A Typical Day
OK, so let me give you an example of what happened to me yesterday, because it will give you an idea of how bizarre a "typical" day is for me.
Our matinee was full of orphans. It was a charity event sponsored by our hosts, so half the audience was kids, and rowdy kids at that. They explained to us that most of them have never seen live theatre, and considering it was subtitled and some were to young to read, it was going to be a bit tough. For most of the show we actually enjoyed a lively audience, since so far all the audiences throughout this leg of the tour have been VERY well-behaved. In China they would sing along and yell randomly, but in Japan it is rude to laugh, and we missed the fun. However, when the kids started clapping along it started to get a little strange.
In the middle of the second act the Captain and Maria get married, and the nuns are all onstage to sing a giant medley. The clapping was started by one lone clapper, and suddenly EVERYONE was clapping along to our 'Confitemini'. Mind you, this is some hardcore Latin church music, and suddenly it was a jamboree! It got even funnier as we switched into 'How do you Solve a Problem Like Maria' which dances to a different beat. This did not discourage the orphans, who just kept clapping at whatever beat they liked. By the time we sang into the third song in the medley, everyone on stage's shoulders were shaking with laughter. Anyone who was singing had only to look at anyone else on stage or in the orchestra pit to completely lose it.
It would have been funny enough if that was the end of it, but no. The lone clapper tried to start a clapping movement during Every Other Song in the show. Even the finale... 'Climb Ev'ry Mountain'. Needless to say it was a riot.
Now if that had been the only excitement of the day, it would have been one thing. But no, there were other fun tidbits. During Maria's opening song, 'The Sound of Music', her petticoat decided to break and fall off her body. This happened to be the day that she had forgotten her black tights, so when we sang and danced around later in 'My Favorite Things', everyone saw her undies. In fact, this was a double undie feature, since when I stood from a bench to begin singing, I lifted my skirt far higher than I needed, causing our sound man to later ask me if I really had been wearing green undies.
During our break between shows I went with my friend Maria to one of our favorite dinner spots that's close to the theatre. Usually in whatever town we're in, all of us white people find some hot spots that we rotate eating at. This restaurant is called The Witches Table, and we like it for its fresh salads and warm peanut butter banana sandwiches. After we ate, the waitress/cook came over to talk to us, and she brought me a CD. A lot must have gotten lost in the translation, because she kept saying, "remember last week? I go hmmmm. You like? hmmmm. Singing!" and humming. I had no idea what she was talking about, but after five minutes I just gave up and started smiling and nodding. At which point she gave me a CD! Now I'm sure it was supposed to be for someone else maybe in the cast or crew, but since we all look alike (to the Asians) I took it anyway not to be rude. This happens all the time! We have about five plus size ladies in the cast who are always being asked to sign my picture, and any skinny girl with dark hair is presumed to have played Maria. Pretty funny.
Thank Goodness we got it together for our evening show, since the special guest last night was the Mayor of Seoul. He's actually running for S. Korean president, and is favored to win. After a photo shoot onstage after the show he presented us all with gifts... of watches. It's true, I now have a watch (of which the band is so small and designed for a Korean lady that it might fit around my thumb) that says Hi Seoul on the face.
The day ended with some episodes of Alias bought bootlegged from China and some room service. The end of just another regular day.
Our matinee was full of orphans. It was a charity event sponsored by our hosts, so half the audience was kids, and rowdy kids at that. They explained to us that most of them have never seen live theatre, and considering it was subtitled and some were to young to read, it was going to be a bit tough. For most of the show we actually enjoyed a lively audience, since so far all the audiences throughout this leg of the tour have been VERY well-behaved. In China they would sing along and yell randomly, but in Japan it is rude to laugh, and we missed the fun. However, when the kids started clapping along it started to get a little strange.
In the middle of the second act the Captain and Maria get married, and the nuns are all onstage to sing a giant medley. The clapping was started by one lone clapper, and suddenly EVERYONE was clapping along to our 'Confitemini'. Mind you, this is some hardcore Latin church music, and suddenly it was a jamboree! It got even funnier as we switched into 'How do you Solve a Problem Like Maria' which dances to a different beat. This did not discourage the orphans, who just kept clapping at whatever beat they liked. By the time we sang into the third song in the medley, everyone on stage's shoulders were shaking with laughter. Anyone who was singing had only to look at anyone else on stage or in the orchestra pit to completely lose it.
It would have been funny enough if that was the end of it, but no. The lone clapper tried to start a clapping movement during Every Other Song in the show. Even the finale... 'Climb Ev'ry Mountain'. Needless to say it was a riot.
Now if that had been the only excitement of the day, it would have been one thing. But no, there were other fun tidbits. During Maria's opening song, 'The Sound of Music', her petticoat decided to break and fall off her body. This happened to be the day that she had forgotten her black tights, so when we sang and danced around later in 'My Favorite Things', everyone saw her undies. In fact, this was a double undie feature, since when I stood from a bench to begin singing, I lifted my skirt far higher than I needed, causing our sound man to later ask me if I really had been wearing green undies.
During our break between shows I went with my friend Maria to one of our favorite dinner spots that's close to the theatre. Usually in whatever town we're in, all of us white people find some hot spots that we rotate eating at. This restaurant is called The Witches Table, and we like it for its fresh salads and warm peanut butter banana sandwiches. After we ate, the waitress/cook came over to talk to us, and she brought me a CD. A lot must have gotten lost in the translation, because she kept saying, "remember last week? I go hmmmm. You like? hmmmm. Singing!" and humming. I had no idea what she was talking about, but after five minutes I just gave up and started smiling and nodding. At which point she gave me a CD! Now I'm sure it was supposed to be for someone else maybe in the cast or crew, but since we all look alike (to the Asians) I took it anyway not to be rude. This happens all the time! We have about five plus size ladies in the cast who are always being asked to sign my picture, and any skinny girl with dark hair is presumed to have played Maria. Pretty funny.
Thank Goodness we got it together for our evening show, since the special guest last night was the Mayor of Seoul. He's actually running for S. Korean president, and is favored to win. After a photo shoot onstage after the show he presented us all with gifts... of watches. It's true, I now have a watch (of which the band is so small and designed for a Korean lady that it might fit around my thumb) that says Hi Seoul on the face.
The day ended with some episodes of Alias bought bootlegged from China and some room service. The end of just another regular day.
posted by Beth at 8:16 PM
1 Comments:
dad was rolling on the floor laughing about the clapping. save that watch and give it to your cousin Emily! you're actually an excellent blogger!
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