Ubu: A 'Patamusical

Day of Show, Part 3

2008-09-16T18:56:00.003-04:00

FIRST PERFORMANCE IN THE BOOKS!!!!! Wow. I'm going to keep it brief, mainly because we have another performance in an hour. But an absolutely HUGE hats off to the actors and musicians and technicians who brought this show together.

4:30pm show had 63 people. Let's double that tonight.

MERDE!!!

Day of Show, Part 2

2008-09-16T13:11:00.003-04:00

Working through the show now. The actors are here, getting really excited. Sound, lights, sound effects, and just plain being in a theater space with a show to do is pumping us all up.

Day of Show, Part 1

2008-09-16T09:41:00.001-04:00

At the theater already, starting to play with lights and other tech such stuff.

Last time through.......

2008-09-14T22:08:00.003-04:00

Let us make sure that the punctuation really allows the emotion to come through:

Holy. Crap. We. Are. So. Tired.

Today was 9 hours of the last bits of rehearsal. Very productive, but a long day nonetheless. Let us just take a moment and shout the greatness of our cast from the mountaintops. They are just relentlessly diving into this show, and we couldn't be more grateful for their enthusiasm. 23 scenes, 16 songs, and they learned it all and then some.

Looking forward to the show. One day away. In theory our article on BroadwayWorld.com should be up today. Maybe tomorrow. We'll let you know.

Strings!

2008-09-13T09:54:00.004-04:00

Yesterday we had our first full band rehearsal: Robert on piano, Bernice on drums, and now the young and talented Adriel Williams on violin. It was Ayhan's inspired idea to add a violin part to the arrangements, and boy, was he right.

Today we finish up learning the rest of the songs, and one more scene. And then, tomorrow, a nice and long 9-hour day, with touch-ups, and a full run through.

So much time and so little to do...... Strike that, reverse it.

2008-09-11T23:01:00.003-04:00

We're pushing forward, ever forward. Still having great rehearsals, lots of progress, people are having fun. And we start feeling really good. And yet there's still so much to do. Like Sunday, for example. Sunday will be the first time that the entire cast and band will actually be together. Meaning that scenes and songs that have not been learned by all involved (due to the impossibility of 14 actors' schedules actually lining up ideally all week) will have to be touched up Sunday morning. And then the two acts' finales are to be learned. And then, for the first time, we'll run the show. A stop and start run to be sure, and a long day (to be more sure.)

The point here is that as we're all getting to learn more and more of the show, we all start seeing so much more in it, and it gets us all the more excited. So much so that we have to remind ourselves it's just a reading that's happening in less than 5 days, and that we've just not the time to do it all.

The whole group has sorta developed this common joke we use as we talk about how we see a scene or a song playing out: "Well, in the magical super Broadway production, I'd......".

And boy, do we all long for that production. First things first, sure. But that excitement sure is nice to see, even for a reading. Maybe especially for a reading.

Bring on the music

2008-09-10T23:05:00.002-04:00

A hugely productive day today. Rehearsals from 2-10pm. Looooong day, but a productive one. And, it was the first day we started working on the music (again, with our fantastic musical director Robert). Can't tell you how excited we are to start hearing it all, and how excited and eager the actors are to dive into it all. There are some really fun songs in this show, hopefully many of you will leave the theater with one dancing around in your head.

Tomorrow's rehearsals are only 7-10pm, so it's a big administrative day for the Ubu production team. But check out our NYMF website (the link to the right), we're updating with cast bios and pictures.

More to come!

When It Rains, It Friggin' Rains! or… We’ve Got One Week, MERDE!

2008-09-09T19:21:00.018-04:00

10pm –4pm with one burry eyed break around 230pm, we have found our cast. The bar was set very high early on, and we knew that ‘real good’ was now going to have to be ABSOLUTELY GREAT! That’s just what we’ve got.

Rehearsals begin, and the script is powerful!

New revised lead sheets are complete. Ayhan did a beautiful job! The musical finally has music! What more could we have asked for? Oh yes, a Musical Director…

After a list of 6 potential options grew into a list of those who were totally booked, just booked, available all week but not the day of the show, available for one of the two show’s, didn’t like to work late (wrong business), didn’t like the short time frame, into names of names of names of the same name, we ended up calling 32 people. Honest to Ubu, 32!!

