Boogie Woogie Opening at Barksdale

Posted by Bruce Miller

The strike in NYC may be continuing to cripple Broadway, but here in River City, there are plenty of shows to enjoy. Swingtime Canteen (Barksdale’s recreation of a 1944 USO show) opened last night at Hanover Tavern, Moonlight and Magnolias (Barksdale’s behind-the-scenes comedy about the creation of the screenplay for Gone with the Wind) will open next Friday at our Willow Lawn home, and A Christmas Story (Theatre IV’s stage adaptation of the movie that taught us about the perils of bb guns and leg lamps) will open at the historic Empire on November 30.

Plaid Tidings (the Mill’s holiday visit with their favorite harmonizing guys) opened this past Thursday, A Christmas Carol for Two Actors (Richmond Shakespeare’s holiday perennial) opens Nov 29 at Second Presbyterian, and Twas the Night Before Christmas (the Carpenter Science Theatre’s holiday celebration) will open in the Eureka Theatre at the Science Museum of Virginia on Dec 1.

And you still have tonight to catch Spinning into Butter at the Firehouse, and tonight and tomorrow to see A Lesson before Dying, produced by the African American Repertory Theatre at Pine Camp.

Last night’s opening of Swingtime was great fun. Vilma Gil, Jan Guarino, Audra Honaker, Katrinah Lewis (pictured below and to the left) and Debra Wagoner lent their exceptional vocal talents to thirty-four 1940s standards. Ryan Corbitt (piano), Brian Sulser (bass) and Doug Draucker (drums) added the swing as our on-stage band. And Terrie Powers (set design), Heather Hogg (costume design), Joseph Papa (stage manager) and Alex Whiteway (assistant stage manager) were on hand to receive kudos once again for their terrific work.
Barksdale Trustees Rick Arenstein and Jack Ward were there with their wives Rhona and Beverly. Longtime Barksdale supporters Scott and Nancy Belleman, Roy Burgess, Ed Ramsey and his wife, and Essie Simms added their goodwill to the audience, along with Barksdale artistic alum Glenn and Sybel Crone, Ales Rowe and Bo Wilson. Staff members Jackie Gann, Billy Christopher Maupin, Brad Tuggle and Jennings Whiteway turned out to support the troops, and house/box office staff Jeannie Kilgore, Beverly and Danny Hobson (our ushers extraordinaire), and Brenda and Walt Meier did their usual best to keep all trains running on time.

Many thanks to one and all for a terrific opening, and best wishes to all of Richmond’s theatre community for a successful holiday season.

--Bruce Miller

Sneak Peak at Rehearsals - Swingtime Canteen

Posted by John Steils

I think Swingtime Canteen is going to be a GREAT show, and the rehearsals have been fascinating to watch. The marketing office at Theatre IV is connected to the tech booth of the Little Theatre. Nosy marketing interns (who, me?) can watch what’s going on in the Little without disrupting anything. And with Swingtime Canteen rehearsing on the Little stage, a LOT’s been going on.

Steve Liebman, who smiles in real life a lot more than he’s smiling in this internet photo, came down from New York to vocal direct the production. Steve is much beloved in Richmond, I’m told, for his work at TheatreVirginia, where he played Pseudolus in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum and the radio D J in A Closer Walk with Patsy Cline. Liebman fans should know that he’s just as warm and hilarious as a music director as he is as the star of a show.

For a week and a half he led Vilma Gil, Jan Guarino, Audra Honaker, Katrinah Lewis and Debra Wagoner through their vocal paces. They’re an amazing, hard-working cast, and the three, four and five-part harmonies in Swingtime make the most of their talents. That's Audra in the photo to the left, appearing as Little Red Riding Hood in last summer's Into the Woods, opposite Russell Rowland.

Weeks before Steve arrived, Bruce Miller (director of the show, pictured below and to the right) began hunting for a pianist to play the run. The usual suspects were all booked. So the net was expanded and a parade of previously unknown pianists (at least unknown to Bruce) began arriving one by one.

