May 31st, 2009
The morning starts with a sweaty walk to Penn Station, carrying the means to work and live for the next year on my back. I take the New Jersey Transit train out to Newark International Airport. Riding the train on this route, I pass through Belleville, New Jersey, boyhood home of Tommy DeVito and site of the Four Seasons’ beginnings. I pass the famous industrial New Jersey skyline that features as a backdrop on the Jersey Boys set. And I pass the long Goethals Bridge that is supposed to be conjured by the metal trusses on the set. I am on my way.
The airline I take departs from a small terminal. Porter Airlines is a Toronto-based company and they share the terminal with El Al Airlines, which offers non-stop flights to Tel Aviv. Frankly, Canada and Israel feel equally far away today. And the terminal is so tiny that they warn me there is no coffee beyond the security checkpoint. Do I really look that tired?
Upon arriving in Toronto, I take a cab to my temporary lodgings. I am staying about a half-hour south of the theatre (too far) and about a fifteen-minute walk from the subway station (also too far). Oh, well. It is only temporary, and the apartment is extremely large. The building feels like a retirement complex and, come to think of it, probably is a retirement complex. (There are VHS tapes in the lobby that residents can borrow. ’Nuf said.) The large common room has a pond in it that is filled with gigantic goldfish. Rachel will dig that when she gets here.
I want to settle in to my new city before the craziness of the next couple weeks, so I unpack and go for a long run in the surrounding neighborhoods. This part of Toronto is very residential. It’s nice enough, but not particularly exciting. I run along many streets with houses, one with apartment buildings, over some train tracks, through a cemetery, past the supermarket…and I could have been in any town anywhere in North America. Nothing distinctive here. Rock music, standing ovations, and my name in lights are a half-hour north.
I am not nervous about the show, really, but I am anxious about this new life away from home. I get lonely. Really lonely. I am glad to have a wife who doesn’t mind a million short phone calls a day. But even some of those phone calls end up being hard.
“Daniel, I’m home now and your clothes are gone.” Cara is feeling alone now that she arrived back in New York.
“Not all of them, hon.”
“No, just the ones you actually wear.” I can’t argue there.
So I ask, “How’s Mark?”
“He’s fine. But he’s not talking to me.”
“Yeah, he wasn’t talking to me much either.”
“I guess he’s just processing the changes we are making around here.”
I get defensive. “We’re not making any changes, Cara, I’m just doing a new job for a while. It’s not forever. And you’ll be up here before you know it.”
“No, I’ll be here and you’ll be there. Don’t get me wrong; I’m still happy and I know this is the best thing for you, but I can’t tell you it’s not killing me to not have anyone to eat with right now.” Note that Cara isn’t complaining about not having someone to talk with, walk with, or sleep with. Just eat with.
It is 11:00 p.m. We often eat nachos at 11:00 p.m. This neighborhood in Toronto seems to have nowhere to eat at night except one gross little dive bar.
That’s not going to be good for my routine.
June 1st, 2009
Today sucks. Only two places here allow you to buy a monthly subway pass with a credit card, and one of those places is sold out of the passes today. I literally spend an hour trying to buy a card. How can you have a city with a public transit system that doesn’t let me give it money? I want to buy a (very expensive) monthly subway card, you send me all over the place to do it, and then you are sold out of them? How is that even possible? When I finally get to the place that sells cards and has them in stock, there are only two credit card machines and one of them is broken. The line at the only working machine is thirty people deep. I ask you, what is the purpose of a public transit system? To let people get around the city more efficiently, right? So how is it efficient if it takes me an hour to get a monthly pass? This is the most ludicrous thing I have ever experienced.
And Verizon’s service in this country gets me angry, too. I pay a lot of money now for a Family Plan that includes coverage in both the United States and Canada. But guess what? First, the coverage here in northern Toronto is lousy. Second, searching for coverage drains the battery on my phone incredibly fast and I can’t go a full day without charging it. Third, my phone doesn’t ring in this country! I’m sure this last one is a problem that can be fixed, but ever since I crossed the border my phone will show someone is calling, but refuses to ring or vibrate. So I’m missing calls from Cara all the time. And it kills me.
