Seth's Broadway Diary, Volume 1: Part 2 (11 page)

Baayork Lee (the original Connie and now choreographer) was super friendly to me, but perhaps thought I was there to relieve the pianist. Instead I stood with the other dancers and prepared to do the opening. It all began well enough, until we got to the turn, turn section. I got nervous and sort of wobbled through a single turn and
right
at that moment, I heard one of the casting people say, loudly,
"He can't do it!"
Perhaps he was talking about something else entirely, but the timing was shockingly devastating. Then Baayork put us into groups. And by "groups," I mean
two people at a time
! That's not a group! How am I supposed to be able to hide and wow 'em with my personality!?! Then, because I wasn't nervous enough, I realized we had to do the opening towards a blatant
camera crew
because they were filming the auditions for a documentary! I got so panicked that my lack of technique turned my "turn, turn" into basically a "trip and saunter out of camera range." I was mortified… especially when it happened again. That's right, we were all graciously given a second chance, and I proved to everyone that my dance training ended in the ‘80s. I’m most thankful that I didn't do a pre-dance interview. They were talking to people outside the audition room, and I was one inch away from saying, "Everybody in there knows me as a pianist, but they're gonna be
blown away
by my dancing." Of course, any editor in their right mind would immediately follow that set-up with a montage of my "fierce" dancing. My only consolation is that the brilliantly talented Grant
did
get the show and told me that Baayork told him if I had done the double turn, I would have gotten a callback.

On Wednesday, I flew out to San Fran and, because Juli's last day of school was Thursday, James came out that night (Juli went to visit her Gran in Texas). Andrea's show has been going great and her beautiful daughter, Alexis Kalehoff, is here with us. Alexis (now 19) made her Broadway debut as Young Cosette in
Les Miz
at age eight and loves to tell Andrea that she beat her to Broadway by five years. The Young Cosettes also have to play Young Eponine, as well as understudy Gavroche, the little boy. Alexis told me that she got to go on for Gavroche, and it was a "unique" performance. She was at the section of the show where Javert sings "Stars," and Gavroche is listening behind the barricade then steps out and sings, "That inspector thinks he's something, etc…" She said that she really had to pee and didn't know what to do… go offstage? What if she missed her cue? Finally, realizing that the show must go on, she simply peed onstage!!! She said that the stagehands who stand underneath the barricade were horrified and had to shield their heads from the onslaught. Alexis thought the story was hilarious at the time, and all Andrea thought was "Thank God we have different last names."

When Andrea was doing
Les Miz
, she wanted the kids in the cast to have an Easter egg hunt, so she hid 72 eggs all over the stage. They were the plastic kind that had money inside, so everybody in the show had a great time looking for them. Unfortunately, she hid 72 eggs… and they only found 68! The remaining eggs wound up breaking the barricade
and
the bank… Andrea had to pay $17,000 to get it fixed!

The most fun part about San Francisco is this chocolate café we discovered in Pacific Heights called Bittersweet. They make a classic hot chocolate, which reminded me of the long-ago discontinued Starbucks "Chantico" hot chocolate… AKA a melted chocolate bar in a cup… delish! What's great about the town is they have lots of zoning laws, so all these charming independent booksellers are everywhere, instead of the big conglomerates that come in and close down all the stores. I've been going into all the bookstores because I love to read (just read
Twilight
, which is a great young adult book about a 17-year-old girl in love with a vampire)
.
OMG! I had no idea how cutting edge I was! That’s like me saying, "Just read GONE WITH THE WIND. I think people might like it.
"
At the first store I went into, I saw my books on the shelf, and the woman who worked there asked if I would autograph them! "With pleasure!" I said.

After that, it was downhill.

At the next store we visited, I asked where my books were and the bookseller told me they were sold out. "Excellent!" I said, with a smile. "Yep," he continued. "We sold all four." Ouch. Then I walked into another store and said to the counterman, "I see you're carrying my two books,
The Q Guide to Broadway
and
Broadway Nights
." Then I added, magnanimously, "Would you like me to autograph them?" To which I got a low energy, "If you want." Suffice it to say, if I had ever gotten a face lift, it would have fallen.

Okay, everyone, happy July and go see a show!

July 7, 2008

Hi, everyone! I just woke up from a nap. No, not the kind of rejuvenating "power nap" that corporate people take to focus their minds. I'm talking about a full night's sleep that wound up being a devastating three-and-a-half-hour disempowered nap.

James and I literally went to bed at 2 AM and woke up at 5:30! What the-?!?!?! It's because we are now on a plane headed down to Dallas and the only flight we could get left at 7:40 A.M. Our Texas jaunt is on account of I'm going to be performing with Betty Buckley at her all-Broadway request show at Lyric Stage in Dallas, as well as giving an audition master class. Oh yeah, today is also James' birthday! The good part is he gets to go to Dallas where he's from; the bad part is the lack of sleep is making us
both
look a year older.

All right, let me give you updates. First of all, last week on the
Legally Blonde
reality show, the coming attraction said that "the pressure becomes too much for Autumn," and then they showed her throwing up in the bathroom. She got sick right after she was critiqued by the judges and the coming attractions imply that the criticism overwhelmed her. Well, the real story is that it was actually the yogurt she ate that had been too long out of the fridge that overwhelmed her. That's right, she didn't realize that the parfait she had for breakfast had been sitting out since Newt Gingrich's "Contract With America." And it was just as rancid. That bit of creative editing totally annoyed me, but not as much as seeing how little I was on that episode! Rude! Then, to top it off, the only time you see me is when Autumn feebly makes her way back to the stage after being sick and I'm hunched over, ignoring her and rifling through my bag! It totally looks like I'm searching for my well-worn copy of a Jackie Collins book, but in truth, I was searching for a piece of gum for Autumn because I felt bad that she was sick and had no Listerine nearby.

