Date of Run: November 1-10, 2012
ROLE: Phil and Trustee 2
Production Photos by Jeff Thomas
It was during this show that I was inspired to begin this blog and thus I wrote down my experiences rather than rely solely on memory.
The final show I did in 2012 was The Great Divide at Sonoma State (SSU) from November 1-10. Written by Adam Chanzit, The Great Divide was a fairly new play, having been staged only once inBerkeley
Adam had spent time inColorado
This was the first show I was ever cast in without auditioning. I originally had no intention of auditioning for any SSU shows that season since I had recently graduated and felt I should branch out. But that year, something unfortunate happened. They held auditions, but no call backs because, as Kevin Ockelmann told me later, there were so few men that they cast everyone and even then, not all the roles were filled. This I had to see. So, I journeyed to SSU and saw the cast lists. The musical show that year was a set of two short operas (which had only three male roles) and they were fully cast, but not the other plays. I was amused and bewildered for some of the male actors still at SSU were not on there at all. They probably had other offers elsewhere.
Three weeks passed and from what I heard from Kevin, they still could not find men. And one or two had dropped out or were uncertain about continuing. So, while still in rehearsals for The Elephant Man, I went to a full cast rehearsal one night and spoke with director Doyle Ott and I offered my services. He was hesitant at first because my availability would soon be limited because of The Elephant Man, but he gave me a script and tested me in a few parts. It was another rehearsal before I was finalized as Phil and Trustee 2. I only had a couple of full cast rehearsals and then I had to go back to The Elephant Man for full cast rehearsals and tech week.
The show was a reunion in many ways for me. I was definitely among good friends. In addition to Kevin, my friends Chris Colburn and Laura Millar, with whom I had doneOklahoma
Though it took me a moment to realize, and I don’t know why, I was now in my fourth main stage show at SSU and once again Chris Colburn was involved. That was a perfect record for me. It seemed like we were meant to work together in all my main stage productions at SSU.
In the case of Kevin, it was our third show together that year after previously doingOklahoma
Tyler
Once The Elephant Man was up and running, I could go back to Great Divide rehearsals. I was usually only called once a week on Wednesdays for full cast rehearsals. Occasionally I’d be called for a couple rehearsals a week, but no more than that. Doyle emphasized character development in the scenes mainly for the main characters, hence why I wasn’t there often. But the last two weeks before tech week we were all called for every rehearsal. We’d rehearse Act 1 one night, Act 2 the next, with various scenes getting additional work. Doyle would say to me more than once “It’s good to have you back.” Truthfully, it was good to be back. I always looked forward to going to rehearsal there, even during Elephant Man rehearsals.
It was around the time I returned that I began to hang out with Kevin a lot more. Once a week I would go to his house and we’d cook dinner together. Kevin had Crohn’s disease and was on a specific carbohydrates diet and had to make a fresh dinner every night. Occasionally we go see a movie and, once, a theatre show, We Won’t Pay, We Won’t Pay! One week, we went to an Indian restaurant with another friend before seeing Camelot.
While I was away doing Elephant Man, another guy was found to take a few other small male roles. His name was Matt Lindberg. By this time, we were still short one man for a main role.
Three weeks before opening, we finally found a person to play the character we couldn’t cast. The character was supposed to be Hispanic and named Juan and the only Hispanic actor we could find was apparently not only a poor actor, but only showed up once and was never seen again. Doyle consulted with Adam and they decided to rename him John and they found another student, Phil Ferrero, to play him. He embraced the challenge and memorized quickly. He proved to be very cool, integrating into cast seamlessly and I got along with him very well. He and Kyle were very tight and it always amused me to see them goof around with each other.
One of my favorite memories in the whole process was how Ashley, Laura and I would often quote lines and imitate characters from the Disney movie The Sword in the Stone, especially Archimedes. Scarcely a day went by when we weren’t imitating specifically the squirrel scene or Archimedes, even matching the character movements in unison with each other without trying. I even threw an Archimedes line at Laura during the town hall scene twice during the process. And one of those times she did actually hear me, and it very nearly caused her to laugh.