I go for a run to clear my head of the subway pass situation, then for a three-hour walk in the evening to explore downtown Toronto. (I’m really committing to this exercise, huh? The Jersey Boys workout regime! Oh wait, is this effecting my suit size?) Downtown Toronto seems cool enough. The blocks are long, and streetcars carry people east-west while the major subway line travels north-south. The subway seems much less frequent than I am used to in New York, but I guess this is because most people still seem to drive here. (It’s been a long time since I have driven with any consistency.)
Toronto seems much, much dirtier than New York, but there is a reason for this: the city is in the midst of a sanitation workers strike and the raw garbage is piling up everywhere. Welcome to my new home! Every public trashcan has a pile of garbage built around it, and some public parks are being used as temporary garbage-collection stations. Trash bags are dumped in these parks until they reach twenty feet high. And there are rats. I know this is not the normal state of being for this ordinarily beautiful city on the lakefront, but I find it hard not to have a really awful first impression. I am looking forward to starting work again tomorrow, just so I can be inside all day.
June 2nd, 2009
I get to try on some of my costumes this morning, but those suits that didn’t fit last time are suspiciously absent from the fitting. The wardrobe department at the theatre (ten people in all) seems to be full of terrific personalities. These are people who have worked together for a long time; they do puzzles during intermission and take turns baking desserts to share. Their large room, the largest wardrobe room I have ever seen actually, is lit with Christmas and Halloween lights. (It’s June.)
Upon trying on some blue pants, the head of wardrobe tells me, “Dan, you look great in these!” I think she likes the fresh, unwashed color in the fabric. (I think. But it is quite possible she was looking directly at my butt when she delivered the compliment. My butt does look quite good in the blue pants.)
“Yeah, they’re terrific,” I say, “but I bet I will never see them on me again.” I wear the costumes too quickly in the show to ever get a chance to look in a mirror.
I have a spacing rehearsal during the day with two people I will be getting a lot of notes from in the next month: the production stage manager, Cindy Toushan, and the dance captain, Victoria Lamond. Both are very clearly on my side today. Even though the rehearsal is an easy one, just working through any differences between what I was taught and what actually occurs in the Toronto production, they are both full of compliments. I know where I am supposed to be, and I do a smash-up job walking casually through the show.
I visit the hair room for a haircut. I have been growing my hair since I was offered this role, and it is getting quite out of control. They cut it short on the sides, help me figure out an appropriate (greasy) style, and dye it almost black! I’m supposed to look more Italian now, but still I say there are blond Italians, right? And Tommy DeVito himself didn’t have hair that was very dark. Oh, well. It does make for a striking look. My eyebrows are still very blond, though. Black hair. Pasty blond eyebrows. There’s a joke in there somewhere.
I had my hair cut today because there is a scheduled photo call. With a new lead actor in the show, the company prints all new brochures, advertisements, lobby photos, and even a giant billboard outside. These pictures are all being done today, so the cast begins arriving for them in the early evening, greeting me in less dramatic fashion than last time I was in town. The photo call itself has many people doting on me. And those lights! My first time standing under full light on the stage and I find it absolutely blinding. I am not exaggerating when I say that I can’t see two feet in front of me. I can’t even see the two feet attached to me.
I watch the show this evening from a box on the side of the theatre and am struck again by the power Jersey Boys has. The audiences in New York and Florida were loud and fun right from the first moments of the show, but the Toronto audience has a different flavor, one that proves the show’s worth. This Toronto audience starts off far more reserved than the other two types I have observed. Perhaps because of the influence of the Stratford and Shaw Festivals (theatre organizations with more of a classical influence), this audience seems hesitant to clap or laugh too loudly. While they enjoy themselves from the first moments of the show, they do not vocalize their enjoyment as much as I have seen in the other cities. But here’s the thing: I can actually hear them get louder with each successive scene; and by the time the big numbers in the second act come along they are screaming and jumping to their feet. It is like the show has lifted them up, one song at a time, until they can no longer stay in their seats. They go on such a ride that they seem to absolutely burst with excitement during the finale. It is amazing to watch. This Toronto audience is not an easy sell, but they are always sold by the end of the evening.