Music rehearsals pushed back and back to the point of almost having to teach songs the day of the show!

As we didn’t want to let on that we were panicked, twitching in a notorious Kinko’s (sorry, we mean FedEx Office) copy line waiting for the music that, without a teacher, might as well still be in its reams, ‘assuming’ that something would happen soon, HAD to happen, because it’s Sunday for Pa’s sake, the voice on the other end of my cell produced such an adrenaline rush in me that 10 espressos seem like a (cliché) bullet scene from the Matrix. The voice simply said, “Yeah, let me see what you got”.

After only about an hour of nail biting, link sharing, schedule blocking and MP3 demo swapping, we found him. The lucky man, whose 29 hours of free time would make or break the possibility of rehearsals going past one day (very Ubu, if our show closes before it opens), is the talented and highly accomplished Robert Grusecki.

We met today at Ayhan's studio. Brantley, Tony, Ayhan, Robert, and the wonderful percussionist Bernice “Boom-Boom” Brooks, sat together for three solid hours and went over every note. “What’s your take? What’s the tempo again? Oh yes! Really? Perfect. One more time.” Morale has found another step up today. Though we are not skipping along, the weight has shifted and made the soles of our tired trucks feel less wear and tear. As the cast meets the dotted pages of scatological lyricism tomorrow, it seems that our UBU, trapped in our brains for so long, is truly is rumbling to life!

Full cast!!

2008-09-07T08:37:00.005-04:00

Well, casting was a success. We saw a bunch of great actors on Friday. And at last, our roster is complete. Here's our cast:

Pa Ubu - Michael Thomas Holmes
Ma Ubu - Joan Barber
Corporal - Kevin T. Collins
Conscience - Barrie Kreinik
Wenceslas/Achras - Tony Mayes
Daughters Ubu - Tate Evans, Kate Gilligan, Molly Stuart
The Freemen - Chris Carfizzi, Bob Lewandowski
The Paljenttents - Bob Barth, Tom Bartos, Jason Najjoum
The Canteen Girl - Anne Letcher
The Head of Memnon - Matt O'Neill

Crazy-sounding characters eh? Now we're trying to put together a rehearsal schedule that accommodates 14 people's availabilities. Even tougher than we anticipated, especially considering that some characters always need to rehearse together, like the Paljenttents.

Rehearsals start tomorrow morning at 11am. We'll be trying to update the blog daily, to let you all know how it goes.

Casting tomorrow

2008-09-04T19:42:00.003-04:00

We've got a solid full day of casting tomorrow, seeing close to 100 people for 6 roles. We love casting. It's darn fun, and usually is the first time you can really start to see the show come alive. I say usually, because we had that reading at our place a while ago. But all the same.... fun!

Check the blog Saturday night to see who's joining the show.

T.G.I.L.D.W.

2008-08-30T14:00:00.002-04:00

Thank Goodness It's Labor Day Weekend. 4 days to work work work. And there's tonz to do.

We're trying to secure our musicians and musical director. We've already received almost 150 hits off our Backstage casting notice and Breakdown to agents/managers. Final lead sheets are ready Wednesday. Musical director/musicians meeting with Ayhan on Thursday. Casting all day on Friday. Prepping Saturday and Sunday, and then into rehearsals.

That's right. Curtain up is 2 weeks from this Tuesday.

Oy.

The Broadway Bullet Interview

2008-08-28T11:45:00.002-04:00

Our interview with the Broadway Bullet podcast is live and free for you to download. You can find it here, or through iTunes.

37 Arts, Theater C

2008-08-27T23:06:00.003-04:00

Took our first tour of the space tonight. Just another step in the 'it's all happening' journey of this week. It's a great space, holds 199 people, so tell your friends. We gotta sell out.

And by "sell out", I mean fill the seats, because the reading is free. FREE-FIFTY-FREE, people!

Got the acting bug?

2008-08-27T10:31:00.002-04:00

Any of you keen to audition, our casting notice is now on Backstage.com, and will be in next week's print edition.

Music update

2008-08-26T20:17:00.003-04:00

Today we went out to Ayhan's studio to take first listen of all the work he's done with Monty's lead sheets and MIDI files. Short answer: just frickin' great.

