2nd rehearsal

I only had one rehearsal last week and I don't have one at all this upcoming week, so there's not a lot of news. I am "off book" already, meaning I've memorized all my lines and am practicing an Oklahoma drawl befitting my character's background as a lawyer for a Tulsa-based oil company (awwwl cump'neh).

Overall, it seems like things are going along pretty well at this point. One thing that's happening, and it's a little early in the process for this, is some people are cracking up hysterically when they make mistakes. You see that all the time. It's not Broadway, we're all there to have fun and mistakes can be funny. But no matter what, you can count on having at least one person in the cast who thinks every mispronunciation or dropped line is a chance to turn the whole thing into this:
This relegates everybody else to feeling like a dick if they suggest that 'ha-ha, yeah, that was cute but can we move on please?'. And since (usually) nobody wants to feel like a dick, nobody says anything and a lot of time gets wasted. It doesn't matter that much to me; I'm there one day a week if at all. It's just one of those things that you can count on happening when you do a show.


Since I don't have much else to report, here are some photos from the experience so far.

This is the "theatre". If it looks like a Baptist church, that's because it is. Or was, from when it was built in 1923 until 1994. Now it's known as The Plant City Cornerstone Center. It's really a pretty awesome building. Stained glass windows, a huge pipe organ, pews and on the stage itself is a dunking booth or whatever it's called for baptising folks. Kinda looks like a hot tub.

It also has a balcony that wraps around the three sides facing the stage. It reminds me of the courthouse in "To Kill A Mockingbird".

This is Linda's Crab Shack, my favorite restaurant in downtown Plant City. It's a no-nonsense seafood-and-beer joint that doubles as the local bus station (check out the sign to the left). It's less than a block from The Cornerstone which is nice because I'm pathologically obsessive-compulsive about being on time, which usually means that I'm almost always obnoxiously early every time I go some place. That means that when I get to Plant City 45 minutes to an hour earlier than necessary, I have a place to hang out and relax before rehearsal or the show starts. Although, since I'm now living like a monk and avoiding fried foods and not drinking, it's something of a challenge to find something on the menu.

I discovered Linda's the last time I did a show in Plant City (Neil Simon's "Fools" in 2004) and I was glad to see it hadn't changed. I have a feeling I needn't have worried, though. When you've got a formula that works as well as seafood/bus station fusion cuisine, you don't screw around with it.