The biggest challenge, it seemed, was the loosey-goosey nature of Swingtime’s printed score. Pianist after pianist would come in, look at the hand-written and photocopied sheet music, struggle to decipher the musical penmanship of the arranger, and ultimately throw his or her hands up into the air.

Sam French, if you’re reading this, the musicians in Richmond all agree that it’s time to upgrade the Swingtime orchestra materials to something more complete and more readable!

Finally Bruce connected with Ryan Corbitt, a professional jazz pianist who has taken this lemon of a printed score and made lemonade. (Ryan is the tuxedoed young man in the photo to the left with jazz great James Moody.) In Ryan's talented hands, the improvised sections soar and the authentic 40s flavor of the vintage arrangements is beginning to emerge.

After the week and a half of singing, Bruce and Jan Guarino (choreographer, pictured to the right) spent a week staging the 30+ numbers. Bruce and Jan make an excellent team, and apparently have worked together on lots of previous hit musicals, including Annie Get Your Gun and Anything Goes. The staging of the Andrews Sisters Medley is 90% Jan and 10% Bruce. The rest of the movement is probably 70 / 30. Maybe even 60 / 40.

Bruce calls himself the “anti-choreographer,” and one look at him trying to demonstrate a move that he wants the women to do justifies his terminology. With all due respect, Bruce dances like a gorilla impersonating Homer Simpson. But he comes up with some really fun staging ideas, and then Jan “translates” his moves into something that can actually be replicated by a human. They have a lot of give and take, and obviously a lot of respect for each other’s talents.

All five women in the cast are terrific dancers and phenomenal singers. And they all seem custom-made for their characters. I can’t imagine a more talented or “perfect” cast, anywhere. That's Katrinah Lewis to the right, performing with Hannah Zold in last summer's Into the Woods.

Vilma Gil, the strongest dancer in this troupe of strong dancers, is still recovering from the major knee surgery she had just a few months ago. During a dance mishap at another theatre, Vilma did some serious damage to her knee joint, and wound up having her left knee replaced with bones from a cadaver. That’s right folks. “Cadaver knee” jokes have been flying left and right as decisions were made regarding which knee to pivot on, etc.

This week, Bruce and stage manager Joseph Papa are beginning to add props to the show, and they include everything from a vintage Roy Rogers double holster (complete with dye-cast cap guns) to authentic Zippo lighters to Hollywood Canteen aprons to two air cannons that will fire, over the sixteen week run, a thousand dollars worth of red white and blue streamers over the heads of the audience.

Interestingly, the cap guns were among the hardest things to find. After careful searches through Toys-R-Us, KayBee Toys, Wal-Mart, Target, Party City and several variations of the Dollar Store, no holstered cap guns were to be found in Greater Richmond. Eventually the perfect set was purchased on line.

If the performances of Swingtime are half as much fun as the rehearsals, we’re in for a great run. That's Debra Wagoner in the photo to the right, and she sings her heart out in Swingtime Canteen. The show opens Nov 16 at Hanover Tavern, and has already been extended to run through March 2. Thankfully, tickets are going fast. Call for yours today!

--John Steils

"Odd Couple" Closes Flush with Laughs

Posted by Bruce Miller

We closed The Odd Couple today to a sold-out house, a theatre full of laughter, and a standing ovation. Congratulations and thanks to all involved.

We had three shows running simultaneously this summer--a first for us. Into the Woods, Disney's High School Musical and The Odd Couple. All three shows were hits, with lots of sold out performances. All three ended on a high note.