On Monday October 22, little more than a week before opening, I got sick in my throat. At that rehearsal I began to feel horrible. At first, I thought it was a sinus infection because it had all the signs: dry throat, headache and stuffy nose. Then a couple hours later, my headache suddenly vanished, which I thought strange. Then over the next few days I got an eye infection, my nose was stuffed, my throat swelled, and I was constantly tired. By Thursday I began losing my voice. That Friday I visited my family, and I did not sound right because my voice was weakening, and it was a struggle to speak. Tech weekend was that weekend. I was still suffering on Saturday, but luckily, they skipped over several of my lines for cues. Gradually I began to improve, but then the following Monday I felt like a lump was in my throat. I went to the clinic where the doctor diagnosed my condition as pharangytis. The lump feeling lasted three days before disappearing.
For what seemed like an eternity, before and during the run, I went through the process of healing. I took antibiotics, began taking Vitamin C and D, ate soup for dinner and gargled warm salt water every hour I was awake. I also had a cough that came in the evening, but with Nyquil I suppressed it and got some sleep.
During the illness, my vocal abilities diminished significantly. When I tried to sing, I could only sing a limited range, none of my bass or higher notes and I could not speak or sing falsetto. For all of the tech rehearsals I dreaded the moments when my lines came. In one scene where the factory workers had lunch I had a few lines, but my voice was good for merely talking. Then I remembered that my line would end the first act. I would have to yell “Holy shit! It’s gonna blow!” or something like that and then an explosion would happen. Kevin had a monologue at the beginning of the scene, which was set in a bar. Every night during rehearsals, I listened all the way through it thinking, “In one minute this is really going to suck for me.” My voice did return enough in time for opening, though I was in a near panic. My falsetto did not return fully for weeks after the show closed.
The set consisted of a turntable on which a table and chairs sat and that was the main characters’ home. Then up center stage extending to stage left was a high platform, which rose higher on stage right. In the middle was a gas rig. There were two staircases, one behind the platform, which was steeper, and one that led out into the wings. I certainly got a workout climbing up and down the two stairs and turning the turntable around every night.
Opening night went smoothly, with a couple small problems in cues. The second night was better. I had a rather eventful moment at one point that night. If there’s one thing I pride myself on in theatre, it’s that I never miss a cue. I’ve been in situations where actors have missed their cues (seeOklahoma
I did not have much time. I ran as quickly and quietly as I could behind the backdrop. Luckily, I found one and dashed back. I could hear Kyle saying his last line as I turned the corner. As I ran to my place, WHAM! I ran right into him as he was coming off. Katherine was right behind, but she saw nothing. I whispered a hurried apology and rushed to turn the turntable. Kyle kidded with me backstage afterward. No harm done.
The third show, the only matinee, was terrible. Cues were missed by the stage manager, who apparently had a hangover, and the explosion at the end of the first act was horribly timed. In the second act during the town meeting scene, there was a raffle in which I would have a short monologue and then draw a name for a pair of tickets to the Fall Dance show. The first one was blank, so I threw it aside. The second had a name I couldn’t read and the third had a fake name. Eventually I took out a few that were blank, while staying in character. I’m sure the rest of the cast was just as perplexed. Connor tried to just drop it and said, “Maybe we should just get this thing started?” I finally pulled out one that had a cast member’s mother’s name. The next night all the tickets were blank, and I had to say the number.
Wednesday was a gala night. Hors-d’oeuvres were served in the lobby. It was by far our best night. It was our largest and most responsive audience. They talked back during the town hall scene in the second act and we got plenty of laughs. Since Adam was there, we were all at our best. After the show we had a talk back with Adam in the lobby. We talked about favorite moments, what it felt like to play the roles and asked questions.