I finish my night with a long subway ride to my temporary neighborhood, a solitary dinner at the only place that still serves food at this time of night, a long walk up to my apartment, and a too-short conversation with Cara as she falls asleep. It is easy to feel lonely here.
June 3rd, 2009
There are two shows for the cast today, and I am given the choice of how to spend my time. I have not run through the show in real time since Orlando, so I ask if there is a place I can set up and run the show while listening to it over the monitors. Not only is there a place, but it is an infinitely better place than my wardrobe room setup down in Florida. They let me take over an entire small theatre, one that adjoins the larger auditorium where Jersey Boys resides. An electrician rigs the small stage monitor so it will play through a larger speaker in my personal theatre, and he installs a television that is cabled through to the adjoining building so I can see the live performance as well. Unbelievable.
They give me a few guitars to use, some basic props, and even a swing. That’s right. One of the swings not performing this afternoon runs through the show with me, playing all the other parts himself. Grant Tilly covers six roles in the show, and knows all the nuances of each actor. He is even able to give me a whole lot of information about my own track, because he has already performed it about twenty times.
Grant helps a lot; he finds the perfect balance of respecting my own differences and helping me with what the other actors are used to. It’s quite tricky to do. I’m sure he notices a bunch of things that I do differently, or even wrong, but he is very careful about what he says and how he says it so that he isn’t telling me what to do. I like him right away, and am in awe of his knowledge about the subtler points of doing this role. He teaches me which pocket to keep my prop car keys in, when to transfer the deck of cards from my jacket pocket to my pants pocket, where to keep water bottles backstage, and a million necessary tidbits like that.
During my dinner break, I opt to stay at the theatre and work on some of the guitar parts. I play the songs decently now, but am still figuring out which ones I trust my playing enough to have the guitar turned on for. Playing guitar while dancing is like writing a letter while walking. You can do it, but it comes out messy. (To make an even more accurate comparison, try writing the letter while running, dodging taxicabs, and holding a cup of coffee; that’s what it’s like playing guitar while dancing in Jersey Boys.)
June 4th, 2009
Oh, What a Day! The entire cast is called into the rehearsal studio with me today so we can work through the show together for the first time. It is hard on my brain, but absolutely thrillingly and breathtakingly fun.
With long studio mirrors in front of us, we all take our places for the top of the show. We have just a piano for accompaniment, and no costumes or microphones, but every other element was brought into the rehearsal room and is waiting for me: my real guitars, props, microphone stands set to my height, tables, and chairs. And the cast seems excited.
My opening position is hanging on a fence, but of course there is no fence in the rehearsal room, so I mime holding a fence during the first number. Then, my entrance music begins and the rest of the show barrels on like the freight train it is.
What do I remember? I remember my hands shaking as I sang “Silhouettes,” and I kept hoping no one would notice. I remember the scene change into “Apple Of My Eye” happening smoothly all around me, and a guitar virtually appearing in my hands as the scene change ended and the song began. I remember another thrilling version of “Cry For Me” because I was hearing these guys—my guys—for the first time. I remember sweating so much during the Big Three that I couldn’t hold on to my guitar pick. And I remember lots of congratulations from the cast.
Michael Lomenda, Jeff Madden, Quinn VanAntwerp, Daniel Robert Sullivan
©Joan Marcus
Daniel Robert Sullivan, Jeff Madden, Quinn VanAntwerp, Michael Lomenda
©Joan Marcus
I do all right with this run; I was not great, but they all congratulate me as if it was a success. Good people.
I go to dinner at a local barbecue joint with some of the cast. Here’s a thing I am realizing about this area: the cast members of Jersey Boys get special treatment when they eat at local restaurants, and other patrons recognize them when they come in the door. This is a crazy feeling.