Tuesday night, James and I saw
The 39 Steps
and, quite frankly, it took 39 steps to get to our seats. I've gotten really spoiled because I always can get house seats because of my Sirius radio show, and when I arrived at the theatre and was told my seats were in the balcony, I thought of hauling out the ol' "Don't you know who I am?" routine til I remembered that the most common answer when I ask that question is a firm and decisive "no." I went to the balcony ASAP. The seats were actually fine and I was impressed because that show has so much creativity in it. There are only four cast members, and they play all the characters that are in the film, but the lead (who's wonderful) stays the same character throughout, so it's really
three
people playing everybody else. Brava!

Speaking of seats, tell me if you think I was wrong in this situation: I was dying to see
In the Heights
again, and I bought one of the few seats left, which happened to be in the boxes. It was a $100 seat, but I couldn't see everything because I was over on one side of the stage. So, of course, during Act One, I eyed the orchestra seats and saw two open ones in the fourth row. They stayed that way the whole act. During intermission I came downstairs and put my bag on one of the seats. Right before Act Two began, I saw some women standing there discussing the seat. I walked over and said, "Hi! I was sitting over on the side, saw that seat and decided to snag it during intermission!" One of the women said, "Well, it wasn't yours to snag!" I was mortified. "Oh, I'm sorry!" I said, "Is it your seat?" She continued, "No. We're sitting next to it. These are
premium priced
seats." I realized she was annoyed that she paid a lot for her seat and preferred that the unsold seat next to her stay empty for the principal of it! It's not my fault nobody bought the seat next to her. I said something to the effect of, "I don't think I need your permission to sit there," sauntered past her and planted it. So, my question is: was I wrong? In
my
day of buying standing-room tickets, the ushers would always come over once Act One began and move us down if there were empty seats. Isn't that theatre protocol? It's one thing if someone else told me that they snagged the seat first or if the ticket holder showed up just for Act Two, but this woman just wanted to keep it empty… and felt she could tell me where I was allowed to sit. I wound up watching all of Act Two with an enormous smile on my face directed out front
and
an angry glare directed to my side, which took incredible facial flexibility. Hmm… maybe
I
should be in
The 39 Steps
.

This week at the
Chatterbox
I interviewed recent Tony Award-winner Laura Benanti. I've worked with her so many times and I simply adore her. She's such a great musician, such a funny performer and
so
nice! She also has a great sense of humor in real life. When she came onstage, she told everyone that, after the Tony Awards, you have to send in your Tony to get it engraved, so she happened to have it with her. Laura said she really wanted to attach a chain to it and make it into a necklace for her entrance. She thought it would be hilarious to walk out on stage casually, but with her neck jutting down from the weight of it and just be like, "Hey, everyone. What's up?"

I asked her about her first Broadway audition, and she told us that, when she was 17, she went to the open call for
The Sound of Music
Broadway revival. She wanted to play Liesl, but when the casting people looked at her résumé, they told her that she needed to update it because it only had high school credits. She told them that's because she was still
in
high school, and they were shocked. Or, as she put it, they looked at her and said, "High school? You're 40." The most devastating part of the whole day was that Laura assumed, because it was an audition, she had to get dressed up. And to her, "dressed up" literally meant… her prom dress. But she had stayed in the city the night before and forgot her shoes in Jersey, so she showed up at the audition in her prom dress… and clogs. Shockingly, she got a callback. As a matter of fact, she got four of them, and they finally made her an offer to play one of the nuns and understudy the lead role of Maria. She had just started NYU on scholarship but decided to quit (and, P.S., lose her scholarship) to take the gig. She got to go on for Maria, and contrary to Autumn, she actually
was
so nervous that she threw up right before she made her first entrance. She stayed terrified as she ran down the ramp (AKA the Alps) to sing the title song, and she remembers that as she raised her arms to start singing, "The hills are alive," they were both shaking uncontrollably. She obviously did well, though, because she was asked to audition to replace Rebecca Luker (who was leaving) and star opposite Richard Chamberlain. Unfortunately, it was raining the day of her audition
and
she was doing a reading all the way downtown that went on longer than expected, so she ran into the audition late
and
soaking wet. But instead of Richard being angry, he said, "Wow… she really
is
Maria." She got the gig and was starring on Broadway at age 18! Opposite Richard Chamberlain, who was 65. I'm sure the audience wasn't at all uncomfortable when they got together at the end of the show. Hmm…

When Laura got one of the leads in
Swing!
, she had to belt for the first time and didn't quite know how to do it. She said she thought to herself, "I think I'll sing… but yell a little bit…" and it worked! On the morning the Tony nominations were announced, she was awakened by a friend calling to tell her that she was nominated for a Tony. She thought he was crazy and explained that the
show
was nominated for a Tony. Her friend apologized and told her to go back to sleep. Then her Mom called to tell her she was nominated, and she was outraged her mom was calling so early. She was 20 years old and in that "My mom is so annoying" phase, so she said, in full brat, "I wasn't nominated, the show was…
and
you know my Broadway schedule. Don't call me before noon!" She had had it by that point and turned her phone off. When she finally woke up, she had a hundred messages congratulating her… and finally believed it.