opening night!

We open tonight. Maybe. Weathermen all over the city are predicting thunderstorms, hail, lightening, dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria! Last night, our final dress rehearsal was called off after 4 scenes because of rain...so we went to Gressos instead and celebrated Kristina Kopf's (Queen Anne) birthday...

The drag about the rain, besides losing a rehearsal, which is never good, is all the stuff I have wear and take off...by golly, here's a marching order of preshow activity:

I arrive at 6:15, with the other fighters. I go into the dressing hole--er, room--and get out of my 21st century clothes. I tape both ankles with athletic tape, then strap up the left one with a high ankle brace with whalebone stays, and the right one with a low ankle brace. Then I wrap both knees with ace bandages, and cover them with thin foam kneepads. Then I put on my Musketeer knicker/breeches and a tee shirt. After that, I force on the knee-high boots, which takes supreme effort after all that taping and bracing. 

Next I put on my wireless mic. This is a little involved. I have a long piece of thick wire that I have shaped like a horseshoe, except that ends curl down. To one side I have taped the long mic wire with black tape. Then I put the rig on my head, curving round the back of it and over the ears, like a headphone. The mic end is now positioned at my sideburn. The plug end hangs down my back. I run this between my teeshirt and my good ole 17th century puffy shirt. Around my waist I strap an ace bandage that holds the rest of the mic unit (about the size of a deck of cards). I have someone plug the mic wire into the unit, after having first turned it on. Oh, almost forgot--each night we roll a fresh condom over the mic unit, to protect it from body sweat. I am saving all the used condoms on the wall above my mirror. Then I tuck in  my puffy shirt, button on my vest, and go up top to the stage for fight rehearsal. 

I stretch and stretch, using a program of exercises Angela Barch  (fight choreo) taught us back in April. Then I go through my list of fights with my fellow combatants, first just marking it (meaning going through the motions), then doing it up to speed.

By now it is nearly 7pm, and the other actors have arrived and the dressing room is jammed (there are around 25 people in this show, with 70 costumes). At my tiny little table (I will post pics of the dressing hole in the near future), I sit and try to apply a little makeup. Long experience in Schiller Park has taught me to be sparing of it, because it will all sweat off in 10 minutes anyway--actually, it sweats off in the dressing room. 

Next I put on my tabard, which is a kind of smock, blue, with the fluer-de lis design on the front. Then I tie a lace collar over the tabard, and then buckle on my sword belt over that.

Now the wig. It is long and straight--not the wig seen in the previous post--and difficult to manage. I put on a wig cap, and then with Angela and Dani's help, we pull on the long wig. It has a shortish ponytail that needs freshening up each day, and all the dangling hair needs brushed out and combed. The ladies pin it all up, arranging strands and spraying down the flyaway bits.

By now it is about 7:45pm, 15 minutes till curtain, and all I have left to do is place my cloak and  jacket backstage (these I put on later in the show), jam my too small musketeer hat over my wig, then put on the long black gloves, put my sword in the sword belt scabbard (called a frog), and pace around, getting my brain around the coming performance.

So last night I did all that, 8 pm comes, the show begins, and 10 minutes later we are back in the dressing room, taking it all off, as the rain blows in thick sheets all over the park.

Tonight, signs point to the same result. But the rest of the weekend looks wonderful--low to mid 70s and clear, mid 50s at night--maybe a trifle chilly for the audiences, but perfect for us on stage.

And so begins my summer. For the next ten weekends, from Thursday-Sunday nights, I will be in Schiller Park--the first five as Athos, the dark and dangerous musketeer, and the last five as Caliban, the green and dangerous "hag-born whelp" from The Tempest.