I thought that by the third week of the joan rivers theatre project workshop I would have hours worth of juicy, dirty stories about miss rivers. as it turns out, I have nothing but admiration for the woman. this is no "moving right along". she's always full of gracious words and praise, never missing a chance to joke, and the jokes are always good. mean, crude, dirty and delicious. she shares old school femme tricks with me and has about a hundred pairs of fake lashes in her dressing room. a woman of my own heart.
she gets off stage after a 90 minute show, I rip her out of the rigged costume I just shimmied her into a few moments before and she jets over to another venue to do standup. two shows a night. it's rather unbelievable. I'm exhausted when we have mere two show days, much less two different venues in one night. we are all going to watch her standup at the plush room on friday, I'm excited. she's running the NY marathon and she's stronger than me (there's a gag where I hold a door shut so it appears as if she's locked in the dressing room set on stage and it takes every once of my strength to keep the door shut while she pulls it open from the other side.) her team of handlers are all dolls and we've had a blast drinking lava bowls and dancing at the tonga room.
I am to the point as a stage manager where I'm not learning anything more backstage and this is one of the easiest productions I've run at the magic theatre. still, they all think I'm working very hard and making the magic happen. really, it is just an honor to watch this woman and her supporting characters from behind the curtains as the play gets rewritten on a daily basis, growing into a full blown production and not just the staged workshop it was scheduled to be. I cry with laughter every night at the same jokes I have now heard a hundred times. I chain-smoked with Melissa on our fire escape balcony and listened to her talk about cooper, the grandbaby, and thought to myself, wow, joan looks better than her own daughter. I've seen precious pictures of the two of them together when melissa was a baby and joan had a nose. I don't need a signature, these are memories I will not forget. truly old school hollywood at its finest.
I won't be going union right away next week. the show I booked got moved to next spring so I will be waiting until mid-december to fulfill my AEA dreams. in the meantime, I miss the lusty and will need all the free time I can afford to pursue dreams in a more southerly direction. I am content and excited and life feels good.
she gets off stage after a 90 minute show, I rip her out of the rigged costume I just shimmied her into a few moments before and she jets over to another venue to do standup. two shows a night. it's rather unbelievable. I'm exhausted when we have mere two show days, much less two different venues in one night. we are all going to watch her standup at the plush room on friday, I'm excited. she's running the NY marathon and she's stronger than me (there's a gag where I hold a door shut so it appears as if she's locked in the dressing room set on stage and it takes every once of my strength to keep the door shut while she pulls it open from the other side.) her team of handlers are all dolls and we've had a blast drinking lava bowls and dancing at the tonga room.
I am to the point as a stage manager where I'm not learning anything more backstage and this is one of the easiest productions I've run at the magic theatre. still, they all think I'm working very hard and making the magic happen. really, it is just an honor to watch this woman and her supporting characters from behind the curtains as the play gets rewritten on a daily basis, growing into a full blown production and not just the staged workshop it was scheduled to be. I cry with laughter every night at the same jokes I have now heard a hundred times. I chain-smoked with Melissa on our fire escape balcony and listened to her talk about cooper, the grandbaby, and thought to myself, wow, joan looks better than her own daughter. I've seen precious pictures of the two of them together when melissa was a baby and joan had a nose. I don't need a signature, these are memories I will not forget. truly old school hollywood at its finest.
I won't be going union right away next week. the show I booked got moved to next spring so I will be waiting until mid-december to fulfill my AEA dreams. in the meantime, I miss the lusty and will need all the free time I can afford to pursue dreams in a more southerly direction. I am content and excited and life feels good.
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