March
31, 2005
LENNON Tech Rehearsals, San Francisco
Wednesday was a travel day, but it began with an appropriate twist of irony. As I was organizing my bags outside Newark Airport, a skycap was calling for the next customer, shouting "who's next? I need someone over here..." Suddenly I heard, "John Lennon, you're up next, c'mon!"
What did he say??
"John Lennon!" he repeated, looking at me as I spun around.
Life is strange.
As our bus pulled into downtown San Francisco, the vibe was noticeably different from that of New York. In fact, everything is different. We're setting up camp here for seven weeks and everyone's looking forward to taking a bite outa the town. That'll come later. With the exception of dinner at Fisherman's Wharf, today was about getting settled in. Most of us are living within a mile of the theatre. My new digs are on Sutter St, in an early 20th century studio apartment building. Compared with the shoebox I was inhabiting in Hell's Kitchen, this one-bedroom apartment is a palace. I actually have a real bed instead of the aerobeds of the past six weeks, and a strange new phenomenon called sunlight! The walk to the theatre is a bit questionable, however, since we have to pass the Tenderloin, a notorious haven for the homeless and desperate. Fine in the day, but not so much after dark.
Even the rehearsal schedule is different; cast call is at one in the afternoon instead of ten in the morning. But tech rehearsals run notoriously late, sometimes until midnight. This afternoon I entered the majestic Orpheum Theatre on Market Street, where LENNON will open in less than two weeks, and saw the set for the first time. We'd all seen a miniature model and knew what to expect, but full scale is infinitely more impressive. The show is a multimedia spectacle, with vertical, horizontal and circular light rigs on all sides, huge projection screens, and assorted platforms and benches for the musicians and the actors to work on. The rehearsals plod along slowly as the light, video and backdrop cues are all tested and coordinated. For the cast, there's an awful lot of standing around. If they get through fifteen pages of the script it's considered a good day. For the swings (Rona, Mark, Nicole and me), it's a different situation from studio 6A. There's a bit more freedom here, not to mention more space, and plenty of places to go off and practice lines when things are running painfully slow. Up in the mezzanine, on the first row, the view of the stage is the best in the house. I sat up there and had a videochat with Sasha, aiming the iSight cam at the stage so she could watch the work in progress from home. Out in the house, computer workstations are set up for Don and his assistants, the stage managers, lighting directors, projectionists, designers and sound technicians. All these workstations will be gone and replaced by ticketholders by the first preview on April 12th.
The first tech rehearsal ended by 11:00 and Don arranged for the management to buy us cab rides back home to avoid the seedy late-night street dwellers. While sitting in the back seat with Julia and Chuck, they both said to me,
"Just so you know, Darin, this kind of thing never happens in this business!"
When I heard that, I was reminded of something: ever since I first heard of this show, I've been experiencing one thing after another that just never happens in this business. Most of these things have been happening because of Don Scardino...and, I believe, because of John Lennon.