Children, the stage, loss, love and legacy: A story of opening night

I am going to divert for a moment, because working in a mixture of children, adults, theatre and the occasional dog will often take you on a detour. The astonishment of this new place is always something not to be missed. Below is a story of an opening night that electrified the cast and the audience with its heart.

BACKGROUND:Early on in directing Cheaper by the Dozen, I knew the focus of the play was to save time for what you love (of course), and love, loss and legacy. The Gilbreth children wrote Cheaper by the Dozen in tribute to their father. In doing so, they also honored their mother and their siblings. The emotional nature of the stage play contains quite a lot of laughter intermixed with heartbreak. During the rehearsal period, my actors (young and old) have grappled with loss, love and legacy. Many have had personal issues similar to that of the Gilbreth family and the focus of the play hit an emotional nerve.

OPENING NIGHT: A few scant hours before the show opened, the lead actor (gracefully playing Mr. Gilbreth) received a phone call that his father had died. There are many choices to be made with such news and as a director, the welfare of the cast comes before "the show must go on." The actor decided to do the show and in doing so planned to honor his father in the performance. Which he did beautifully. Backstage, the scenic designer was in attendance with his family - including his seven-week-old son. The actor asked both me and the designer if he could bring the baby onstage for the curtain call. After spending two hours onstage referring to the "babies upstairs," it seemed fitting and proper. The play ended as plays do, the curtain call began and the culmination of the evening was this actor finding a way of completing the circle. Bringing new life on to the stage. In his arms, after a heart-breaking loss on stage and off was new life complete with all its blessings. It was fitting, beautiful and a glimpse into one of the many reasons one does theatre. At seven weeks of age, a young baby has already performed a blessing for many people. I cannot think of a better start in life. Or a more beautiful joy to share with our audiences.

The Gilbreths honored their father, the actor paid tribute to his own father and the immediacy of "life goes on" was shared by all. For it does. On stage and off. Celebrate everthing and remember. Remembering keeps people near you.
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Kids Onstage in Costume

Before I start on costumes, I will just mention last night's preview performance and the latest installment of "working with a dog." If the dog has a fan club (and this one does) and they come to see "the dog," they should not sit in the front row. For the dog will recognize them and want to visit - even though there is no place in the script which states, "Dog now visits audience." And during curtain call, the dog's fan club should in no way enoucrage the dog by calling to the dog and saying "Here, girl" because the forty pound girl cannot keep the 54 pound dog from greeting her friends.

COSTUMES: As with props, costumes have their own peculiar life. Without even being worn, costumes will rip, pop buttons, get covered in chocolate ice cream and occasionally run away. Costumes seem to favor a hidden corner of the floor in which to hide. Most will fit very well during dress rehearsals but will grow longer and tighter by opening night. A costume that graced a young performer during rehearsal will suddenly be so long on opening night that the young actor will trip on it three times - on stage - invariably knocking over a set piece. It's required.

Costumes are also hungry. Young performers know they must not eat in costume. And every young actor will solemnly tell you that they don't. So those rascally costumes feed themselves. Costumes are fond of grape Kool-aid, melted chocolate, yellow powder from cheese doodles and anything else that stains with a vengeance.

THE PARROT COSTUME: This deserves a subject heading all of its own. For many years, I had birds in every play. Young performers seem to play birds successfully so I wrote a lot of "bird-parts." Indeed one year, I adapted Aristophanes The Birds for kids. Lakeshore Players had (has - but I hid it) in its stock a garish parrot costume. It's made of of hundreds of green and yellow small squares of material that "fly" when the actor moves about. My favorite young performers have worn that costume. It was a badge of honor to be awarded the costume that "no-one-could-possibly-look-good-in." My daughter wore that costume! For five years running, the parrot costume was paraded onstage. And then finally, I grew weary of writing for birds and wrote a play about a commedia troupe in medieval Italy. There were no birds in the play. Well, you should have had heard the wailing about the absence of the parrot costume. "It's a tradition!" "Someone must wear it." I gently (maybe not so gently) told all that the parrot costume would remain offstage that summer. And that was that. I was firm but adamant! Well, there is a part in the play where the troupe comes to town and sets up to do a show. They bring out costumes and props and - on opening night, unbeknownst to me - out flies the parrot costume - used as a prop! After that, the kids would conspire together how to get the parrot costume onstage - inconspicuously - without the audience knowing what they were doing. Over the next few years, I waited to see how the kids would bring on the costume successfully so that nobody in the audience would know anything diabolical was going on behind the scenes. Of course, the young actors who wore the costume grew up and later few were left who understood the impact of that costume. After it was hung on a clothesline in Renoir's garden during Castaway in Time, (and really stood out as "a mistake"), we (I!) decided to "retire" the parrot costume. But I do feel twinges of sadness that no one in this year's By Candlelight ever heard of the infamous rag of feathers. (To Lakeshore: If you are looking for it, I think it remains hidden in a bag in my closet.) Tomorrow, the subject that should put fear into every youth director's heart - the subject of lines. Lines and will kids learn them and will they "count" them? (Yes!)
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