup. I didn't like the eyelashes Louis put on me; they were too severe and not appropriate for the character, so I made him change them. He wasn't happy. Again, something I shouldn't have to go through, but what's right for the show is right for the show.

Gerard Kelly arrived with the wig at 7 and it looked nice. He had added some more copper highlights at my request and seemed to have washed and freshened it so it didn't look like it had too much product in it. We put the microphone under it and Gerard styled it, and that was done.

Lisa was sent to Louis and I wasn't in the room when he did her makeup. He made her look very nice (I had never seen Lisa without her eyeglasses, or wearing any makeup, and she had always had her hair pulled back in a pony tail) but he had put glitter on her eyelids. That was totally wrong, because she has to be able to fool Leatrice into thinking she works for Sylvia, and it's just another day at work. So the glitter was removed. With her wig and costume, Lisa looked spectacular. It was like a Cinderella moment. She said she was ready to throw up, but she was smiling the whole time. I think she was loving it, and later on one of the dressers told me Lisa was very excited. I told her she was a pro, and she would be fine, and she was all that, and more. She was just great! Read about her success here from Playbill.com.

Christine Ebersole was already planning to come to the show and I think it was Michael Borowski's idea to have Christine go onstage and let the audience know that Whoopi wouldn't be there. There were signs on the front doors of the theatre teling the public that Whoopi would not be there, and plenty of buzz in the lobby about the fact, but it was important to make an announcement. Christine also encouraged the audience to be supportive of Lisa, and they were. She got an ovation when she appeared.

Fran Lebowitz was the narrator of the show, she got her laughs I'm told at the beginning of the evening. I was in the dressing room (my character doesn't appear for about 15 or 20 minutes) so I wasn't able to hear everything. But I couldn't stand it any longer so I went down to the wings to hear what was working, and what might not. I heard Bryan getting laughs and when Charles made his interest the show really started to cook and I was very proud. Proud of my own work, and proud to hear Kirkwood's text finally getting New York laughs.

Charles and I were both shaking onstage, filled with adrenaline and nerves, but I tried to keep my performance cool and not push. I hope I succeeded. Dashaun of course got a huge ovation; he and the choreographer Josh Rhodes did fine jobs.

During intermission the hair and makeup people freshened us and Patrick McMullan and Bruce Glikas came backstage to get photos of all of us: Christine, Charles, Lisa, Bryan, Todd, Dashaun, Fran, Donna, Roma, Mark, Josh and me. See Patrick's photos here. His associate took the production photos. See Bruce's photos here.

I think we were more relaxed during the second act, but, as Charles says, the play is a souffle that you have to work hard to keep light. The audience was response was enormous and the event was pure showmanship thanks to the director Mark Waldrop and others.

More photos were taken afterwards (with Fabio Toblini the costume designer and Ray Klausen the set designer) and there was a weird autograph hound who got backstage. Bored with that, I decided it was time to get out of all the trappings and face packing up. I'm going to publish this post now, and finish the rest of the evening and the event of the next day later on. Maybe later today. Thanks to everyone who attended the show, or were interested in it!