St. Paul Minnesota- Week Twenty Seven

The Sleeper bus from Des Moines to St.Paul, was actually really enjoyable. Usually, I can't sleep on the bus because it is ALWAYS hotter than the Sun in my bunk. This time around though, it was quite cool and sweet slumber was achieved. When I woke up and checked into the hotel, I looked out my window and high up on a hill over looking the whole city was/is this beautiful cathedral. I was instantly transported back to my visit to Italy. I learned that it is -obviously- the Cathedral of St.Paul.

I am not a big fan of his, honestly. His views on women can really piss me off. Often I have thought that perhaps Paul was a big sissy, but that is a debate for another time.

I also learned that you can't toss a cat around this town without hitting a Catholic. On a very brief walk I took, (brief because it was deliriously HOT) I ran into three different Catholic churches. I had no idea there were so many here. You know when you visit Boston that Catholics abound, but my experience has been that once you get into middle America, the predominant religions are more along the Evangelical line. Whatev. This topic is boring me. However, I will go in that church before I leave. I am hoping you can go all the way to the top of the dome.

So.
Opening was fairly uneventful, a great relief from the dramas of the last few cities. The crew is really good. Some of them I have worked with before when Sweet Charity did it's pre Broadway try out in Minneapolis. I liked them then, and I like them now. This doesn't mean that there aren't any characters among them, but nothing like Des Moines, that's for sure. What is even better, is that we are here for 3 weeks. (breathes a sigh of relief)
Opening was a piece of cake.
After the show the presenters threw us a very nice Opening Night party. Lots of people I don't know were there. You can always find everyone in the show, because we are all dressed uber-casual, while the fancy people are dressed...well..fancy. They had this great little veranda most of us settled on. That's a picture of Tony, Nate, Patrick, and Mike, toasting the night.
Wednesday Night I went out for cocktails with Wayne and Tony. It was at a place called...oh God I don't know what it was called but they had these hilarious cans of Spam with our logo on it. Actually the place was crazy with Spamalot promos. Big Posters and Spam napkins at every table. Either St. Paul luuuuuuuuuuvs Spam...or they are REALLY excited about our show being here. The waitress gave me one of the cans, but you know, I can't find that damn thing anywhere. That means I hafta go back and get another one. Balls.
After hanging there for a spell Tony and I had a pinball championship playoff. God, I really love pinball, but you can rarely find a place that carries it anymore. It is a dying game. Pics below.

Thursday I went to the Science Museum. I went because it is around the corner from the theater and because they currently have an exhibit about Pompeii. Jim and I went to Pompeii during our visit to Italy a few years ago. I loved it. There is something so horribly beautiful about all the artifacts from that event.
The excavation in Italy seems like work that will never end. I am sure, they will never be finished finding interesting things at that site. The exhibit was very arty actually, considering it was surrounded by the typical -jump on it-push it-pull it- displays that normally crowd such a museum. I really felt it represented the sad beauty of what I saw when I visited the actual dig. I spent a long time just staring at the casts of people covering their noses and mouths, trying to protect themselves from a certain death. Powerful stuff. pics below...
God forbid I should have a drama free week. I woke up on Friday morning thinking my front teeth felt funny. One of them felt kinda wiggly. I joked about it with people at work, and basically mocked myself until I got back to the hotel. I took a close look at my teeth and realized that my extremely expensive, VERY NEW veneers had a crack running down them.
DUN dun duuuuuun.
I completely wigged.
I spent Saturday morning online and then on the phone, calling all over God's green earth to try and find some dentist who could keep me from looking like a resident of Deliverance. In my mind's eye, I saw it breaking off. I peeked at the stumps that used to be my teeth when they were being fixed. I KNOW what that shit looks like. This is a Catagory 5 issue. I have been on a pureed diet since. People offer me hard food, I just shake my head no and point at my mouth. What's funny is that a normal person might have kept it a secret and just dealt with it quietly. I told everyone. One, because I thought someone might know someone who knew someone who knew a good dentist.(which they did) Two, because if the damn thing did break off, everyone would have some prior knowledge of the problem and not judge me for my snaggle teeth.
Hello?!!! This is my front tooth I am talking about. This is not some back molar that I can hide and deal with later.
The stress of the whole thing has given me a monumental zit right on the nerve line in my cheek. Great. Now if I go to my new dentist, and he is hot, I have this adolescent pustule radiating off of me. AND I get to spend my day off at the dentist when I was supposed to go hang with my good friend Anne. great. just great. (insert many many swear words)

Sunday morning I woke up in a panic, SURE that my tooth had broken apart in the night. Nope. Still there.
During the second show on Sunday, I popped an Altoid in my mouth and it hit my tooth and I felt it shift and stick. Then I said " GOD, I have one act left, can you just get me through it, without me looking like someone from Arkansas???!'
Our leading lady Esther turned around, gave me a good hard stare and said "EXCUSE ME?!"
cough.
She is from Arkansas.

