She Loves Me (2018): Debrief

     Sometimes I finish plays and can just sit back and be pleased.  (Don't get me wrong, even then, there's always a thing or two I would do differently in hindsight.)  However, the She Loves Me revival has brought up a different feeling altogether. Overall it was a good experience. I thought the final product turned out really well.  The audience responded and things came together nicely. I got to work with some of my favorite actors. It was the first time I got to direct my little brother. I love the symmetry in capping our first 10 years with a re-staging of  our first show.  I liked having the chance to appraise 25 year old Nic's directing. (He missed some things.)   I'm glad we did it, but it also served to reaffirm my feeling that I just shouldn't do musicals.

     Back in the days when I was performing more I gravitated towards musicals and looked at plays as a nice change of pace every now and then. Now that I approach scripts as a director, I just don't find a lot that excites me in the libretto of a musical.  I prefer to be able to put my own stamp on things and I think the nature of the musical just makes that difficult.  In this show, for instance, there are many subplots that are mentioned but not explored. I kept trying to find ways to lean in to those moments, to build them up to the level I wanted them to be.  That's a mistake though. In play you maybe get three pages to work through an issue.  In a musical you get three lines, then the songs flesh things out a bit more.  That's the kind of thing I missed.  I wanted to go down these side streets and add a little weight.  I think we did manage that here and there, but the format just ties your hands.  That's not to say that you can't do great and even deep stuff with a musical.  I've certainly seen that and I think I even did it once.  But that's usually the exception to the rule.
     Think about The Sound of Music.  A man loses his wife and is left to care for seven children. A young nun comes in to care for the children while the Nazis move in on their home.  Meanwhile, Dad's best friend is a lovable Nazi sympathizer.  The nun and widower fall in love and and then drag children through the Alps on foot. To me that sounds like a dark story with a little hope sprinkled in.  How much time we give to the kid's dead mom or the fact that the Captain lost his wife?  What about the fact that a nun is contemplating breaking her vows because she's falling in love with an engaged man?  And we haven't even gotten to the Nazis! Anyway, the answer is that each of these things gets about 3 lines.  So does that mean The Sound of Music is bad?  Do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-NO!  I love it.  It's one of my favorites.  But do I want to direct it? The hills are alive with the sound of me saying NO.
    All that to say,  I love She Loves Me.  There was a ton of talent in our cast.  Again, I'm glad we did it. It was great to get the chance to do it in Houghton and expand to the Wellsville stage. Basically, what I'm saying is that until someone writes this dark take on Sound of Music, I'm probably done with musicals for a while.   (The Sounds of Music in a Minor Key?  We'll workshop it.)

Tune in here for a special interview with the cast: https://soundcloud.com/allthebooks/episode-160-she-loves-me

She Loves Me (2018): Director's Note

      In 2002, My friend Beau was working at Tibbitt’s Opera House in Coldwater, MI. He got a set of free tickets to their big musical for the year and invited me along. The show was She Loves Me. We both loved it.  I picked up the 90’s cast recording and listened to it a million times over the next few years. Amanda had a similar experience seeing it in Miami, FL. with Mike. They saw it and it stuck with them. Cut to 2008.

Directing Scene 1.4 in 2008

     When we decided to launch Valley Theatre, it was an obvious choice for our first show. We already had affection for the characters and that great music. Plus it appeals to me as a show with a small cast and an offbeat little story. It remains one of my favorite musicals, which brings us to 2018.

Cast Selfie at 2018 Read-through

    Directing it again after all of these years was an interesting experience. Not only was I directing the actors, but in a way I was directing my 25 year old self. When rehearsals began we’d get in to a scene and I’d find myself catching things I’d missed before. I’d nudge things in a different direction thinking, “Not so fast 25 year old Nic.” I’ve enjoyed working with Mike, Amanda and Paul in reprising their original roles. Knowing the characters as well as we do has given us a freedom to try new things and see what shape the scenes take. It’s been memorable. I don’t think I’ll run out and re-direct all of my old favorites, but this was a very fitting way to cap our first ten years. Here’s hoping I age as well as this show.

Also, in preparation for the show I interviewed Mike, Amanda, Josh and Vanessa on The All the Books Show.   You can find the audio here. 

Debrief to follow...

Press Release: A Grand Night for Singing

The Valley Theatre is pleased to present a special production of Rodgers and Hammerstein's A Grand Night for Singing! This charming musical revue features nearly 40 of Rodgers and Hammerstein's best loved songs, from both popular and lesser known musicals.   The cast, made up of performers from around the county, sing their way through Rodgers & Hammerstein classics all the while showcasing snatches of romance and humor.   The show is directed by Hilary Gunning with musical direction by Amanda Cox and choreography by Sarah Keeler Badger.

