After a long rehearsal period and a brisk production season of only 4 days (of 5 performances), West Side Story is now over. Not without considerable adventure, however.
Tim and I were covering the percussion part in the 44-strong orchestra. We had a large set of 4 timpani, a xylophone, a glockenspiel, a keyboard (for vibraphone and tubular bells), suspended cymbal, congas, bongos, and two tables of hand percussion (some of which are only called for in the score for 1 or 2 bars). It was busy work for the two of us, dashing back and forth in a carefully choreographed routine, referencing 5 copies of score surrounding us.
During the Prologue of the Saturday matinee performance, I was dashing back from the timpani to get to the bongos while Tim was playing the vibes when I ducked down to get out of Tim’s way and head-butted the side of the cymbal. I was a little dazed, but kept going and got to the table in time for the bongo line. I had hit the cymbal pretty hard, so I wondered if I was bleeding. Soon enough I felt the cool wet of the blood above my eye. I had cut open the skin where my eyebrow was, but other than a slight case of the dazes, I was fine. The bleeding eventually stopped I was fine, but I’ve got a cool scab now.
During the final performance, as we were just about to play The Rumble – the last cue of the first act – suddenly the fire alarm in the orchestra pit let out a big “whoooop” and just as quickly stopped. We could see lights flashing in the bio box above the orchestra. Tim and I looked at each other as if to say “Are we evacuating?” Things kept going on stage, the audience probably just assuming it was a misfired sound effect didn’t flinch. Our poor conductor, Peter, who had been through so much already was having a heart attack while conducting us in. Brett, Pete’s assistant in the pit was on the cans and confirmed with the stage manager that it was a false alarm, and we should keep going. Apparently, though it would not have been obvious to the audience, the fire brigade turned up extremely quickly and insisted on being taken up into the fly tower to confirm there was no fire. As for us, we kept playing, though there was a real sense of “Oh dear, what now?” after what happened to us on opening night…
We arrived at the theatre on Thursday for our first performance and walked down the stairs into the corridor to reach the orchestra pit. My usual route was taped off, but not before I walked through something wet. I looked down at the yellowish puddles on the ground. Someone said “One of the basins overflowed and leaked down here,” but from the colour alone I knew it wasn’t a basin. We made our way into the pit and settled in. Five minutes before the show was about to start, Tim and I noticed the “water” was coming under the taped off door and was spreading into our percussion section. Soon after one of the stage crew came down and confirmed the suspected; the “water” was in fact sewerage and was flowing quite quickly to the lowest part of the building – the orchestra pit. We raced to clean pick up cables and tape up electrical danger out of the way. Over the next twenty minutes they were busily sweeping the sewerage out of the percussion section and back into the hallway. We started the show 15 minutes late to a rousing applause and a festering smell.
At times the smell got rather horrendous, and we could hear the stage crew sweeping it away on just the other side of the door. Perhaps halfway through the first act, the drummer noticed it was creeping up to him. It had flowed right around the whole corridor coming in through the back store room and the middle pit doors.
As we left for intermission and at the end of the show, it was everywhere. The pit remained fairly safe (except for our percussion section), but the corridors were horrid. We all left in a hurry that night to shower and scrub, and left the professionals to come in and clean.
The next day, we were assured the place had been disinfected and we could see the sewerage had lifted quite a lot of paint off the concrete floors. We’ve all claimed any damaged goods (including the poor women who were wearing open toed shoes and had to walk through it), and we’ll see if anything comes of it.
These events, in conjunction with the usual coming off stage with damaged body parts and flown set landing on people’s heads made this production of West Side Story just a little more memorable than usual.
Now I find myself in a position where I haven’t been in for probably over a year – I have nothing to work on! I’m not involved in any show at the moment, beyond my usual committee commitments. Furthermore, a large number of my friends are going to be tied up in another show soon and they’ll be out of the equation for a month. What ever will I do? Maybe it’s time to clean my house or play some vinyl?
so you had a wee-ly good final show?
haha – how does this sort of stuff continually happen to you?
And I get a little annoyed when the drunks wee against the cab doors on a Saturday night…
Apologies – WordPress has decided to stop letting me know when people comment!
Rebecca – Yes. I guess I’m just lucky.
Kevin – Which is fine, unless you like to smear your face on the cab door.