Friday was the final performance Adam would attend. The first act went generally well; the explosion sound was perfectly timed, but not the lights. Then in the town hall meeting, disaster struck. At one moment, Laura’s character is showing contaminated water samples and would put a jar on the table where Cassandra and I sat. But this night she slammed it down. It cracked and water began leaking. I tried to move it aside, but it broke, and water spilled all over the table. I spent the rest of the scene struggling not to laugh. Then at the end when everyone was onstage reaching around for papers, I took care to make sure it was out of the way so no one would cut themselves. After the show Adam found me and said that he enjoyed the “cadence” of my raffle monologue and said that if he had known ahead what I was doing he’d have written a monologue for that moment. It was awesome to hear that.
The closing show was fine. I pulled a prank on Kevin in the second act. I had been planning this for some time and only told Laura of my plan. In a scene in the second act between Chris and Susan, Kevin and I would be above on a platform, watching and jeering. Finally Chris came to his line “You left my house that night in a frenzy,” to which Susan responded with “I was not in a frenzy.” At that moment I turned to Kevin, covered my mouth and whispered in his ear “I bet he put it in the wrong hole.” He did not crack up, but he thought it was hilarious and the expression on his face was worth it.
My one regret is that I never took any photos of me in my costumes or with any of the cast. I do not know why I didn’t do it. It just seemed as though I lost the will or the urgency to do that and before I knew it the end of the run had arrived, and I missed my chance. Better watch out for that in the future.
It was during this show that I was inspired to begin this blog and thus I wrote down my experiences rather than rely solely on memory.
The final show I did in 2012 was The Great Divide at Sonoma State (SSU) from November 1-10. Written by Adam Chanzit, The Great Divide was a fairly new play, having been staged only once in
Adam had spent time in
This was the first show I was ever cast in without auditioning. I originally had no intention of auditioning for any SSU shows that season since I had recently graduated and felt I should branch out. But that year, something unfortunate happened. They held auditions, but no call backs because, as Kevin Ockelmann told me later, there were so few men that they cast everyone and even then, not all the roles were filled. This I had to see. So, I journeyed to SSU and saw the cast lists. The musical show that year was a set of two short operas (which had only three male roles) and they were fully cast, but not the other plays. I was amused and bewildered for some of the male actors still at SSU were not on there at all. They probably had other offers elsewhere.
Three weeks passed and from what I heard from Kevin, they still could not find men. And one or two had dropped out or were uncertain about continuing. So, while still in rehearsals for The Elephant Man, I went to a full cast rehearsal one night and spoke with director Doyle Ott and I offered my services. He was hesitant at first because my availability would soon be limited because of The Elephant Man, but he gave me a script and tested me in a few parts. It was another rehearsal before I was finalized as Phil and Trustee 2. I only had a couple of full cast rehearsals and then I had to go back to The Elephant Man for full cast rehearsals and tech week.
The show was a reunion in many ways for me. I was definitely among good friends. In addition to Kevin, my friends Chris Colburn and Laura Millar, with whom I had done
Though it took me a moment to realize, and I don’t know why, I was now in my fourth main stage show at SSU and once again Chris Colburn was involved. That was a perfect record for me. It seemed like we were meant to work together in all my main stage productions at SSU.
In the case of Kevin, it was our third show together that year after previously doing
Once The Elephant Man was up and running, I could go back to Great Divide rehearsals. I was usually only called once a week on Wednesdays for full cast rehearsals. Occasionally I’d be called for a couple rehearsals a week, but no more than that. Doyle emphasized character development in the scenes mainly for the main characters, hence why I wasn’t there often. But the last two weeks before tech week we were all called for every rehearsal. We’d rehearse Act 1 one night, Act 2 the next, with various scenes getting additional work. Doyle would say to me more than once “It’s good to have you back.” Truthfully, it was good to be back. I always looked forward to going to rehearsal there, even during Elephant Man rehearsals.
It was around the time I returned that I began to hang out with Kevin a lot more. Once a week I would go to his house and we’d cook dinner together. Kevin had Crohn’s disease and was on a specific carbohydrates diet and had to make a fresh dinner every night. Occasionally we go see a movie and, once, a theatre show, We Won’t Pay, We Won’t Pay! One week, we went to an Indian restaurant with another friend before seeing Camelot.
