MARY POPPINS JR.

Date of Run: November 23 and 24, 2019
Role: Bank Chairman and ensemble

I'm almost loathe to write a post for this one at all for two reasons. First, it was only two performances and second, this is not a show I would include on a resume. But it was an experience and as such, it deserves a mention. Also, it was the first Disney musical of any sort that I got to do; not exactly what I had in mind for doing one, but it was a start. It was one little show to slip in before the end of 2019.

This musical was produced by a music lesson company in Cotati, California, called "Music to My Ears." This company not only did music lessons, but also the occasional acting and dance class, as well as a couple musicals a year. Sometimes, as in this case, it was a junior production, and sometimes the regular full production, but in each case, the shows had only a few performances.

Three weeks before the performances, I got a Facebook message asking me if I was interested in doing this. Apparently, the show had suffered from a number of people dropping out and they were considering cancelling it, unless they could get at least ten more people. After first checking that I would only be doing the adult shows at seven in the evening on the two nights, I said I could do it. Fortunately, they got the number of people necessary to do it so the show would go on.

The rest of the cast included Brandy Royal, Eric Yanez, Julia Stiege, Kristin Isaacs, Francesca Antonini, Victoria Antonini, Alicia Webb, Denis Solano Jr., Amy Isaacs, Rebecca Maggi, Maggie Milard, Kandis Gilmore, Devan Royal, Jennifer Iloff, Perla Solis and Jeremy Martin.

I was assigned ensemble roles, such as park person, chimney sweep, etc. My main role was that of the bank chairman. Sadly, since the musical has many differences from the film version, this was not Dick Van Dyke's character of Mr. Dawes Sr. from the movie. That would've been awesome.

With Julia Stiege (George Banks)

 

We only had six rehearsals after the new cast members came in. I've no idea how many they had before that. A couple rehearsals were devoted to dance and the rest were staging. The dances mercifully were not very complicated and quick to pick up. Unfortunately, though they must have learned the music and been assigned parts early on, that was not the case when I joined. We never had a single rehearsal where we worked just music. I would have liked at least one so I could record my parts if nothing else. In the end I had to wing it.

The music for this show was not with a live orchestra, but rehearsal track recordings of the music. That certainly made it easier to learn the tempos and cues. For the most part anyway. Some of them were a bit tricky.

I had to provide my own costume pieces for this show. Luckily, I had a number of the things they asked for a white shirt, black pants, a vest, a chimney sweep type hat and a colorful shirt. I did have a black jacket, but I felt it was too modern for 1910s England and I also needed a dark black shirt. I ended up finding both items in a thrift store and though I had no intention of keeping them, at least they were cheap.

In my bank costume

The Chimney Sweeps

The two performances were done in the gym/theatre at Liberty Elementary School, which was out in the middle of nowhere. We never had a rehearsal in there with the set pieces, which was a shame because we could've used it. The rehearsal space was open and wide, but the stage at Liberty was smaller and cramped in the wings. We at least could have used some practice running through the cues.

The stage and set

 

My main job was to take the two "beds" on and offstage with Perla. They were really a couple of folding benches with sheets over them, but they were long and awkward to move. We made it easy only by stacking them on top of each other and then carrying them. It wasn't too bad except for the traffic on stage with all the other pieces and people needing to move to their places.

The first show was anything but perfect. It was more like a run during tech week than an actual performance. There were so many mistakes made. I made two mistakes involving a set change: first, I entered too early for the first one in the show before the curtain was closed, so the entire audience saw me. Second, I got confused on a set change, thinking it happened before a moment where the cast sang a part, so I entered as a chimney sweep without a sweep. To make matters worse, there were three children in the front on the audience that would not be quiet. It was very distracting with them going on and on. Some people missed their cues and dropped lines and the music was often too early.

On stage during a rehearsal

The second show was, regretfully, not much better. Though the set changes were a bit cleaner, and people did better with their lines, the music cues still could have been better. One notable mistake was made at the song "Precision and Order." The cast was lined up ready to start their choreography when the curtain opened too soon. The person pulling it, realized their mistake and closed it, though it caused things to look bit awkward.

For all that happened, the audience didn't seem to care on either night about the mistakes. But I truly think that if we just had a couple days of tech in the actual space the show would have been much better.

And that is the story of how I was able to slip one more mini show in before the end of the year and the decade.