Amber & Laurent's Wedding

Saturday, September 25th, musical theater veterans Amber Jean Moore and Laurent Lazard got married at St. John's Lutheran Church, 17th and L Street, in Sacramento. Starting from their home base at Runaway Stage Theater, Amber and Laurent branched out to other theaters, and they were on equally splendid relations with all of them, and so the wedding promised to be a perfectly ecumenical blend of musical harmony. On the other hand, there were natural hazards in putting half of Sacramento's divas and stage hounds under one roof, and there were natural rivalries among the various theaters. I preferred to think of it as the Montagues and Capulets and the Sopranos and the Corleones get together for an afternoon of whimsical entertainment.

I had to leave INterACT rehearsal early at the Broadway Playhouse theater in Fair Oaks, and so I was half an hour late to the ceremony. Not wanting to interrupt the ceremony, and determining from the audio being broadcast in the lobby that the ceremony was at a critical stage, I crept up the staircase into the choir loft and watched from up there, next to the pipe organ. There was excellent singing (of course), and candle-lighting and candle-snuffing: it was very pretty. At one point, the organist blew past me to get the organ going for the final procession (he had just seconds to get from the keyboard downstairs up to the organ).

At the reception later, some people described being disoriented by the absence of the "I Do" exchange in the ceremony (since I was late, I figured I had just missed it), but there was a wonderment in their voices, like they had been given an unexpected alternative script to a familiar reading, and they were trying to determine whether they liked it or not.

Afterwards, the guests idled outside on the front steps of the church as photographers besieged the wedding party inside. J.D. counted four theaters in attendance (Runaway Stage, Magic Circle, Chautauqua Playhouse, and DMTC). I half-expected the guests to spontaneously coalesce into Jets and Sharks: I knew Jeremiah had played Tony, and I'm sure there were a few good Marias in attendance too. Nevertheless, the atmosphere was happy and relaxed. It was good to see people who hadn't been around lately, such as Pheonix Vaughn and Jason Stevens (I think they're in LA these days).

The reception was held at the Newman Center near Sac State University. There were some unfamiliar appetizers on a table in the reception hall. One looked like a slurry stabilized into a cake, with green ovals dotting the top. I said, "well, it looks like mortar with pickles." The helpful man in the chef's hat said: "It's duck pate. It's French!" But of course! Why shouldn't Laurent, who is French, have French hors d'oeurves on his wedding day?

Dinner was delayed for a while, so there was some dancing, and much socializing. I met Gino Platina's parents, and gabbed with the DJ. Amber and Laurent looked fine. Among many others, Bob Baxter, producer of Runaway Stage, buzzed about.

Since Runaway garnered most of the Elly Award nominations for musical theater, in some sense, Bob is the current capo de tutti capi on the ever-shifting sands of Sacramento Valley amateur musical theater. Bob came over and put his hands on the shoulders of rival capo Steve Isaacson. No piano wire, though: Bob had in mind a test of Steve's endurance. No contest - Bob reduced Steve into a quivering mass of jelly by giving him an impromptu massage (Don't! Stop! Don't Stop!) These two made men of the musical theater world have their own inscrutable rituals that mere consiglieri such as myself can't understand.

After dinner, there was some excellent dancing - there were a few good dancers of West Coast Swing present. I had to leave to usher "Bye, Bye Birdie" at DMTC, so I missed the karaoke. According to Tev, who left a few minutes after I did, Laurent sang the first song: "Pretty Woman."