New show opened at the theatre last week, Tom Dick and Harry by Ray and Michael Cooney. It's a British comedy, almost a farce but not quite. Not too many slamming doors, nobody running around in their underwear. It's a funny show though.
But like a farce, there's not a lot for me to do. Lights up at the beginning, down at intermission, up again for Act 2, down for the end, and up again for the curtain call. No lighting effects, just up and down.
Even the sound is pretty easy. A couple of sound effects, and music. Since there are no scene breaks not a lot of music, just preshow, intermission, curtain call and exit really.
The sound effects consist of someone falling out a window and crashing into galvanized garbage cans, twice. I thought it might be difficult to find the sound of galvanized garbage cans falling and/or getting crashed into but it was surprisingly easy. I got six or so good ones, then mixed them together with some breaking glass and made two different effects so they don't sound the same. I even added a cat in one of them for a little comedy effect. Now, if the actors would only quit talking over the sound, the audience might laugh.
There is also a cordless phone ringing twice in the show. If it's an old fashioned corded phone we can wire it up to make it ring, but apparently not a cordless. So it's a sound effect, coming through the speakers. I have a standard one that I always use, and I'm using it again.
As well, there is a part where someone gets hit over the head with a metal tray. And the director didn't ask but it looked pretty fake, as the actors are not actually hitting each other. So I added the sound effect of a Chinese gong. I pay close attention at that part and hit the gong sound just as the tray comes closest to his head, and it looks and sounds great.
For the music I went with all British Invasion stuff, even though it's a little rockier than what I usually do. Oh well, in three weeks I'll be changing a lot of it anyway.
Christmas is coming, and I'll have to add some holiday songs in there I guess. The boss has told me in previous years that I can put the Christmas music in from the beginning--late October/early November is not too early for Christmas music. I disagree though--even though it's more work for me I'm happy to change the music the first week of December. That's plenty early enough.
Next show is Boeing Boeing at the end of January. I'm not sure what that involves as I've never seen the play. I have seen the movie, starring Jerry Lewis, but that's not much of an indication.
No concerts in my future so I'm not sure if I'll have anything to talk about until January. So, happy holidays if I don't, and see you in the new year!
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