I watch the show this evening and take notes. I am trying to be very specific in noticing what Jeremy Kushnier does. As I mentioned before, there is no way to copy another actor’s performance and have it seem truthful. But there is something to be said for taking lots of what Jeremy does and making my own version of it, for the cast is used to his rhythms and certain of his moments. I am going to change things a lot here, but I am trying to keep the general rhythms and timings the same. So, my notebook is full of things like, “Say second speech slower than I have been,” “Respond to Frankie right away during every line of first scene - no air in between,” and “Put a lot of space before saying ‘what’ in bowling alley scene.” I have learned a lot from watching other guys play this role (Christian, Jeremy, Matt, Dominic). I tip my hat to them.
And the best part about tonight? My director from New York, Shelley Butler, arrived. After being away from any kind of artistic direction for weeks now, it will be nice to have her here again. I know the moves now. I know the lines now. And I know what I’m supposed to sing. Now, she will provide the discerning eye to make what I’m doing seem good and believable. Or she’ll tell them to fire me.
June 5th, 2009
This is a high-energy day. We work onstage with the full cast, props, and set. We have no band yet, just a piano for accompaniment. This is my first time moving pieces like the car seats and the whore bench on our actual set, and I find it difficult once again to find the proper marks on the floor. It looks like a landing strip for clowns—lots of marks in lots of colors. (Afterthought: “Landing strip for clowns” is not a great metaphor, but it is my honest first thought when I see the stage up close for the first time.) I also discover that I have to be very careful wheeling the whore bench out from the wings because the actress playing Mary Delgado sits on the bench with her hand slightly off the edge and I come very close to scraping her hand against the metal poles on the set.
The work-through goes well enough, but all I can think is that this rehearsal process is backward, with me learning the steps and technical elements before really even knowing how to play Tommy DeVito, the person. I am still not sure how to perform him well. And I open in eleven days!
Eleven days. Hmm. That actually seems like a good amount of time. I have mounted many shows in summer stock in two weeks or less. I even mounted a show in two days once. (Each of us in the show had done our respective roles before, so there was no new material to learn, but still…two days! We arrived in town and met each other for the first time on Sunday night, and then opened the show on the following Tuesday night.) So, eleven days left should be no problem. I should be fine building a solid, believable character in eleven days. Right? Right.
The show really is a tidy knot of perfection. There isn’t too much room for playing, improvising, or really doing anything other than the specific things I am told to do. But I find myself wishing I had more time devoted strictly to character work. I am lucky. Shelley thinks the same thing.
Instead of watching the cast’s evening performance, Shelley and I go into the rehearsal studio and work over all of the direct addresses Tommy gives to the audience in the first half of the show. We work on the way he brags right out of the gate. We work on finding a bit of a smirk. We work on figuring out the fine line between playing smart and playing dumb. This last one proves tricky. Tommy has a lot of lines in the show that come off as being a little dense, stupid even. But he also has some very slick, very witty lines that a “stupid” person wouldn’t come up with. So, I have to find the proper balance.
For some reason, I also start to freak out tonight that I will forget my lines during one of my first performances. This is idiotic. I have not forgotten my lines once yet, and I rehearse the entire show every single day. But I am thinking about character today instead of the technical aspects, and freeing my brain like that makes me have to trust that the words will come…but what if they didn’t? Tommy begins the show with twenty minutes of solo speeches to the audience. What if I were to launch into the wrong speech? That would be easy to do. Every speech feels the same because the spotlight is bright and I am in my own little bubble. If I were to begin the wrong speech, I am not even sure I would know it was wrong until I finished.