As soon as the house lights came up after Odd Couple curtain call, Joe Pabst (the director) and I scurried onto the stage to begin collecting the props we had lent to the production. As soon as the audience cleared, Jeff Clevenger (Speed), Jennifer Frank (Gwendolyn Pigeon) and Dave Bridgewater (Oscar Madison) joined us. Seems that over the years we’ve all learned the same valuable lesson. When you lend a prop to a show, be sure to claim it immediately after the final curtain call, or expect never to see it again.
Somewhere there’s a black hole that contains all the props that are routinely sucked into it approximately 60 minutes after each show ends. These props are destined to remain missing forever. It’s one of the laws of stage physics. I guarantee you that anyone who comes looking for props tomorrow will walk away empty handed. I’ve never figured out where the props go, but they go somewhere. And they go very quickly.

Jeannie Kilgore, who’s been subbing for stage manager Joseph Papa this week, warned me that one of the tin coffee mugs went missing in action this week, before the show even closed. It seems that Scott threw it down the hall one night, as Felix is supposed to, midway through Act II. The mug has never been heard from since. Seems Scotty’s got a great pitching arm. And the black hole was waiting, like a catcher, just offstage, behind home plate. Go Red Sox!

Jeannie also apologized for her faux pas during last night’s curtain speech, dutifully performed by Phil Whiteway. Phil and his family headed off to Nags Head today. Since he knew he’d be missing the final performance, he attended last night to personally thank our outstanding cast and crew.

Whenever Phil shows up at the theatre, he feels honor bound to make a curtain speech. God bless him for it. I HATE making curtain speeches, and more times than not, I ignore my responsibilities (opportunities?) and remain silent. Phil is far more responsible than I. He knows that making curtain speeches is an important component of our efforts to raise funds and sell tickets. So he selflessly mounts the stage, time after time, exercising due diligence for himself and also for me.

Anyway, as his pre-show welcoming speech was drawing to a close, Jeannie Kilgore was pushing buttons in the booth, preparing for the first sound cue (pre-show music) that she intended to start as soon as Phil finished. But, Jeannie, as I said earlier, is only filling in for Joseph Papa, and didn’t know exactly which button was which. So just as Phil was on his last two or three sentences, Jeannie hit the button that started a particularly loud rendition of the second sound cue—a exuberant toilet flush coming from off stage right. Phil apparently played it to the hilt and graciously allowed himself to be flushed off stage. The audience laughed uproariously. Jeannie was mortified.

At least we now know how to end Phil’s curtain speeches and still get a robust first laugh for the show.

Thanks again to everyone who made The Odd Couple such a hit. You couldn’t have been more Odd, and we appreciate it.

--Bruce Miller

Closing Thoughts on "Smoke on the Mountain"

Tonight was the closing performance of Smoke on the Mountain at Barksdale Theatre at Hanover Tavern. It was a bittersweet time, I suppose. We had, after all, been working on the show since January (including rehearsals), so we definitely had a healthy run of (so I'm told) around 40 performances. Several Broadway productions have run for less than that (Carrie-the musical- officially ran for 5, not counting 16 preview performances, which still only comes up to 21).

But I suppose I'm not really feeling the humor tonight. Although there was lots of humor to be had and was had during the run of Smoke, onstage and off. If you happen to run into one of the cast members, be sure to ask them about Aunt Judy, a special figment of Julie Fulcher (Vera)'s brilliant mind.

Smoke on the Mountain, I think, is quite possibly the most fun I have ever had doing any show. The chemistry in this cast was sensational. Every single one was a delight. I do hope that the Sander's Family and Reverend Oglethorpe might emerge on a Richmond stage again someday not too far away. No matter where I am, I think the call to step back into Reverend Oglethorpe's shoes would be a temptation too alluring to pass up.

The love, comraderie, and joy that was shared on that stage each night is something that doesn't come with every show. Perhaps it's something that happens only once in a lifetime. I hope that's not true, but if it is, I'm glad I was there on that stage with Aly, Julie, Drew, David, Eric, and Emily. It's an experience that I will never forget.

A much-deserved "Thank you" goes out to director Bruce Miller for allowing the seven of us to be together on that stage 40 times and to stage manager Joseph Papa for holding it all together.

And that, dear readers, is my small love letter.