While I was away doing Elephant Man, another guy was found to take a few other small male roles. His name was Matt Lindberg. By this time, we were still short one man for a main role.
Three weeks before opening, we finally found a person to play the character we couldn’t cast. The character was supposed to be Hispanic and named Juan and the only Hispanic actor we could find was apparently not only a poor actor, but only showed up once and was never seen again. Doyle consulted with Adam and they decided to rename him John and they found another student, Phil Ferrero, to play him. He embraced the challenge and memorized quickly. He proved to be very cool, integrating into cast seamlessly and I got along with him very well. He and Kyle were very tight and it always amused me to see them goof around with each other.
One of my favorite memories in the whole process was how Ashley, Laura and I would often quote lines and imitate characters from the Disney movie The Sword in the Stone, especially Archimedes. Scarcely a day went by when we weren’t imitating specifically the squirrel scene or Archimedes, even matching the character movements in unison with each other without trying. I even threw an Archimedes line at Laura during the town hall scene twice during the process. And one of those times she did actually hear me, and it very nearly caused her to laugh.
On Monday October 22, little more than a week before opening, I got sick in my throat. At that rehearsal I began to feel horrible. At first, I thought it was a sinus infection because it had all the signs: dry throat, headache and stuffy nose. Then a couple hours later, my headache suddenly vanished, which I thought strange. Then over the next few days I got an eye infection, my nose was stuffed, my throat swelled, and I was constantly tired. By Thursday I began losing my voice. That Friday I visited my family, and I did not sound right because my voice was weakening, and it was a struggle to speak. Tech weekend was that weekend. I was still suffering on Saturday, but luckily, they skipped over several of my lines for cues. Gradually I began to improve, but then the following Monday I felt like a lump was in my throat. I went to the clinic where the doctor diagnosed my condition as pharangytis. The lump feeling lasted three days before disappearing.
For what seemed like an eternity, before and during the run, I went through the process of healing. I took antibiotics, began taking Vitamin C and D, ate soup for dinner and gargled warm salt water every hour I was awake. I also had a cough that came in the evening, but with Nyquil I suppressed it and got some sleep.
During the illness, my vocal abilities diminished significantly. When I tried to sing, I could only sing a limited range, none of my bass or higher notes and I could not speak or sing falsetto. For all of the tech rehearsals I dreaded the moments when my lines came. In one scene where the factory workers had lunch I had a few lines, but my voice was good for merely talking. Then I remembered that my line would end the first act. I would have to yell “Holy shit! It’s gonna blow!” or something like that and then an explosion would happen. Kevin had a monologue at the beginning of the scene, which was set in a bar. Every night during rehearsals, I listened all the way through it thinking, “In one minute this is really going to suck for me.” My voice did return enough in time for opening, though I was in a near panic. My falsetto did not return fully for weeks after the show closed.
 |
| The bar scene. Left to right, Me, Matt, Kevin, Charvel and Phil |
We had a large technical problem that was more frustrating because I felt no
matter how much we ran and reran through it during tech rehearsals, it was
never right. The crew up in the box never got the explosion sequence right. The
timing was always wrong. The lights came on too early and the sound too late. I
found out later that the light board operator was always messing up. Every time
we came offstage from that, Phil and I always ranted about how badly it went.
The set consisted of a turntable on which a table and chairs sat and that was the main characters’ home. Then up center stage extending to stage left was a high platform, which rose higher on stage right. In the middle was a gas rig. There were two staircases, one behind the platform, which was steeper, and one that led out into the wings. I certainly got a workout climbing up and down the two stairs and turning the turntable around every night.