Many people have the impression that if an actor forgets a line they need simply whisper offstage to have someone cue them, but this is completely untrue. Were I to forget a line, I would be completely and utterly alone in trying to salvage the situation. There is no such thing as a “prompter” in the theatre. My options would be to say any of the following:
At the end of rehearsal, I have a particularly dramaturgical conversation with Shelley, and I adore dramaturgical conversations. I heard it said that Tommy doesn’t change much by the end of Jersey Boys, that he remains the self-centered schemer that he is at the beginning. I have always believed, however, that every major character in literature and theatre has to undergo a transformation, that it is a prerequisite to being a major character in the first place. So, I believe Tommy changes. In real life, Tommy DeVito married his long-time girlfriend and reaffirmed his faith in Christianity. I believe the authors of Jersey Boys represent this change in the script by having Tommy acknowledge the loss of Frankie’s daughter (a heartfelt moment), and I feel I can accentuate the change by wearing a wedding ring in the final scene. Shelley buys this argument. And I feel good to have brought it up.
I ride the subway downtown with Michael Lomenda, who plays Nick Massi in the show. I have a lot of scenes with him, but this subway ride is the first time we have ever really spoken. He seems like a terrific guy. He, Quinn, and Jeff Madden (who plays Frankie) are taking Jeremy out for a final night on the town this Sunday. They have rented a limo for seven hours, and are going to hit all the classy places in the city, including the bar at the top of the CN Tower. I have to admit, I have a secret desire to be invited. I shouldn’t be invited, as it is their last time together and they are a tight unit, but I still hope I will be. I want to hang out with them, get to know them, and feel like a part of the group. Sunday is also the Tony Awards broadcast, but I think I would give up watching the Tony Awards to hang out with them. And I always watch the Tony Awards.
June 6th, 2009
I spend the cast’s first show of the day trailing Jeremy backstage and discover that he is a real ball-buster. Not a second goes by back there that he is not smacking another actor, chasing a musician, singing a funny song to a dresser, throwing guitar picks at a stagehand, or flicking a towel at…well…anybody. And this all occurs just moments before he steps onstage to sing the next song. He is a personality to contend with, for sure. And he keeps things active and fun. He’s done the show for two years, so I guess this is one way to keep himself, and everyone else, in the game.
No one in the show has time to go to their dressing rooms to change costumes. This was true with the National Tour and remains true here in Toronto. And the quick-change into the Big Three, a change that I witnessed once before and knew would be tricky, actually happens as four quick-changes right next to each other. I didn’t realize this before. The Four Seasons line up next to each other with four dressers ready to go. The dressers help rip off shirts, Velcro up new ones, slip on jackets, and push the Seasons back onstage. Seeing this group of eight people work so swiftly and precisely is great fun. It is a backstage ballet. And if something goes wrong, I have a feeling “Sherry” will start without them.
It is also fun to see one of our stage managers, Melanie Klodt, call the show today. She dances through many of the pages, calling the cues on beats of the music as she wiggles around. I have never seen a stage manager dance before, so it must be the effect of the music. There are some shows that you get sick of hearing the music, shows where you turn down the dressing room monitors so you don’t have to hear the songs when you are not onstage. But there are some shows where the music is genuinely catchy, powerful, or engaging and you rarely tire of hearing it. I’m starting to think that Jersey Boys falls into the latter category, and that this explains why the Four Seasons have sold more than 175 million records.
Casting Director Merri Sugarman arrives this evening from New York, causing quite a stir. She is here in town to cast a replacement for one of the female roles, as one of the actresses is on medical leave and the only female swing has been covering the part every day for too long now. I notice tonight how my relationship with Merri has changed. Now that I am in the Jersey Boys family, we are buddies and can talk about all kinds of things. It is like I have crossed the line from being the person who walks in the audition room very respectfully and does everything she says to being just another friend from work.
Although I have no actual rehearsal today, just trailing Jeremy and watching the second show, I do discover something funny about yesterday’s rehearsal. Fake marijuana joints are used in the show, and since I don’t smoke I have been practicing inhaling with them. Stage management gave me a bunch of (very fat) joints to rehearse with and I mistakenly left two of them on a table in the rehearsal studio. A children’s theatre group rehearsed in that same studio this morning. And yes, a child found the joints, brought them to his director, and asked what they were! They were turned over to security, for the director assumed they were actual marijuana joints. Woops.