Performances will be held in Houghton and in Wellsville.  You can see the show on the Nancy Howe Auditorium stage on September 21 at 7pm at the David A. Howe Public Library in Wellsville.  This performance is sponsored by the Friends of the Library and the Allegany Arts Association. Shows will also be presented on Friday, September 22, at 7pm and Saturday, September 23, at 2pm at the Houghton Wesleyan Church.  For more information please contact director Hilary Gunning at thevalleytheatre@gmail.com

Star-Spangled Debrief

Looking at me writing my debrief in the same calendar year.  Progress!  

In the summer of 2016 we decided to revisit our old friend Neil Simon (Jake's Women, The Odd Couple) and mount a production of his little-known flop, The Star-Spangled Girl.   SSG tells the story of two fellas who are happily publishing a newspaper out of their apartment until an Olympic swimmer moves in next door and, through no fault of her own, leaves chaos in her wake. 

I discovered it in much the same way that I discovered Allegro.  I picked up a collection of Neil Simon's writing to read Barefoot in the Park and found SSG instead. Several things appealed to me about this show.  First, I'm a Neil Simon fan so I find his dialogue and timing to be always entertaining.  It also had shades of The Odd Couple, so I thought it might be fun to approach that relationship from another angle.  The small cast, just three characters, was very appealing as well.  My first instinct was to cast Mike and me in roles that would mirror the ones we had in The Odd Couple.  It was tempting, but the pull to direct was stronger.  Plus I kept reading Eric in the role of Norman.  (I typically do this when I read shows, mentally cast actors I've worked with.  It helps me visualize what a performance would look like.)  With Eric as Norman and Mi

ke as Andy (the "Oscar" role),  my mind jumped right to Sarah to play Sophie, the southern swimmer.  This cast energized me because they are some of my favorites to work with and I'd never had any of them in a play together before.  We decided to do one show in the Fire Hall and two shows in the Nancy Howe Auditorium at the library to tie in with the adult summer reading program.

The rehearsals were fun from the get-go.  We had a really great readthrough, which helped to get everyone excited.  Neither Mike nor Sarah had read it prior to that.  Eric had, but was unimpressed with his first read.  Hearing it all come together gave us an early vision of what the show would be.  The final performance stayed very true to that original readthrough.  Now that can be a bad thing, but in this case it's because things just clicked early on.  That gave us plenty of time to play around with the jokes and rapid-paced delivery.

Memorization was a major issue with this show.  Because of the small cast and tendency to rehash conversation from earlier scenes, it was difficult to lock things in to place.  The script is very dependent on things being said exactly right, meaning that if one person was off then so was the whole scene.  They were scared, but I wasn't.  I've been in shows where the cast peaks too soon.  It makes things feel stale and can effect the quality of the actual performances.  On the flip-side, I've directed shows where things landed exactly right just in time for the curtain to rise.  (This was never more true than it was with Guilty Conscience, one of my personal favorites.) SSG definitely landed just in the nick of time.

We opened in the Houghton Fire Hall, something that we skipped (and really missed) for Spinoff. I think we were all more excited about that performance than we were for the ones at the Howe.  I like using the Fire Hall because it speaks to the indie roots of Valley Theatre.  It feels more alive and urgent.  The Houghton show killed.  In the Fire Hall the crowd is so close to the action, that they don't miss a thing.  It makes it more frenetic and engaging.  SSG borders on the absurd and played much better to crowd that really felt like they were along for the ride.  The show climaxes with a fist fight between Eric's Norman and Mike's Andy.  In was perfection, particularly for that first show.  The Houghton crowd was in tears and we were right there with them.  In what would become a signature move of the show, Eric's watch actually broke during the fight.

For the next few shows we moved to the Nancy Howe Auditorium.  It's a beautiful space and everything looked just right.  The show didn't play nearly as well in that space though.  The crowds definitely enjoyed it and were very enthusiastic at the post show meet and greets, but it lost something with the distance between cast and crowd.  The cast played nicely off of each other. They adapted to the space well.  Eric broke a trophy in the first show and knocked over a fireplace in the second.  Classic stuff.  In the end we all agreed that we liked the Houghton show best.  

It's funny how that happens.  We originally used the Fire Hall for Art and Telephone Roulette out of necessity.  Now, even with a beautiful theater at our disposal, it has become our old-school preference. 

Bottom line, I really dug directing The Star-Spangled Girl.  It felt like the old days, like a return to form.  Something I hadn't really felt since Wise Women three years earlier.  I think the show itself was lost in the shadow of The Odd Couple, which to be fair is a better show.  It failed to get the acclaim of its predecessor and never really found a footing in area productions or even with it's lukewarm film version. Still, it worked just right for us.  It was nice to dust if off and breathe new life into it. 

