A Peek Behind the Curtain - Part 8

by Stephen Sondheim

Produced by Circle Ensemble Theatre and Co-sponsored by the Morton Theatre Corporation

(This production was staged on July 12th and 13th, 2013, at the historic Morton Theatre.)

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Part 8 – The Last Entry           

                       “…AND HAPPY EVER AFTER”

            The Show is over.  The props are tucked away and/or destroyed.  The cast and crew are exhausted.  The audience is appeased.  And I’m writing my last blog entry for the Circle Ensemble Theatre Company’s production of Steven Sondheim and James Lapine’s “Into the Woods.” 

            Personally, I learned quite a bit.  I learned about the value of energy drinks.  I learned that it takes at least a week to get songs from the musical that you just wrapped up out of your head (seriously—when the teenager at the Ingles counter asked me if I wanted him to put my water into the bag I told him, in song, to put them into the woods so that I could get home before dawn.  I am apparently now banned from Ingles.  Publix seems like a more musical grocery store anyway.).  I learned that there are so many different parts that must work together seamlessly to put on a live show, any live show, and that, in the case of THIS SHOW, you can take that number of parts and square it then add five and then square that number.  I learned that it’s really cool to climb up onto the Morton Theatre catwalk and change out the gels (colored lights) and that it makes you feel like Spider-Man.  I learned to respect the process with all of its interesting, sometimes trying, often beautiful twists and turns.  Truthfully, I learned a hell of a lot more than that, too much to include here.      

           The Circle folks allowed me, after some thorough training, to operate the fly rail.  That means that anything that looked like it fell from the sky in the show (the birds, scenery like Granny's house or the gigantic tree and so forth) was operated by me.  It was pretty cool…tiring and not as easy as I would have thought, but pretty cool nonetheless.  I wasn’t perfect.  I did hit Cinderella (Suzanne Zoller) in the head with the gigantic tree--I just nailed the girl with a forty foot flying plywood tree.  She kept on singing.  That’s a professional.  When most people have gigantic trees dropped on them they generally stop singing.  But, of course, the show must go on. 

            Lisa Mende, one of the founders of Circle and the storyteller of the show who met a horrific death at the hands of a female giant (her character, not Lisa), and I were talking after we closed the final performance.  I was complimenting her on the professionalism of the whole experience and I mentioned to her that Circle seemed to me to be different from most local and regional theatre companies.  She said, “This isn’t your home-schoolers’ theatre company.”  I couldn’t have put it better myself.

            Hindsight is twenty-twenty, so they say.  It’s also hard to get LensCrafters to make rectal glasses.  My only regret about the show was that we didn’t bar the doors at intermission.  The last musical number of the first act ends with the line, “And Happy Ever After.”  Then Myron (you probably know him as “My-My”), my fellow stagehand, closed the curtain.  And some people, understandably, left and went home.  I can’t blame them.  Most fairy tales do end with “happy ever after.”  Of course, that’s the opposite of the intent of this show.  If you only saw the first act, then the play is a very sweet, very catchy, retelling of some familiar fairy tales.  It’s the second act where Sondheim and Lapine turn the tales on their heads.  Even if you left at intermission, I’d say that you got your money’s worth.  You got to see a well-made show at a well-made theatre.  Provided you avoided the tropical deluges of torrential rain, I’d put money down that you had a good night’s experience attending the theatre. 

            The Circle Ensemble Theatre Company is going to keep on doing what they do.  In order for them to be able to do that, they need your help.  Tell your friends.  Bring them to the next Circle show.  Send my incoherent ramblings to a friend, even if it’s just a Facebook “Friend.”  If you haven’t noticed, Athens is becoming more than just football and music.  Lately the theatre, stand-up comedy, poetry (thank you again, Aralee), street preaching, bicycle racing, storytelling, circus arts, and the visual artistic scenes have begun to expand.  Every day we’re becoming more and more the Greenwich Village of the South.  Art needs patrons.  Art needs support.  Art needs you.

            Come see the next Circle Ensemble Theatre production.  You’ll gain an experience.  You’ll broaden your knowledge base.  You’ll get to feel cultured.  You’ll get a good excuse to wear a tuxedo to somewhere that doesn’t involve a dead body.  You’ll realize, as I have, that a night at a Circle Ensemble Theatre show is better than anything you can find in a Red Box and better than most theatre you can find within a thousand mile radius.  You’ll be proud of your hometown professional theatre company.

            So, that’s your peek behind the curtain.  I didn’t share everything.  It was just a peek.  Maybe there will be another peek.  Either way, come out to the next show.  It’s worth it.