June 7th, 2009
Based on my work two days ago, I have an hour of notes with Victoria, the dance captain. And I thought the notes were specific before! Now, they are even more so.
“Dan, your guitar should be at 60° instead of 80°.”
“Um, ok.”
“Dan, your body should be at 45° around the microphone stand instead of 30°.”
“Um, sure.”
“Dan, your hands should actually touch your legs after the snaps, not just come close to touching your legs.”
“No problem.”
“Dan, you have to pull your guitar neck back beyond your shoulder instead of just to your shoulder.”
“Of course.”
“Dan, your head should snap to the right on the first count of the second eight, instead of the last count of the first eight.”
“Is that a change generated by Meisner’s technique, or Stanislavski’s?”
“Huh?”
“Never mind.”
No excuses anymore, I guess. And before I get sarcastic again, I think I should remind myself that actors have been fired from this production for not being up to par. I do not want to be fired for not being up to par.
Later, I make a call about an apartment. I have to leave the retirement complex I am currently living in by the end of the month, and I am starting to spend my free time (ha! free time!) looking for a new place that is nice enough to spend a year in and big enough to have Cara and the kids with me part of the time. I was given the phone number of Lindsay Thomas’ boyfriend. Lindsay is the cast member on medical leave, and her apartment directly next door to the theatre is becoming vacant. Her boyfriend makes plans to show me the place tomorrow.
I head home on the subway and, again, have dinner by myself at the dive in my neighborhood. The four Jersey Boys are doing their night on the town to say goodbye to Jeremy tonight, and I was not invited as I had secretly hoped. I told myself that I should not have been invited and it would have been weird to have me there, but still I harbored the secret wish! So, to the Tony Awards I go. Well, to my television I go, rushing back from dinner to catch the opening sequence.
Although Jersey Boys isn’t eligible for awards this year, they do have a featured performance. The performance is “Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You” in which five of the actors playing Frankie Valli from across North America each sing a section. While they sing, the city in which they are performing flashes on a giant screen behind them: Las Vegas, Chicago, National Tour, New York, and Toronto. Wait. Toronto?
It turns out that our Frankie Valli, being the only actor from outside of the United States, is not able to participate in this performance because the producers couldn’t get work papers processed for him in time. So, the Toronto Frankie that shows up on the broadcast is actually the National Tour Frankie (justified because the National Tour played Toronto last year before the Toronto Company took over), and the National Tour Frankie that shows is actually the National Tour Joe Pesci. You get all that?
That is a disappointment, and maybe one of the reasons our Frankie, Jeff Madden, is going out tonight instead of staying home and watching the Tonys himself. He is an amazing actor, one who brings more depth to the role of Frankie Valli than I would have thought possible. And Jeff just won a Dora Award for the role, the Canadian equivalent to a Tony Award.
The Tony Awards have always been a special night for me. As a kid who loved theatre, the only way I knew what was going on in the professional theatre world was by watching the Tony Awards. Each performance was a three-minute glimpse into what was happening in those grand, mysterious theatres off in the magical city that I had not yet visited: New York. There will always be kids watching the Tonys and dreaming about one day being a part of them. I taped the Tonys every year and memorized all of the performances. I can still tell you what songs were performed from each nominated musical from about 1988 until today. I was proud to be the only person I knew who had these broadcasts on tape and could watch them whenever I wanted. Imagine my disappointment when the website BlueGobo.com came along with a vast archive that let everyone in the world see these same broadcasts. My VHS tapes are no longer valuable, but I still keep them under my bed. Damn that BlueGobo. Damn that Al Gore and his internet.
June 8th, 2009
Today is a day off, so I spend it hunting for an apartment. I begin by looking at buildings down on the waterfront. (Ok, maybe I begin with a luxury side trip to the top of the CN Tower. What a place! It is over a hundred stories tall and has a glass floor way up there near the top. I am so nervous to step on that floor that I spend most of the time just sort of tapping it with my foot to make sure it is sturdy. It is sturdy enough for the five-year-old tap-dancing on it, but not for me.)