Opening night went smoothly, with a couple small problems in cues. The second night was better. I had a rather eventful moment at one point that night. If there’s one thing I pride myself on in theatre, it’s that I never miss a cue. I’ve been in situations where actors have missed their cues (see
I did not have much time. I ran as quickly and quietly as I could behind the backdrop. Luckily, I found one and dashed back. I could hear Kyle saying his last line as I turned the corner. As I ran to my place, WHAM! I ran right into him as he was coming off. Katherine was right behind, but she saw nothing. I whispered a hurried apology and rushed to turn the turntable. Kyle kidded with me backstage afterward. No harm done.
The third show, the only matinee, was terrible. Cues were missed by the stage manager, who apparently had a hangover, and the explosion at the end of the first act was horribly timed. In the second act during the town meeting scene, there was a raffle in which I would have a short monologue and then draw a name for a pair of tickets to the Fall Dance show. The first one was blank, so I threw it aside. The second had a name I couldn’t read and the third had a fake name. Eventually I took out a few that were blank, while staying in character. I’m sure the rest of the cast was just as perplexed. Connor tried to just drop it and said, “Maybe we should just get this thing started?” I finally pulled out one that had a cast member’s mother’s name. The next night all the tickets were blank, and I had to say the number.
 |
| My monologue before the raffle |
Tuesday the following week, we had an Italian run or a speed through. It was
the first type of brush up rehearsal I ever had. Doyle wanted the lines to be
perfect for Adam, who would be there for the next few nights. Kyle was absent
due to class and Cory was late. We zipped through the lines and ran through the
staging. It took forty-five minutes.
Wednesday was a gala night. Hors-d’oeuvres were served in the lobby. It was by far our best night. It was our largest and most responsive audience. They talked back during the town hall scene in the second act and we got plenty of laughs. Since Adam was there, we were all at our best. After the show we had a talk back with Adam in the lobby. We talked about favorite moments, what it felt like to play the roles and asked questions.
Friday was the final performance Adam would attend. The first act went generally well; the explosion sound was perfectly timed, but not the lights. Then in the town hall meeting, disaster struck. At one moment, Laura’s character is showing contaminated water samples and would put a jar on the table where Cassandra and I sat. But this night she slammed it down. It cracked and water began leaking. I tried to move it aside, but it broke, and water spilled all over the table. I spent the rest of the scene struggling not to laugh. Then at the end when everyone was onstage reaching around for papers, I took care to make sure it was out of the way so no one would cut themselves. After the show Adam found me and said that he enjoyed the “cadence” of my raffle monologue and said that if he had known ahead what I was doing he’d have written a monologue for that moment. It was awesome to hear that.
The closing show was fine. I pulled a prank on Kevin in the second act. I had been planning this for some time and only told Laura of my plan. In a scene in the second act between Chris and Susan, Kevin and I would be above on a platform, watching and jeering. Finally Chris came to his line “You left my house that night in a frenzy,” to which Susan responded with “I was not in a frenzy.” At that moment I turned to Kevin, covered my mouth and whispered in his ear “I bet he put it in the wrong hole.” He did not crack up, but he thought it was hilarious and the expression on his face was worth it.
 |
| The scene with me and Kevin. |
The strike took little more than an hour. Afterward Kevin, Chris, Matt and I went to In-n-Out before attending the party at Susan’s house. Her house was not even one minute from my house. I remember how beautiful the night sky was and talking about the stars and other science facts with a guest named Jim. He was not an astronomy major, but an enthusiast. I was not at the party long due to work the next day.
I was glad to have done this show. It was a good run. It felt good to be back in Person Theatre and doing a show with a lot of friends again. It was only afterwards that I realized that at no time during this run did anybody think to say, onstage or off, “Somebody’s poisoned the water hole!” (Toy Story reference)
I was glad to have done this show. It was a good run. It felt good to be back in Person Theatre and doing a show with a lot of friends again. It was only afterwards that I realized that at no time during this run did anybody think to say, onstage or off, “Somebody’s poisoned the water hole!” (Toy Story reference)
My one regret is that I never took any photos of me in my costumes or with any of the cast. I do not know why I didn’t do it. It just seemed as though I lost the will or the urgency to do that and before I knew it the end of the run had arrived, and I missed my chance. Better watch out for that in the future.
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