Francesca and Jovon had a good laugh at that one. (They were walking behind me)

I recently sent out an email, telling people of my new email address. In that email, I let everyone know where I was and how I was doing. Two seconds later I get an email back from my friend Robin. I am such a loser. I mean, seriously people - LOSER!!! I completely spaced that she lives here!!! This isn't some random person, this is a woman who had a MAJOR role in shaping the neurotic work obsessed person I am today. I mean Robin is - well - ROBIN. Those of you who don't know, I didn't go to school my senior year of high school. I was an intern at a regional theater and got credits to graduate. Robin was my mentor and advised me through the whole thing. Not only did she act as an advisor to me, but she, god bless her, dealt with the teenage Fran. I was full of all this unbridled, unfocused energy and she spent an incredible amount of her own personal time leading me through that mine field. My mom thinks she is a saint. (OMG I can't believe I was EVER 17)
Robin took me for a tooth friendly brunch and we got to catch up a little. It was at this lovely place in the richey rich area up by the cathedral. I need to spend a little more time looking at the houses up there. Those of you who know me well, know how much I love looking at the homes of the better half. It was beyond great seeing Robin and, no doubt, we will have some more time together while I am here.

So tomorrow I head over to Minneapolis in the hopes that this dentist will correct my smile. Hopefully I will still make it down to see Anne. You will have to check back next Monday and see what happens.

Love
Fran



The Extra Pics:



Catholic Church #1. Actually this is the "poor peoples church". one of the locals told me they built this church so that the rich people who went to St. Paul's on the hill, wouldn't have to look at the poor.



Called "The Little French Church". This was around the corner form my hotel. Catholic Church #2




Ryan, Mike, and Nate, enjoying a bite to eat at Wild Thymes.




The Opening Night party.


The nest few are from the Pompeii exhibit










This picture really shows how I felt about the whole exhibit. It was haunting and beautiful.





Wayne and Tony have a shot while we were out.




Tony playing pinball. As you can see from the score, he is winning. (@!%$GT#@^%!!!!.....I am just a lil competitive...)

Des Moines Iowa-Week Twenty Six

Ahhhhhh Des Moines. My life is soooo glamorous.

The flight from Tulsa to Des Moines was fairly uneventful. It was an early morning flight as you can see by the very tired crew scattered about the boarding gate. It is kinda hilarious, walking up to the gate and all around are bodies. One of our lighting guys even had his sleep Apnea machine hooked up. I cannot imagine what that looks like to your average traveller going on vacation or something. To us, it is just, well...life. To a normal person it must look like a bunch of homeless people... After getting in my seat, the couple I was sharing my row with on the first flight decided 8am was a GREAT time for a 5 course meal. They laid it all out and started chowing down. I was fine until they started feeding each other and making out. Good God. They had so much garbage that when the flight attendant came by to pick up trash before we landed, he took one look at the Hefty bag the guy was holding and said (in a very gay way) "Ummmm.... I am SO gonna have to come back for THAT". LOL. Who can eat like that at 8am? and on a flight???

As soon as we started training people on Tuesday, I knew this was gonna be a big week of suck. The dressers here, are a sweet sweet bunch of people, but some of them are beyond help. One of our leading man dressers was not only inexperienced but had been beaten up 6 years ago and now has a metal plate in his head and no short term memory. This means that everyday I was teaching him the show all over again. Not for Nothin, and I mean it, he was as sweet as could be, and really wanted to do a good job. By Friday I had to dig deep for patience and calm, after retraining him every single show. Not only that, but he would come out with these random statements that had nothing to do with ANYTHING. Almost as if the wiring in his head was a little facocked. It wasn't just me either. Francesca had two prop guys who were born during the depression who she had to baby sit all week. I think one was deaf and the other was colorblind. Hmmm I may have that wrong. I think one of the spot ops was the color blind one - which is even more hilarious. You just can't make this shit up people.

So it was an exhausting week althogether as far as the show was concerned. On an awesome note Linda Lee, who is my ultimate-on-high-Mt.Olympus, boss was here. You gotta love her. Linda gave me my first Broadway job back in 1997. We have been trying to work together ever since, but I have been so busy really, that every time she called me to work on her new show, I already had a gig. I think she is the perfect boss. Not an once of pretense about her. She is just a straight up lady. She came out to see how we were doing, and to show the Austrailian Spamalot supervisor around. Normally when a boss from NYC comes out to check on things, there is much nervousness and anxiety, but Linda is just too cool. It has been great having her here, and I hope to see her soon.