The waterfront apartments are all beautiful buildings with lake views and bowling alleys in the basement. New York hardly has bowling alleys in the city, never mind in an apartment building’s basement. The commute down here takes about forty-five minutes from the theatre, and I am not sure I want to live that far away. Although, having people recognize me on the subway ride after a show would be very good for my ego. But that shouldn’t be a deciding factor in choosing an apartment, should it? (Should it?) So I travel back up north to the theatre and look at a few apartments in the surrounding block. They are cheaper here, but the neighborhood is not nearly as interesting. But if I am going to have the family here with me for the summer, I want them to be a presence at the theatre. They will not be a presence at the theatre if they have to travel forty-five minutes from the waterfront just to get here.
I visit with Lindsay’s boyfriend and see her apartment next door to the theatre. Her balcony overlooks the stage door from many stories in the air. It is a beautiful place, but I think too small for my family.
Later, Cara calls after some small argument with Mark, needing some consolation. “I feel like a single parent again,” she says.
“But you are not a single parent, hon. I am here with my phone on, just like always. I can talk to you anytime you need me.”
“It’s not the same.”
And she’s right. It’s not the same.
June 9th, 2009
A two-hour choreography rehearsal with Caitlin Carter leaves me sweating through my shirt. She arrived earlier today, and I realize I hadn’t seen her since she taught me the first four or five numbers back in New York. She leaves little room for error, and little room for breathing! She will be here in Toronto for at least a week, maybe more. And her job is…um…me.
I follow that sweaty dance extravaganza with an hour with Shelley. The work goes well, but I really need other guys in the room to act with. (Haven’t I said this before?) I act these scenes just fine with imaginary partners, because imaginary partners do exactly what I want them to do. Real actors tend to be less predictable.
“Daniel, I know things will change when you get other guys in these scenes with you.”
“Oh, yeah, I’m sure of it,” I tell her. “I just wish it could happen now.”
“Well, that’s just a money thing. They can only afford to pay for so much overtime. Think of it as a compliment! We don’t think you need the extra rehearsal.”
I watch the evening show with Shelley and Caitlin and get an earful of commentary about what people are doing. They have seen this show, and its many variations, countless times. They laugh at choices that are different than expected, and then decide whether “different” is bad or just different. Usually, it seems, different is just different, although there are definitely places where they expect certain things to remain identical in all the companies. (I take mental note of these places so I can squelch any future inspirations.)
After the show, at about 11:00 p.m., I go to see another apartment in the theatre’s neighborhood. The guy showing me the place flips out when I tell him I am in Jersey Boys, and offers me $100 less rent per month because of it. This is the tiniest taste of celebrity, and I like it. I hope this is a trend. Too bad the apartment smells like feet, and a tiny celebrity can’t live in an apartment that smells like feet.
June 10th, 2009
Another two-show day for the cast means another light rehearsal day for me. I watch the first show, rehearsing it only in my head. This proves equally as effective as exercising only in my head.
I go to see two more apartments, both of which are awful. I decided to live up here by the theatre, but every place I see is unlivable.
Then, I come back to the theatre for a quick-change rehearsal. The eight-person quick-change into the Big Three is something easily handled, but the change into “I’m In The Mood For Love” requires practice. So we practice. It isn’t perfect, but we make it in time because the two dressers helping me are so good. On a typical night, here is how this change breaks down:
The whole process has taken fifty-eight seconds.
After this amazing quick-change work, I run some choreography in an area of the Performing Arts Centre that is above an open kitchen and dining room. It is a bit awkward to be dancing with my guitar while people eat shrimp and asparagus twenty feet below me. I really have rehearsed this show in many settings, haven’t I? I’ve rehearsed at the Dodger’s rehearsal space, Adam Ben-David’s apartment on the Upper West Side, my bedroom in Midtown, the exercise room in my apartment building, my hotel room in Florida, the stilt-walker’s studio, my makeshift wardrobe room rehearsal space in Florida, the stage of the Bob Carr Performing Arts Centre, the rehearsal studio here in Toronto, the Studio Theatre here in Toronto, the stage of the Toronto Centre for the Performing Arts, my apartment here in Toronto, and today, this space above the kitchen. Whew!
