DMTC - "Brigadoon" Opens

Opening night went reasonably well. There seemed to be fewer glitches than on some other opening nights. There weren't even many dropped lines. I think it's because the grandiose pace of the show gives actors time to think ahead and avoid mistakes even before they are made.

A three-legged stool upon which Katherine Coppola jumps toppled in one scene. She had been wary of that stool during rehearsal, and now I think she'll skip the jump entirely.

Tony's big leap over Jabriel worked well, and the gasp of the audience was something to behold!

Decorative foliage mugged John Van Wart's shirt. Tonight, I fear he will seek revenge.

Playgoers sitting on house-left said they could easily see the fan blowing fog in from the wings. They could see Harry Beaton pursuers as well as they torpidly gathered, singing in the wings, as Harry Beaton ran madly past.

Late in the rehearsal period, we realized we were going to have trouble with the temperamental bagpipes. Apparently a slow leak sabotaged the instrument and made it difficult to play. Plan A having failed, Plan B was instigated. Efforts were made to have a synthesizer play bagpipe-like bleats from the orchestra pit. Only trouble was, the accordion-sounding synthesizer gave what, to me, sounded like a real norteño edge to the supposed bagpipe music. Instead of sounding like a funereal Scottish dirge, to me, the music instead sounded like a happy Bernalillo baile. Nevertheless, Plan B was the plan, until the moment of truth arrived, and the synthesizer failed. So, with the barest hesitation, Laura instead played the music on piano (Plan C), which worked out OK. Perhaps on a future weekend, we'll try to reintroduce the bagpipes....

The audience was unusually large for an opening night. DMTC is apparently participating in a promotional program offered by seeaplay.com (the Onstage Ticket Club?), whereby people can see shows for free, or somesuch. As the former Treasurer, I don't like the sound of this program. Nevertheless, it was nice having a reasonably-large audience.

[UPDATE: Mike Mac says the bagpipes are fine. Which begs the question, what precisely was wrong? Suffice to say bagpipes, the Ethel Merman of the musical instrument family, are temperamental.]