Also this week brought my birthday. Usually I am nutty about my birthday. Some fantastic event takes place, with at least a month on planning. The older I get, the more I want something quiet. Not that the day isn't important to me anymore, of course it is. I dunno. I just wanted some peace. It was a good day. I started out by going to lunch with the sister of one of my favorite friends. Joe Porto grew up in Des Moines, but now lives in Oregon -pics of him will of course follow when I go to Portland. I have never met any of his family, except his nephew, so when he wrote me and told me his sister wanted to hang, I thought, well, of course! Eileen is a great lady, and even though we didn't really know each other at all, we had a lovely lunch and a place owned by their uncle. It was a very yummy Italian experience.
After that I went to work. YeeeeeeeeeeeHaaaaaaaaaaaw. Happy Birthday to me. LOL
There was an opening night party for the company at a local brewery called the Court street Brew House. I went there last year while I was on (let's all say it together) Hairspray. I like this place. It is fun and cool without being too trendy and irritating. I had only told a few people it was my birthday, but one of the company (Piper) heard me thanking people, and like the Pony Express, galloped throughout the joint and my worst fear came true. Everyone stared at me and sang Happy Birthday. Man, I used to Looooooooove being the center of attention, somewhere between 28-32 I flipped over to just HATING it. Actually, there is no better way to have that song sung, then by some talented folks in 4 part harmony. When I covered my face in humiliation and only listened, it was actually really beautiful. 6 shots later....I went home. LOL. I don't think I have done that many shots since college. And the best part of all, I heard from all my people. My phone was going off constantly with text messages and voicemails from my people who let me know that they love me. Who could ask for more? It was a really good day.

The rest of the week has been about work (God bless my metal headed dresser) I honestly didn't get out at all this time around. If it didn't happen between the block between my hotel and the theater, well, I didn't see it.

I am starting a new segment to this blog. I am calling it "The View From My Hotel Room Window." I like it because it could be a beautiful skyline shot of Anywhere USA or it could be a ventilation shaft. You just never know. This week I have a nice view of the little park between my hotel and the theater which is that cement building in the very back of the photo. So here ya go

Next week we load into St. Paul. We are sitting down there for 3 whole weeks. That means I will actually get some days off!!!
We are on a sleeper bus to St.Paul, which is great. I am so sick of the airport and security and hiding my lighters, and forgetting to wear socks so then I have to put my bare feet on the floor as I walk through the metal detector. EWWW (and the sad thing is...I ALWAYS FORGET!!!)
Anyway, I am missing you guys so much right now. The next few cities I have people in, upper echelon people...so that's gonna be swwwwwwweet.

Love to all.

The Extra Pics



Jovon and Kevin at our opening night party. This is Kevin's last week with us.




a crowd of the Spam Fam enjoying the party




Des Moines has a series of bridges connecting most of the downdown buildings called the Skywalk. It is full of shops and quick eateries. There is a also a lame mall in the center of it. It keeps you out of the horrifying heat though.




The Capitol building. one my my favorites.




That's Janet, the Austrailian Spamalot Supervisor with Linda. They were goofing around on deck before Janet left to embark on her own Spamalot Journey. Hmmm...Austrailia.....wonder if she needs an assistant....




The Court street Brewery named a beer after one of our Characters for the Opening Night Party. I have to admit it was very very tasty.





a show shot. The King Ni potrtion of the show.




A crowd of the locals hanging out before the play. Check out the one digging for gold in the front. It's a 2 knuckle nose pick if I ever I saw one.


Finally, this week I would like to out the Pott Heads on this tour. That is what I am calling the crazy Harry Potter fanatics who ran out and bought the last installment the minute it hit the stands. This is merely a sampling of the many people on this gig, who currently have their noses firmly stuck in that book. crackheads.....lol

Tulsa Oklahoma - Week Twenty-Five

Wow
Really?
Week Twenty-Five?
Wow. I HAVE been away for awhile. I will be surprised if anyone even checks in anymore. Slowly but surely things are getting back to normal. It's been an interesting month. Crazy really, but I am holding my own. I miss Mike and Jaki terribly and am feeling out of sorts and not a little alone. So much has been going on though, that I haven't really been seeing anyone outside of work, so I think as things settle in, it will be just fine.

The last time I was in Tulsa, I was on the Hairspray Tour.
coughs.
I shall leave it at that.

