May
14, 15 2005
LENNON Closing Night, San Francisco
On Saturday morning
my old friend Joe picked me up at my hotel and took me to breakfast on Nob Hill.
After eating and catching up we hit my favorite part of the city, North Beach.
This mostly Italian neighborhood runs along Columbus Avenue just north of Chinatown,
and it was an old stomping ground for the likes of Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg,
Bob Dylan and others. While we were there we had to visit the legendary City
Lights Bookstore, the headquarters of the Beat Generation. Caddy corner from
it is the Hungry i, a famous old folk venue which the Kingston Trio packed out
regularly in the early 1960's. Ironically, it's now a strip joint bearing the
same name. I couldn't help feeling a touch of regret at not having spent more
time in North Beach during my seven-week stay in San Fran. The vast array of
quaint Italian restaurants, shops and coffee and gelato bars surrounding Washington
Square make it a very pleasant and cozy hang.
But I reckon it'll still be there.
Our show has been running basically on auto-pilot for the past three weeks, left in the care of the cast, managers and crew. But on this final weekend of performances, the directing/producing team showed up to asses the show's progress and thank the company for their hard work. Everyone, that is, except Don Scardino. He's been ill on and off since the show's rehearsals, and on the day of his trip he found his body unfit to put on a coast-to-coast plane. He was devastated. He'd wanted so much to address the company in person, bond with his team and assure everyone that the show is only going to get better than it already is. Fortunately, Don had recently picked up an iSight web cam. I have a pair of those and I give them much credit for the survival of my family over the last three months. So he's at least been able to appear on my laptop screen and have a a few brief video chats with the group.
Don and producer Allan McKeown had some news for us. The Broadhurst Theatre in New York, where Lennon will run, is currrently occupied by Billy Crystal, who has a one-man autobiographical show called 700 Sundays. It's going so well and he's having so much fun doing it that he asked for an extension. Since you don't just say no to Mr. Crystal, the producers agreed to set the opening of Lennon back an extra week. So now previews will begin on July 7th, with the grand opening set now for August 4th. What this also does is buy time for more script revising, so the cast will have a little down time after we meet for a read-through on May 24th. I may actually get to go home again!
In the big theatres, there are strict rules regulating the use of cameras in the house, of any kind, for any reason. But with a little persuasion we managed to get clearance from the Orpheum's management to aim my web cam at the stage, allowing Don to watch the Saturday matinee performance live. In retrospect, I wish we'd chosen the evening show. Video graphics were locking up in the afternoon, leaving several screens blank and throwing off the show's rhythm slightly. But the evening's closeout performance went off without a hitch. Everyone onstage, who had been playing a bit on the conservative side lately, saved their best for last and put it all out there for one last time.
After the show we all met in the theatre's VIP Lounge for a quick champagne toast before splitting up. I joined Mandy, Michael, Julie, Jon, and Allan at the Plush Room next door to my hotel. Each weekend the room features an old-school cabaret show, which I'd never seen, but had heard echoing up through the roof and through my windows directly above it, sounding like an arena event being held several blocks away. But in fact it was a pretty small lounge with a small but noisy crowd and a large emcee with an even larger voice and attitude. While not being cheap to get in, it did feature cheap humor (groaners, people, groaners), impressive yo-yo stunts and old-fashioned jazz-backed burlesque at its semi-pro finest. Just good clean fun, folks.
So today is a travel day for me, and I'll be taking a break from the show and from this blog. I have a week at home in Austin before I'm due back in New York for the next phase of work. The past seven weeks have been a trip, to say the least. In a story that we're making up as we go along, we've reached the end of another chapter that turned out differently than any of us imagined. It was packed with surprises - some funny, some revolting, some frustrating and some overwhelmingly magical. What was not surprising was the fulfilled promise of a cosmic ride in a cosmic town.