Ayhan has really been having fun with these songs, and you can tell. He made the inspired suggestion of adding a violin to the orchestrations, which should really help the reading gain a little musical depth. Anything more than just acoustic piano and a drum kit would be a bonus, but his pick of the violin, and the way he's incorporated it into Monty's music, should, frankly, kick ass.

And on the whole, this was the first time we've heard the music anew. The only recording of (most) of the songs was from a 1996 demo Monty recorded in his home (you can hear one song from that demo on the "Broadway Bullet" interview we did for the podcast. We'll let you know when that comes out). Now we're hearing them fresh, and in orchestrations that are specifically for NYMF and the World Premiere reading.

It was another moment of the show becoming that much more real for us: this is happening, and happening soon.

But additionally: this is happening, happening soon, and dammit, it's gonna be good.

Flying along

2008-08-21T11:33:00.002-04:00

More stuff to do, more stuff getting done. Postcards are just about ordered. Everything is square with Equity (we can use both Equity and non-Equity actors in the reading, which is great). Tech meeting with NYMF on Monday. Music meeting with Ayhan on Tuesday. Touring the theater space on Wednesday. Backstage ad for the remaining casting should appear Thursday.

We're starting to dive into the script, creatively, finding that scoring pace that was mentioned in our casual reading post below.

We had our interview recorded with the Broadway Bullet podcast yesterday, in which we played an old demo of one of the songs, called "The Master Awaits". We'll let you know when that podcast will be available for FREE on iTunes.

Really feeling good about everything at the moment.

Our New Postcard

2008-08-16T22:48:00.004-04:00

After almost 9 hours in front of the computer, teaching ourselves Photoshop as we went, we have our new postcard. You may notice that a similar image appears in the header of the blog now, too. We've gotten a lot of new images ready today, not just the card. Fun fun.

Casual Read-Thru Success

2008-08-16T13:01:00.007-04:00

Had some friends over Thursday night, including a few people who will be involved with the actual NYMF reading. This was the first time we heard the entire piece aloud.

And man, was it helpful. The script is almost like a score: it has quick parts and pauses and ups and downs. Some parts have the quick exchanges of "Who's On First", others have awkward long pauses of 'pataphysical thought. Now, in a normal production, with a good four to six weeks of rehearsal, we'd have the time to discover these with the actors. Indeed, in the read-thru the other night, the actors were already finding natural places where the script wants them to speed up or slow down.

But since this is a reading for the Developmental Series, we are only allowed about 29 hours of rehearsal, tops. And that includes teaching the songs, too. So to make use of every minute, we'll need to go in already knowing where most of the pace needs to be, and "conduct" the show accordingly.

In other news, we'll be appearing on the Broadway Bullet podcast next week, talking about the show and playing a demo of one of the songs. It's available for free on iTunes.

Media

2008-08-14T16:08:00.004-04:00

Started adding some photos and such to the NYMF page. We've posted a few of the early concept/costume drawings. Here's one of a Paljenttent. Pretty wicked, eh?

You can see more at our show's NYMF site.

Hearing it aloud, and other things

2008-08-14T10:45:00.002-04:00

A few friends are coming over tonight to do a casual reading of the show. This will be the first time that we hear the full book aloud. Should be fun.

Met with Ayhan the other day. He's having fun with the music, which is great. He also brought up the idea of including a violin to our reading, just to spice it up a little more. So now we're on the lookout for a violinist.

Tony and I are flying away on multiple things at once. Sound design, musical effects, AEA paperwork, NYMF paperwork and deadlines, casting, etc... I got home from work last night at 7pm, and worked on Ubu until about 12:30am. Felt good.

b

Back in NYC

2008-08-10T22:33:00.003-04:00

Looong flight back to New York today. Read thru the script 4 times, taking notes and such. Tony's back today, too.

Somewhat productive trip on the Ubu front. More later.

b

Nobody Works In LA

2008-08-04T17:58:00.002-04:00

Life... you know, the jobs that keep us earning money. Tony and I both are in LA this week. I'm shooting a Maytag commercial, he's working the LA Tap Festival (Monty, as always, is in Costa Rica).