Opening Night wasn't the best. Some of the dressers are a little weak. One of them was a complete mess, actually. Just completely freaking out. I can usually see that coming. You get little hints throughout the day that someone is a freaker, but I was completely surprised by this one. They were so cool all day, then 8pm curtain hits and they suddnely can't read or comprehend English. Most of them were fine. It was just a little harder with this load in being the first one for our new Wardrobe Department. Hell, I am the veteran and I have only been here a few months.

As the week wore on, most of the dressers improved, but my main dresser really just started tanking. From the very beginning I could not instill in her a sense of urgency. They are called QUICK CHANGES for a reason. We would be in the middle of Camelot, where the fastest changes are happening, and she was moving at a complete snails pace. She was literally 4 steps behind the whole way. I tried everything except yelling "MOVE GOD DAMN IT!!!" Maybe I should have...I just can't bring myself to yell at the locals. Things were going wrong everyday. No matter how much I checked in on her, she managed to screw up the one thing I didn't have time to check. When I asked her if she was alright, she said the heat of the dressing area was making her confused. Funny thing was, it wasn't hot at all. In fact, it was one of the most ventilated Quick Change areas I have had. I just nodded and got her a few ice packs to use if she started losing it. Not to be crass, but she was of an age that might have contributed to the heat issues. Bless her. I spent the entire week dealing with it. I won't miss this place.

I had some fun during the week. On Wednesday, Wayne, Roy, and I headed out to see the Golden Driller. Those of you who were getting the Hairspray blog, will remember my visit to Tulsa's anatomically incorrect statue. That's Wayne and Roy at the bottom of the photo. A better picture is in the Extra pics portion. We drove out to see that, and then stopped by Oral Roberts University, where the World's Largest Praying Hands live. I spent more time wandering around the campus this time. The archituecture there is so wacky. It had to have been built in the sixties or early 70's. Everything was layered with shiny gold. I wanted to go up the Prayer Tower, which reminded me of Spacely Sprockets building on the Jetsons, but it was closed. There was no way I was leaving that campus without something for my trunk, so I stopped by the campus bookstore and got a lil something to stick on. Oral Roberts Campus was pretty fun actually, but I made the mistake of wearing my "Catholic School Survivor" T-shirt, without even thinking. At one point I walked pass this man and he smiled at me then read my shirt, and gave me this completely disapproving stare. I giggled.
That is a picture of the Prayer Tower. C'mon...it looks JUST like Spacely Sprockets!!!!!



Later on in the week we went to one of the casinos out here. It is never easy for me to gamble my money away. I'll go out and buy a new shirt or some dvds or something, but putting my money in a machine and having it disappear within five minutes doesn't sit well with me. Wayne really wanted to go, so in the spirit of togetherness, and trying to get my department more of a cohesive unit, I decided to go. I wound up being out ten bucks. I was actually way up and put my original investment away so I wouldn't play with it, and then proceeded to lose my winnings. Brilliant. Wayne is hilarious when he gambles. Every hand is THE hand that is going to come through. He always verbally coaxes the cards to go his way. At the end of the night he was at a penny slot machine, and it was every bit as important as the ten dollar bet at the black jack table. He hit some major thing and drew a crowd. The penny slot crowd is not the same kinda crowd you find at the tables. Seriously, the entire outing was hysterical.

I just got through with load out, it went pretty well. Even my heat stroke dresser did a good job tonight.

Tomorrow we move on to Des Moines. Des Moines. Another Hairspray stop. You know, we are playing all these venues that Hairspray played when the tour was gasping for it's last breath. This tour is still fairly young. It baffles me really.
Whatev.
As long as that paycheck keeps coming in, I am just fine.

Love to all.

Extra Pics.


There was a car show going on right next to the theater. It was a pain, cuz we had no where to park, but I really enjoy these kinda cars.




Wayne and Roy at the Golden Driller




The World's Largest Praying Hands. I think I have seen as much as I can at Oral Roberts. The next time I come to Tulsa (GAH!) I will have to find something else to do.




This is an old photo from Houston of the clouds outside my hotel room. Scary, no?




This is a pic from Dallas. My gondola that hold all our stock of tights and stuff, completely crapped out, and Nate fixed it for me! It was a huge pain, and the whole time he was fixing it he was telling me how he was doing it. It was like watching a do it yourself TV show. LOL. It works perfectly now. Thanks Nate!!


The next few pictures are from the first Wardrobe hosted Shot Nite. As i explained in earlier posts, every Sunday night some member of the company hosts and creates some alcoholic concoction for the entire company to enjoy. Our shot that we served is one that my friend Don Bush made up. It is called a Sunday Morning, and it is very yummy. It was a big hit.

