An Anniversary to Remember

The last time I blogged about The Complete History of Vermont Stage (abridged) , I had little more than a few images, a basic idea of how the evening might go, and no script.

Now, 4 days after the big event, I'm happy to report that we ended up not only with a script but a full evening's worth of entertainment, and that it went, by all reports, exceedingly well.

At 9 am on the morning of Saturday, September 12^th I arrived on the Flynn Mainstage greeted by a flurry of activity: lights being focused, slide projector screen being hung and draped, microphones being set up and tested. A union crew of 10 was working hard to ensure that we would be ready to have a technical rehearsal for the show by noon.

I have to say, it was a nice change for me. Usually, when we move into FlynnSpace, I'm doing a good deal of physical labor helping to install the set. On this morning, all I had to do was make decisions: where a light should be focused, the sound level for a microphone, the trim of the screen. Even so, by noon, after three hours, I was ready for a break.

However, that was the time for the actors to arrive and for the tech rehearsal to start. We had five actors in from NYC (their plane had arrived at 10:30 am), and 11 local actors ready to put together a two and a half hour show in just under five hours.

The first hour was all about getting actors fitted with microphones, testing sound levels, and making sure all costume pieces were present and where they needed to be. By 2:00, we started writing light cues. We went back and forth between the narration and the scenes, while also incorporating the slide show. As we were so pressed for time, the actors doing the excerpts from the featured plays only got one chance to do them on stage, then we had to move on.

By 4:30, we had made it through most of the show, with only the song from My Ohio to go. That was when we ran into sound issues and had to stop to deal with the technical difficulties. We were racing the clock, since the union crew went into overtime at 5:00. We finished at 5:10. After dealing with a few last minute details, that gave me an hour to have dinner, get dressed and be in the lobby to meet our raffle ticket sellers at 6:30, then greet the audience at 7:00.

The show started just a bit after 7:30 and went off almost without a hitch. I have to say, I had a great time on that stage for the next two hours, and the moment I had envisioned first, the one where all the VSC artists gathered together on stage, was even more powerful for me than I had imagined.  The light cue actually came a bit earlier than we had rehearsed, and all of a sudden, the stage was filled with this intense white light, and then artists were streaming on stage and people were applauding and I was practically shouting to get the last lines of narration out.  And then we were all there together and the audience was on its feet and it was a wonderful culmination to a long day and of the last nine years.

Congratulatory emails started coming in that night, and there were a few lovely notes in the mail by Tuesday. Here's part of one of my favorites:

Your work and your words do indeed inspire us to be more humane, to care about each other, our community and our world.  When I walk out after a theatrical performance I am determined to be a "better person".  I continue to strive in that direction.

I want to thank everyone who made this evening possible - the artists, the Flynn team, the audience - it was a wonderful start to this anniversary season, and I feel energized by the response we received. Here we go!

September 16th, 2009