“That’s live theatre for ya folks!”

First off my solo song, “Those Magic Changes”, was supposed to be brought down a key, but the pianist forgot to change it so I ended up straining my voice trying to sing notes that I couldn’t. Then in the next scene, one of the lead girls tripped and fell launching her wig into the audience. And just when I thought things couldn’t get worse, in the middle of “Greased Lightening” the fog machine set off the house fire alarm forcing us to stop the show. The cast stood on stage for three minutes waiting for the sirens to stop. That was just Act One. The second the curtain went up for Act Two, trouble started again. The T-Birds were supposed to have a rumble scene, and I was

So there I stood in the dressing room preparing to put on another performance of the show from hell. Although the morning’s performances had been bad, I was hoping that this one last show would make coming all the way to West Covina worth it. The two morning shows had been field trip performances for children, so most of the cast had thought of it as a dress rehearsal. But this one would be the public performance, the one performance that friends and family come to. Agents and managers seeking talent also come to this performance. All of the important people to please in the audience usually made everyone put a little extra energy into their performance, and I hoped the same would go for tonight.

The first five minutes of the show brought some rest to my worry. So far no one in the cast had made any mistakes, the pianist had played on key, and my hair was still straight. It was the moment after that all my hopes were crushed. The T-birds and the Pink Ladies began snapping to cue the pianist to start the music for “Summer Lovin”, but no music was heard. We continued to snap waiting for the music to save us from a horrible stage death, but no music was heard. My fingers started to ache snapping for what seemed like an eternity. And then the sweetest sound reached my ears, but it was not the music. The talented actor who played Danny Zuko began to sing the famous words, “summer lovin had me a blast.” Then the actress who played Sandy responded by singing, “summer lovin happened so fast.” Before the audience knew what had happened

Some topics in this essay:
Magic Changes”, Danny Zuko, West Covina, , Pink Ladies, Educational Theatre, “those magic changes”, minutes waiting, sound check, “summer lovin”, set house, magic changes”, music heard, singing “summer, morning’s performances, “summer lovin, “those magic,