Thursday's CHICAGO notes...

All,

Generally speaking, I was quite pleased with the run last night.  Despite a lot on your plates you continue to explore and find moments to sharpen and clarify.  Plus it was really fun to watch!

Please read these notes and incorporate them into Sunday's run.

Grazie'

Fred/Roxie.    Try to keep a majority of your bodies covered with the odd limb poking out

Amos.             Your lines which are underscored need to be a bit louder.

Cell Block.       The monologues were quite good ladies.  Remember- keep them ACTIVE
                         There's a reason you're telling the story, and it's not to relive the past.  It's so
                          that you can sway the jury

Velma.            "the most me and Veronica ever made..."  explore ways to share this out to us

Mama.                Hair and Makeup - go for a severe look, hair pulled back, darker eyebrows.
                          Don't let Mama look glamorous.

Mama.               Explore just how naive it is of Roxie not to already know Billy.  Enjoy
                           making fun of her naïveté

Tyler.                 Try not to be directly upstage of Rox on "...a tap dance"


Billy/Amos.        Take the air out of the first 1/2 of your first scene.  If Billy keeps the urgency to
                            the scene and Amos tries to keep up with the info, it should help.

Billy.                   "Reached for the..."  You still need to be on a slight diag.  facing right so she's not    
                              covering you.

Reporters after Roxie.      Great energy here everyone, it was like you got shot out of a cannon to
                                          get your headline out.

Jenna.                 "  Cancelled, down the drain, out ", don't let the energy drop, keep building.
                           The active part here is to show Velma you're as angry as she is

Velma.                Instead of being sweet to her as your trying to get Rox to join the sister act,
                           Try enticing her with the fun of a conspiracy.

Mary Sun.          As you exit with the reporters on stage right, keep up with them, don't linger back.
             
Billy/Amos.        "Step down Daddy". When you get the other cigar from props, stick this one in his
                            mouth, just after the line.

All in 2:6.            Excellent work.  The scene is clean and tight.  Don't change a thing.

Jenna.                   Great baby

David.                   We talked about a lower register for Mary Sun's speaking voice.  Try that on
                               Sunday

Amos.                    " My exit music please"...step down, as if its a pronouncement.  Then, not
                                getting the music is even worse.

David.                    "Ladies and Gentlemen"- the lights are waiting for you.

Rox.                        Don't knit in the last scene

Rox.                        React to the set being unceremoniously taken away from you.

Vel.                         X in front of the MC

Tyler.                       Try:  "And now, the Bigfork Summer Playhouse, Montana's home for quality    
                                 family entertainment..." instead of the Vickers' Theatre line.  Just be prepared
                                 to change it back.

Vel/Rox.                  After Hot Honey..., get through the initial
                                 "Thank you's" much faster

All- I won't have too many more chances to thank you for your work, which I have found to be very professional and inspiring.   I'll try to make the most of our time together by letting you know how much I appreciate your efforts.

KPK

Saturday's Rehearsal

Saturday's Rehearsal Schedule

On Stage

1:30 - 1:50:  Billy's on stage costume changes

                     Billy & all ladies in All I Care About

                     ( with fans )

1:50 - 2:00:  Roxie's on stage costume change

                     All in Reached For The Gun

2:00 - 2:10:  Amos' on stage costume change

                     Amos, Shelby, and Mary Kate

2:10 - 2:20:  Mary Sunshine's disrobing

                     Mary and Billy

2:20 - 4:30:  Full Cast ( fix problem areas )

DINNER

6:30 - 7:30:  Velma and Roxie (Choreography)

7:30- 10:00:  To Be Announced- check the blog

-

Wednesday's Schedule

Please make arrangements to be in your assigned shops when possible...