To hear the cast of the Star-Spangled Girl discuss the show as well as their favorite Neil Simon shows, tune in here!

Star-Spangled Director's Note

We wrapped our Houghton run last night (June 30) and open in Wellsville tonight (July 1) with a matinee tomorrow (July 2).  I am really digging this show and the audience so far has loved it.  Here's my director's note:

Director’s Note

When it comes to theater, two of the things I love most are small cast plays and Neil Simon. The Star-Spangled Girl checks both of those boxes very well.  This is my second collaboration with both Mike and Eric on a Neil Simon show, having directed Eric in a 2010 production of Jake’s Women and starring opposite Mike in our 2014 production of The Odd Couple.  (Sarah is new to the world of Neil Simon, but is no stranger to Valley Theatre.)  I love Simon’s dialogue and it’s always nice to hear it come out of talented actors.

      Over the years I’ve worked with the members of this cast many times, but I realized midway through that they had never worked together before (unless you count Eric’s blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo in Cinderella).  Hard to believe, but true.  With that in mind, I’m even more impressed with how well they play off of each other.  They have a natural chemistry that has made it a lot of fun for me to observe and guide.  I think you’ll like it too.      -Nic

To hear the cast of the Star-Spangled Girl discuss the show as well as their favorite Neil Simon shows, tune in here!

Theater: hate/love/whine/hate/love.

Every time I'm gearing up to do a play, one thought runs over and over in my mind:  I don't want to do this.  It's taxing, it's complicated, it's time consuming, it's a pain.  It would be nice if I could say that once the show starts I don't feel that way, that I am swept away in the magic of theater - but that's not really true.  My feeling of not wanting to do it continues throughout the run, any time I'm not currently in rehearsal, working on the set or watching the finished product.  When I'm actively working on the show, I love doing it.  It's exciting.  It's good old-fashioned fun.  So why don't I remember that when I'm not doing it?  I have no idea.

I'm currently directing my 16th show (Wise Women with The Valley Theatre), and I've felt this way basically every time.  I guess that's due, in part, to my pessimistic nature.  I can't fathom the idea that I might actually enjoy myself, despite all of the evidence to the contrary.  It's a really attractive quality of mine.  I remember and forget how much I enjoy it with each rehearsal, and by the end all is well because I'm happy that I did it.   So basically all of the complaining is just a big waste of time and energy for me. I think it's probably my wife who suffers the most from this phenomena, because she's had to endure a conversation like this one at least a dozen times:

Me: I don't know why I do this.  I hate it.

Her: No you don't.  You enjoy it.  You find it fulfilling.

Me: You don't know.

Her: Trust me.

Me:  Seriously, this will be the last show I do.

Her: No it won't.  You say that everytime.

Me: I don't think I do.

Her:  You do.  

Me.  Well, whatever.  I don't like it.  It's dumb.

Her: You're wrong.  Whenever you come home from rehearsal you are all energized and talking about how much fun all had.

And so on...  (At this point I usually fake a headache or starting singing showtunes to change the subject.)  What it comes down to is that I hate directing plays, it's draining, and this will probably be my last one.

So, in conclusion.  I love directing plays.  It's fulfilling in a way nothing else is.  I'll never stop doing it.  And you should come see Wise Women next weekend (12/13&14) because it's a great show and we've had a ball doing it. I'm just a whiny-pants.

Wise Women '13!

Summer Fun at HMAC

This post originally appeared on the HMAC website:
 
Exciting times at HMAC right now!   As we draw closer to the big showcase, Arts in Motion, the instructors are working hard to get their students ready, and the students are really rising to the challenge.  My acting students have their lines down pretty well and are looking forward to the small test audience I’ve invited for our next class.

Beyond the showcase, I’m looking forward to the new opportunities starting up over the summer.   We have week-long camps for ballet, dance and theater; several regular fitness and dance classes; plus something all new.  This summer we will begin offering voice lessons for kids.  This is an exciting development because it provides a new opportunity for the younger kids in the community  Kendra Mikols will be joining us at HMAC beginning this summer. (You’ll get a chance to hear her sing at the spring showcase!)  She’s a recent college grad with a bachelor’s degree in Music Education, vocal emphasis.  Aside from giving private lessons in the studio, she will teach a weekly class designed to engage young musicians, introducing students to the basics of singing and helping to cultivate their talent.  It’s a fun setup, and I think students will really respond well.

Now that we have theatre, dance and voice covered, I see a lot of future potential for things like joint classes and even musical theater camps.  Anyway, I just wanted to welcome our friend Kendra into the fold.  We’ll see you at the showcase!