March 28

It is now 10:40 pm Friday night. We finished the final dress rehearsal of the follies show at 10 pm. In some ways it feels like forever ago that we had our first rehearsal at Arcadia Methodist Church. In other ways it all went so fast. Tomorrow we perform the show for the only performance. As I started to talk about how we would warm up for the show Saturday night I started to talk about my standard warm up routine and realized that it is not my standard routine. There is no additional performances which means we only get one shot to make everything right.

People have often asked me why Market House Theatre doesn't do our big musicals at Tilghman or the Carson Center. We could fit our whole audience into 2 sold out performances. The problem with that is that after rehearsing for 6 weeks. Hundreds of hours. You want a chance to enjoy the fruits of your work. To perform a show at least 8-12 times. With each audience the show gets better and more polished. I don't like these one shot only shows.

There are several people in the charity league I think have a great deal of natural talent and would be great on the Market House Theatre stage. I have seen these performers move from sheer terror to a sense of fun and joy. That makes it worthwhile. I can honestly say I will miss working with this group. But I can also say I'm really looking forward to having some time back in the evening to spend with family. I'm sure everyone in the show is probably feeling the same way.