Wednesday       5/29

6:30 - Vocals  When Velma Takes The Stand  

6:40 - Vocals  Me And My Baby

6:50 - Vocals  Roxie

7:05 - Vocals  Razzle Dazzle / Courtroom

7:25 - Vocals  Finale

7:35 - 8:35      Choreography clean and fix (all)

8:40 - Staging  Act 2 Scene 6

9:00 - Staging  Act 1 Scenes 12 and 13

9:10 - Staging  When Velma Takes The Stand - quartet only

Mallory's Sunday Evening Optional Dance Rehearsal

Mallory has organized the following times for an optional Sunday night rehearsal:

REHEARSAL HALL

10-10:30pm

fan dance/cell block 

10:30-11pm

all that jazz/reach for the gun 

11-11:30pm

Roxie with boys

Thanks Mallory!

Bert Williams - Taylor, this is for you

Taylor,

Here's a clip from a documentary about Black performers in Vaudeville; it begins on the Bert Williams section.


http://youtu.be/mcpmHvZ_IaA?t=5m5s

COSTUMING RESEARCH - provided by Nicole

I'm not sure when she's had the time, but Nicole has pulled together several pieces of pictorial research, which I'd like to share with everyone.  

Please notice that Nicole is not only thinking about our time period, but has paid attention to the the style and feel of the Vaudeville/Burlesque performer.  She's also helped us with a few pieces that show a reversal of gender stereotypes.

Nicole has been playing with a theme about which all of your creative team - designers, director, choreographer, music director - have been thinking:  

           This 'aint realism - it's a vaudeville.  Don't hide the fact that everyone's performing...

EVERYONE LOVES A GOOD TRAIN WRECK...

CHICAGO the Musical, much like Maurine Dallas Watkins' CHICAGO is - in no small part - an indictment of the media and their role in creating celebrities out of people who don't really deserve to be celebrities.  But the media would argue that they simply give the public what it clamors for:

                                        Got the bubbleheaded bleach-blonde, comes on at five
                                        She can tell you 'bout the plane crash with a gleam in her eye.
                                        It's interesting when people die - give us dirty laundry
                                                                                                                               Don Henley - Dirty Laundry

For some, it was seeing Louisville's point guard Kevin Ware who fell and broke his leg in two places - on national TV.  The networks had to stop showing the gruesome injury, but YouTube exploded with traffic as the curious watched the scene over and over.

For others, it was the 9/11 coverage.  Who could be torn away from the TV that day as the networks played the horrific footage of the planes crashing into the Twin Towers?

For me - and I may be showing my age here - it was that God forsaken slow speed chase with OJ Simpson and AC Cowlings.  It was my birthday, and friends wanted to take me out to dinner, but I declined, citing an illness.  In reality, I was glued to my TV set watching a white Ford Bronco moving up Interstate 405 in my hometown of Los Angeles.  Maybe it was because I felt like I knew OJ - I really didn't - or maybe it was because I couldn't conceive someone being able to drive on the 405 at 5pm and not hit gridlock.  Whatever the reason, I was fixated.


I'm reading a book now from a Wake Forest English professor,  Eric Wilson called Everyone Loves a Good Train Wreck: Why We Can’t Look Away. He interviews such subjects as a man who sold the art of serial killers and an obituary collector. he follows what he calls the “dark tourism industry” that exists in places like the 9th Ward of New Orleans, destroyed by Hurricane Katrina.

“There’s actually a lot of reasons, ranging from expressions of what is worst in us to what is best in us,” he said.  “Our heart rate goes up, our body releases chemicals. We really do get a sick thrill, a cheap titillation,”

But often, the thrill is closely followed by the not-so-moral reasons: relief it wasn’t you in a car accident or a feeling you are better than Charlie Sheen, Lindsey Lohan or one of the Kardashians.

“I think it kind of makes us feel a little better about ourselves when the mighty fall down,” he said.

As we move forward with CHICAGO, think about the dynamic between the media and the public; its almost a Chicken and the Egg conundrum.

Do they cover what we care about, or do we care about what they cover?  The characters in CHICAGO play the media to varying degree of success; consider where you fit into the world...