And so the curtain comes down on my New York stage debut. Needless to say I am fucking knackered!
The show went really well and I'm very pleased with everything, but of course this wouldn't be an update if I didn't highlight some of the stranger aspects of my life for the last few weeks.
I'll start with the venue we performed in. The Medicine Room theatre was a very nice space to act however it was interesting to say the least.
The owners of the space were probably the most eccentric people I have ever met. One was a old woman who is currently rehearsing a musical version of a ll of Shakespeare's tragedies. Before every rehearsal she would sit around the piano with a group of friends and warble away about the 'Black ram tupping the white ewe.' Her voice was perhaps not broadway ready shall we say. She was also as mad as batshit. One night she came to see the play and the next day spent time questioning me about the explicit stage directions of the last scene (more on that later.) Eventually she demanded to see my script to see if I was telling her the truth!
There was also a dog who owned the theatre. The dog was just a giant ball of fluff and often mid-rehearsal you would hear him wheezing as he slothed around the lobby. The dog was also the only living thing I knew who took the lift instead of climbing two flights of stairs to get to the theatre.
Of course the dog didn't run the theatre, his owner did. His owner was also a little nuts and would always wear one pink Converse and one Green one.
Perhaps the strangest aspect of the theatre was the man who lived in our dressing room.
Now at first I thought our dressing room was just littered with props; tables, chairs, old costumes, a bed. But then last Sunday I came in for a performance early and heard a stirring. I looked into the dressing room and the long haired ghost who floated around the place was rising from a night sleep. Suddenly I realized that the bed was his, the clothes were his, the empty whisky bottle was his and from then on I was permanently creeped out that I was de-robing in another mans bedroom.
Now for those of you that don't know about the last scene of the play it's time to come clear. I get my arse out onstage. I don't flaunt it but it's there, and if you are sitting in a particular seat you get a very very good view of it.
The arse scene was never problematic however it did run into a few problems. At the end of the scene Ollie has to blow out a candle and the lights would cut to black. More often than not the candle would not blow out and the stage would be plunged into darkness except a dull flickering candle light illuminating my bum. It wasn't attractive.
Now I had no problems getting the ol' butt cheeks out, my bum is one of my better body parts. On some nights, however, the people sitting in the prime butt spotting location proved to be a problem.
On the opening night a couple of girls were laughing every time we said the word 'cum' or even 'come' so Ollie and I twigged pretty quickly that the last scene was going to be hell. Thankfully it provided just a few intakes of breath. I like to assume that's because of glorious peach like nature of my rear.
The worst was this Thursday when I had a lot of friends come see me. I had specifically told Dylan to not sit in the front row, stupidly I didn't give him a reason. Just before the lights went down I looked at the audience from the wings and saw Dylan and Dan sitting in the prime rear viewing area, front row. Bastards. They now look at me in a different light.
And so the maddest, craziest most exhausting 6 weeks of my life come to a close. I'm now a New York stage actor as well as still being a waiter extraordinaire at New York's best BBQ restaurant! I fly home on tuesday night for the mother of all celebrations.... my little cousins barmitzvah. Fuck me life is fun!