Wayne and Roy servin' it up.




Piper was a maniac that night. We had readied a ton of shots and she made sure everyone finished them. LOL




Thumbs up from matt Allen! (you can barely see him in the back)




Suzanne enjoying her tasty beverage




Cuz and Jeff knockin' em back

Nunalot

So while things have been crazy and my good friend Jaki has been recovering in the hospital, and I have a new co worker, and I have been spending as much time as I possibly can with our window challenged friend, I did manage to spent a day with my sister Valentine in Amarillo TX. It is only an hour flight from Dallas, so on my day off I jaunted over to see her.

We had a great visit. First of all flying without any luggage is really cool. Liberating, in fact. I zipped through the ticket counter and security. I had no real idea what a huge pain in the ass luggage is. Makes me wanna rethink how I travel with this tour. My sister picked me up at the airport and we immediately went to Best Buy to get her a new computer. She wants to start writing her own blog called Nun On The Run, which I think is HILARIOUS. With all the travelling she does, helping poor places in the world, she sees so much, and I think a blog is a great way to share her experiences. plus, I am really interested in seeing what she does. I love this picture because there she is outside Best Buy and these two drop dead gorgeous, tall guys walk past her. She doesn't even notice. It must be cool to be free from the constant need to look at the hottie boys. Hmmm...naaaaaaaaaaaaaa.




After Best Buy we went back to the convent where she lives. It is this huge place, has a school like feel to it, with a beautiful garden in the back. This is a picture of my sister with Sister Sol, who just seems to be one of the happiest, sweetest people you will ever meet. She obviously loves my sister, so that's cool. While hanging out with a bunch of nuns, isn't high on my list of how to spend a day off, I do have great affection for the sisters my sister the sister rolls with.

Amarillo has an unending supply of weird Americana to feast your eyes upon Cadiallac Ranch is this odd little place in the middle of non descript field. I actually don't know who built it or why. You can all do your own Google search. The coolest part about it was that they left spray paint cans there so you could add something to the cars if you wanted to. I thought about making my sister spray something for the sole purposed of having a picture of her writing her "tag" on a car. Nothing better than havng a picture of a nun defacing property. But alas, I didn't do it.
There were a few other people there, looking at the ranch. People treat you so differently when you are hanging with a nun. Some let their mouths hang open in shock, like they are seeing some mystical creature, like a unicorn, or a leprechaun. The most common reaction though, is big smiles. The majority of people really love nuns. They open doors for you, give you discounts on all kinds of things, and basically treat you like royalty. I believe they do it because they think it will keep them out of hell. Just a theory.
Here's a picture of my sister at Cadiallac Ranch. You can't see them, but there are two bikers right outside the field of vision of the shot, with their mouths hanging open.


So while extremely short, my visit with my sister was a lovely bit of levity. She was only too happy to just jaunt around and look at silly things with me, more pictures of them are at the bottom in the extra pics area. While my pedastal image of nuns is shattered (they are really just a gaggle of decent chicks) it is always so great to spend time with someone you don't have to be polite with. She lets me swear and everything.



And hey remember that part of US magazine (or as Jaki refers to it as "The Paper") called "Stars are just Like Us!" and they have pictures of Gwenth Paltrow picking her nose in her car....
well this is my version

NUNS ARE JUST LIKE US!!!!

THEY DRIVE CARS!!!




THEY DO THE DISHES!!




THEY SHOP AT TARGET!!!!

as a side note actually, my sister prefers WalMart and I had to badger her into promising me that she would NEVER EVER EVER shop there ever again. Adding to that, she could never allow any of the other nuns to shop there either. That now that she KNEW how horrible the Walton family is/was it was her RESPONSIBILITY to inform as many people as she could. How's that for a lil Catholic Guilt!



NUNS EAT OUT AND ORDER FROM SLUTTY WESTERN WAITRESSES!!!




NUNS EVEN PUMP GAS!



It's really sad how I laugh at my own jokes.

love to all.

The Extra Pics (Just a few)



My poor sister endured so many indignities for my pleasure. This prize was outside the steak house we had lunch. God love her that she would let me completely poke fun, not so much as her, but her uniform.



This is the steak house we had lunch at where the above photo was taken.



This 40 ft monstrosity, according to Val, is famous throughout Amarillo. It is not connected to anything and just sits there. He has a name, and Val told me but I'll be a monkey's uncle if I can remember.




I have no clue why or how. Go figure.




LOLOL. I was so close to asking my sister to let me take a picture next to this place. That was even too much for me. Nonetheless, I took a picture of it for you anyway.