All Theater, All The Time

This is getting redonculus.

I don't even know if I spelled that correctly. And I don't care.

I've been creating so much "theater" in the past week, I've forgotten about - pretty much everything else in my life. But "The Mousetrap" is open, we've had audiences (not huge, not sell-outs, but butts in the seat!), and my life continues.

We almost didn't get there, though. Wednesday night of tech week, the second dress rehearsal, one of the actors had an "episode". I don't want to say he was drunk or stoned,  because I don't have definitive proof, but something wasn't...right. In fact, several people thought he was having a stroke, at first. He was slurring his words, he was incoherent, he was missing his cue lines.....I wasn't there to witness the first act of the play; I was picking up some artwork for set dressing. When I got back to the theater, it was too quiet, the other tech people were just standing around, and the director wasn't to be found. He ws backstage, trying to figure out what was going wrong with his best friend. Yes, it was the director's best friend, and somebody I've known for over 20 years, who had a complete physical/chemical melt-down two days before opening. We had to pull him from rehearsal, because he was physically unable to go on. The night ended with the rest of the cast waiting in the green room, while the director and the tech director held down this actor until his brother arrived to pick him up. It was ugly. This is an actor with a long history of alcohol addiction, who's been in recovery; turns out he's had a couple of relapses lately. There are other issues in his life right now, I won't go into them; but he needs help. I can only hope he gets it.

Fortunately, a couple of cast members knew another actor who played the same role just a few years ago; he was available, and willing to step in at the last minute. One rehearsal with the rest of the cast, and he went on opening night! This man is my hero.

Situation #2: on Friday afternoon, about 4 hours before opening, my husband, who's in the play, fell through a riser in the audience, and sprained his ankle. Badly. Like, we thought a broken ankle or blown knee injury. But he went on; fortunately, his character is using a walking stick, so he had a support ready to go, and he got through the show. He did go to urgent care today, for x-rays, after his ankle gave out on him again and swelled up again. Nothing broken, but all of the ligaments are torn. This will be a long recovery for him.

So my creations have been small, theater-related, and dictated by others. Set dressing for an English manor, snow-covered shrubbery, a newly-painted fake fireplace, a cartridge-pleated skirt, and a hero shirt (or a pirate shirt, or puffy shirt, or Renaissance shirt, whatever you prefer to call it!) are some of the projects I've worked on in the past week. I also created a couple of food items, including a mock shepherd's pie, with turkey, and a pancake breakfast on Sunday morning. My kids deserved a treat!

Sorry, there will be photos in the future. But I'm so fricken' tired right now, I don't have time to upload them.

And today's creation? A new measurement sheet form,for a new zip drive, for a new theater project I started tonight. I was getting upset with myself, for not creating anything today; when I remembered this simple technical creation from this afternoon. I'm golden.