Holy Cow! That Kid Can Dance! Billy Elliot at the Jube...

On Saturday Night we saw Billy Elliot at the Jubilee as part of the Broadway Across Canada series.  Although I have seen part of the movie I was not familiar with the musical so I was in for a bit of a treat in discovery.  They have been running commercials on TV for the past month so I was familiar with a few bars of one song but not much else musically.  It was a great night of theatre.  This is a show that is really about dance and it sure did that well from all in the cast with the lead, Billy Elliot, as a phenomenal stand-out.  There are four Billys with the tour.  We saw Ben Cook. I was floored at what this kid could do.  Not only was he an amazing dancer, but he was also a wonderful actor with a lovely singing voice. It blows me away that they have four of them! That one kid could do all that so well is amazing, but to have four! Wow!  There are other talented members in the cast, both young and old.  I particularly liked Sam Poon as Michael and Janet Dickinson as Mrs. Wilkinson. Now I do admit, there is not much of the music that has stayed with me, but it was tuneful and in places quite epic but it was the dancing I was watching and it was awesome!

A side note: I am better rested now as I caught a few more hours of sleep this afternoon to compensate for my sleepless night last night. I also spent an hour fiddling with the schedule and I feel less stressed about that.  I'm a problem solver and a people pleaser and both of those tend to make me more stressed at times as I take in the challenge of a musical.  The sheer size of the casts and structure of the shows often leads to major challenges with scheduling.  I am not sure everyone involved realizes that.

Too Many Pieces want to Fit in the Same Spot...

So yesterday I wrote about my love for the Fringe Program... today I write about my frustration with the BYOV scheduling I discovered in the Fringe Program.  One of the things that the people with BYOVs tend to do is schedule all their shows in the 7-10 p.m. window... ALL THEIR SHOWS in that window.  It sucks.  It means they are programming for the casual Fringer - the Fringer who comes to the Fringe Village during the 'high hours' and sees one or two shows and then hangs out in the beer tent.  It does not work well for the die-hard Fringer - the one who wants to see a lot of shows. 

I go through the program and circle the shows I am interested in - I come up with about 57 - about 1/3 of those are indoor shows and 2/3 are BYOVs.  Can you see the problem?  Consider as well that the BYOVs are not all in the Fringe Village area.  Some of them you have to drive to.  So I am finding myself with a challenging schedule.  I can't make it work.  And because there are some at off-site venues this means that travel time is reducing things even more.  Plus, if I leave the parking lot to see another show I am less likely to come back and pay again to see a later show on site.  I will be more likely to just head home.

How to fix it?  You can't.  Not at this point, however, I would encourage some of the BYOVs to mix it up a bit in the future - add one or two afternoon shows to your schedule so that those who like to fringe a lot can get to your show.  I know for some of the spaces this is not possible but if a few of you do it you might actually find it works in your favour. Instead of competing only in the dense time, spread it out a bit. 

Oh well, perhaps this will benefit the indoor venues who do have afternoon times and are on site.  I know that for me I have chosen a few shows because they were more convenient to get to in terms of location and timing, whereas if I had more options at that time I might have seen something else.

Do What You Need to Do to Make it Work...

This is the story of my life as a Director when it comes to scheduling. I thought my Fringe show was going to be easier, but despite having only 5 actors, it was a major challenge. My schedule doesn't help, but I planned to use Sunday afternoons and Monday evenings to get around the worst of A Little Night Music. A wrench was thrown in that with one actor unable to do Sundays. I knew I had one big challenge with one actor being away the last two weeks of July, but the plan was to use the week before Fringe Techs start to review and tighten. I could make this work. But a different actor came in with a conflict that affected 5 out of 7 of those days in that week. That's the section about which I am most worried.

I haven't even got all the conflicts in, but I had to start constructing a schedule before any more of them filled up the remaining weeks with vacations, or visits from families, or other rehearsals (2 of my actors are in other Fringe shows). I laid it all on the calendar. In June there were 6 days in total where I could use everyone and 4 of those were days I could potentially be scheduled for ALNM. Okay, now I need to write a sucky email to my ALNM Director asking for days off in June. I wanted 8 rehearsals in June - I can get 6. In July, it's even worse. There are only 3 days where everyone is available and 2 of those I have potential ALNM rehearsals. I write about that in my sucky email to my ALNM Director. Apparently those 2 days are 2 of only 3 days she has her whole cast until Aug 16th, can I give her one of them? I will do so, because I know what it is like, but my cast needs to rehearse without me there so I will put someone else in charge that night and fix what I need to the next night. In July there are 6 rehearsals (I wanted 8 minimum) one of which I cannot be at.

Now I don't need them all for ALL of the rehearsals, but because of the structure of the show I need 4/5 of them at almost all times. It's done. We will rehearse 20 times between now and then if we are lucky (like I said, I still don't have all the conflicts). No one can be sick. No one can throw another 'surprise' holiday in the works. This is THE schedule.

Next year, if we decide to do a Fringe show and we get in - I am building the schedule first and saying 'if you can't work with this, then I will find someone else, I love you, but maybe next time...'

Scheduling Nightmares....

Well, I got the Whorehouse Schedule done, and then problems rolled in. Part of it was a miscommunication about available dates from certain people, part of it was a misinterpretation on my part, part of it was people finding new conflicts after the fact. It is what happens with a cast of 31 people and a production team which has two key members working on different shows that run very closely in time to ours. It's a 2000 piece Jig-saw puzzle to begin with so I didn't expect it to be easy. I did expect it to be easier than it was and is.

I am confident that the show will be good and that it will come together, it is just that everyone has to realize that the 'ideal' situation with regards to scheduling is not going to be possible and that we will get it done in a different way. Trust me, if I had my druthers, we would be working chronologically with choreo at the beginning of the rehearsal period and with built in review. That is not in any way possible so I will make it work. I have done shows with kids with schedules that were just as bad so I can make this work!

So, let's hope this current schedule works with no major issues. I am anxious for June when it is the only thing on my plate!