For a while we were nervous about losing a week to work on Ubu, being out on the Sinister Coast here. But somehow it worked out, and Tony and I are looking like such multi-taskers to our respective co-workers out here: "I'm going to have to skip dinner with you guys tonight. Gotta go work on a show. No rest for the wicked, you know!"

See you on the coast.

b

Which version???

2008-08-02T12:46:00.002-04:00

Silly little thing bothering me today. Again, this dives into the history of the show, which as I said will be filled in more completely on this blog later. But....

This script has been written in two different programs, transcribed and/or rewritten within both, by three different people in two different countries over the past 8 years. So what we're trying to do today is make sure everyone - me, Tony, and Monty - is working with the most recent version.

I think it's just the nature of the way this show developed. It began as an idea, then casually became more, then more seriously became more, then casual again, then suddenly receiving its World Premiere at a festival in NYC and becoming quite serious.

Still, it's fun to be diving into these old drafts and seeing what we changed, and trying to remember why.

- B

Welcome to Ayhan Sahin

2008-08-01T15:19:00.004-04:00

We now have our music taken care of! (and we're dangling our prepositions like crazy!) A bit of history with this (with a further, more complete history of the show to come later):

Monty had written many of the songs in 1995-6, and recorded a demo with many of the actors from the original one-act production in '95. What we have today are:

- Monty's original lead sheets
- A recording of the demos
- The original MIDI files

The thing is, after the last rewrite in 2004, some songs were cut, others were trimmed. One song has the leads but no recording. One song has a recording with no leads. Also, none of the leads are ready to be used to teach vocals or to play accompaniment. So what we needed was pretty much transcription, but with a little more orchestration than straight transcribing.

With the helpful guidance of Seth Goldstein at The Splinter Group, I emailed what was essentially a job posting to the Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program, who included the info in their daily email to students and alums. Less than a day later, I received a call from Ayhan.

We met with him last week, at a Starbucks (as is the industry requirement). We had checked out some of his pieces on his website, and went into the meeting already thinking he may be a good fit with the show's style. He's an excellent guy, and after reading the script and hearing the demo and our musical references, he was excited to be a part of it. And today, he is.

Check out Ayhan's work at his website here. Thanks Ayhan, so glad you're onboard.

Promoting

2008-08-01T09:17:00.002-04:00

Tony and I are just two guys with day jobs, we're not some theatrical powerhouse with a publicist, nor can we afford one on our own. So publicity is up to us. Last night I spent some time starting this blog, as well as starting up a Facebook group for the show. I've always been wary of Facebook, because, as a friend told me, "you're not 15". I'm getting used to it, however, and honestly, setting up the group last night was darn easy. And sending it out to all of my friends even easier. Way easier than it was to squint thru my Gmail address book to check off the names of people I know, hoping it's their correct address (Gmail basically saves all the address you send to, which is useful, but over a few years, it tends to build up).

So, Facebook group up. Blog up. While I don't think I can track views on this blog (can I?), Facebook gives me instant numerical gratification. And of course, allows people to write on the group's Wall. Right away, a dear high school friend posted words of encouragement, followed by a not-too-unexpected "I knew you when..." story. This particular story involved me getting maybe slightly intoxicated at prom and maybe being a little sick.

Add to that our first comment on this blog, by another friend, calling me an alcoholic.

Ahhh, first day. Great theme started. Excellent branding opportunity for the show!

b

Welcome to the NYMF

2008-07-31T19:14:00.002-04:00

Well, here it begins. We were accepted to the festival. It happened quite quickly. A lunch with a theatre friend, which led to an email, which led to a call from the festival, and here we are.

We'll start blogging soon about the details. Just wanted to start it off. For now, check out the New York Musical Theatre Festival's website here, and check out our show page here.

PS - I will add one little thing. A fun moment last night. I randomly Googled my name, joking with someone about the sorts of things that come up on you when you do so. And I spotted a link to a page on Playbill.com. Clicked on it. At first I saw it was just due to the release that NYMF gave with the full festival line-up. But then we saw the headline:

Black Footnotes, Wrapped, Fairy Tale and Ubu Complete NYMF Slate

Now, it's no big deal really. But it's Playbill.com, and it chose our show to put in its headline. Sort of made it real for us. We celebrated with a beer.