Playin' In Between the Cracks

We've been continuing to rehearse Kitsch every night, though we've wound up with some unexpected nights off as we've lost the people or space we'd need to rehearse. Frankly, this one is tiring enough to put together that the nights off (and we get one tomorrow, hooray) are probably more productive for me in giving me some rest and time to consider the work.

Still, we're actually a little bit ahead of where I thought we'd be at this point, mainly because the actors are picking things up fairly quickly, though I'm going to have to constantly be vigilant about everyone's timing in this precise farce (a pain, when it appears at this point that we will NEVER have the full cast of 19 together at any one time until the ONE night before the show opens . . . {sigh}).

Up until recently, we've mostly been rehearsing in the chilly basement of Theater for the New City, amongst old props, costumes, and set pieces. Here's Josh Mertz and Avery Pearson as Violet Vogelbaum and Heinz Bruderlieben, having a lover's spat in the Klub Katzenratzen:

And here's Roger Nasser, Esther Silberstein, Josh, and Avery from the other side, as another spat between Violet and Heinz is watched by Klaus Hanswurst, busboy, and Schwamm, the Klub Katzenratzen singer:

This past week, and hopefully for most of our remaining rehearsals, we've moved upstairs to the actual space the show will be in, the vast (for me) Johnson Theater. Here's Berit (can you spot her? she's actually standing in the same "place" of the set as Esther in the picture above) in the midst of our rehearsal set . . .

That's a lot of space to fill, but it's looking good thus far. Sounding okay, too -- I was worried about echo making the lines muddy, but it's not too bad, and once the back curtain is pulled and our set is in there (and, hopefully, an audience) the reverb should be decreased to a perfectly fine level.

Tonight, Sunday, and Tuesday we're supposed to be in this space, and I've called as much of the full cast as I can for those days (which means 10-14 people, depending on the day) so we can put the pieces of the show together -- but there's always the chance at TNC that we show up and need to be moved to a smaller space (one night, as I noted, we wound up in a hallway), so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we get to keep working in the Johnson, as it makes the show a lot clearer.

So . . . we're okay on this, but not so much that I can relax.

Meanwhile, back in the iPod, here's today's Random Ten (with assorted links) from the 25,580 tracks in there . . .

1. "Hope" - Kristin Hersh - Strange Angels
2. "The Director Never Yelled 'Cut'" - Sparks - Exotic Creatures Of The Deep
3. "Speak To Me" - PP Arnold - The First Cut
4. "That Is Rock & Roll" - The Coasters - Fifty Coastin' Classics
5. "Peekaboo! (muzak version)" - Devo - E-Z Listening Disc
6. "Sinners" - The Cramps - Flamejob
7. "Anybody Seen My Baby?" - The Rolling Stones - Bridges To Babylon
8. "Devil In Disguise" - Elvis Presley - Beat of the Pops 02
9. "If I Didn't Love You" - Squeeze - Singles 45's And Under
10. "You Should Know" - The Sevens - The Sevens

And yes, some recent pictures of the kitties . . . Berit having some cuddle time with a sleepy boy . . .

And Berit tried to get some late night reading in, but has some friends that won't quite let her . . .

Okay, and now I have to get myself ready for our first "full cast" (11 out of 19) stumblethru tonight -- still figuring out where everyone goes much of the time . . .