After rehearsal, six people work on various parts of my costumes. My suits have arrived. They need more adjusting.
June 11th, 2009
Today is my dress rehearsal.It is my first time in costume, my first time with a microphone (we wear two, actually, in case one breaks), and my first time with the band. What a ride it is.
Michael Lomenda, Daniel Robert Sullivan, Jeff Madden, Quinn VanAntwerp
©Joan Marcus
I learn, and re-learn, many things. For example, I learn that Tommy needs an attack right out of the gate, but that this attack needs to be calm, cool, and collected. Today, I am not at all calm, not at all cool, and not at all collected. I am high on adrenaline, and attack out of the gate too harshly. How do I fix that? I guess onstage repetition is the way, because the rehearsal room just cannot duplicate the adrenaline rush of hearing the band kick in and seeing the spotlights turn on as I slide downstage for my first entrance. The more I experience that moment, the more calm, cool, and collected I will become.
The sound mix differs greatly from what I’m used to hearing in the audience. Onstage, I hear more voices than music, so I can tune to other people but not to the band. That said, hearing more voices really lets me dig into the harmony, and “Cry For Me” is thrilling as always.
The eight-person costume change leading into “Sherry” doesn’t go so well. This is supposed to be the easy quick-change, the one that didn’t require any rehearsal, but I get caught up in the Velcro and don’t make the change in time. I run onstage with my guitar around my neck, but my pants around my knees.
Throughout the first half of the show, my microphone cord keeps getting caught in my waist and pulling down on my hair. We wear two microphones threaded through our hair and running down to two transmitters strapped in a belt around our chest. This is standard and I have worn such a rig countless times in my life. But I have never worn pants that were so high-waisted! Seriously, the pants in this show make me feel like Grandpa Joe from Willy Wonka. So the cord drifts down, gets caught in the high waist of my pants, and pulls my head back. If you ever see a Jersey Boy not moving his head, you now know why. Blame it on his old-fashioned pants.
Between shows, with no rest for the weary, I go to visit three lousy apartments, then return to receive notes from Shelley and Caitlin. My choreography notes are simple and don’t disappointment me too much (because I didn’t disappoint Caitlin too much). But my acting notes are not too positive with regards to the opening speeches. Tommy sets the tone for the show; if I am too frantic, then the entire show will seem frantic. I have always been good at sensing an audience and talking to them directly in a settled tone, but the spotlights won’t even let me see the audience in this show. How can I talk to them if I can’t see them?
Oh my, I am exhausted. My joints hurt. My bones hurt. I even think my bone marrow hurts. Good night, Cara. I miss you. But even if you were here, I would still be going to bed right this second.
June 12th, 2009
Well, this is it! The day of my put-in rehearsal. The infamous day that every replacement actor prepares for. (Oh, what am I talking about? I have never been a replacement actor. I just feel like I have because “the new guy” seems to be my full identity these days.)
A put-in rehearsal is the only time a new actor gets to do a complete version of the show before performing it in front of an audience. It’s the only time when everyone is in costume with me, all the lights are on, and we are not supposed to stop to fix any mistakes. It’s a rehearsal that is supposed to mimic a real performance exactly.
The cast is warmed up and ready to go. There is a photographer present taking pictures for press releases and the like. And I do pretty well, infinitely better than yesterday. Shelley gave me so many notes yesterday on toughening up my Tommy that I come in ready to be a cocky jerk. (Well, to play a cocky jerk, not to be a cocky jerk. If I decided to be a cocky jerk I might get fired, and being fired is still very much a fear I am trying to deal with.) I maintain my sarcastic smile and jokester attitude, but I add a layer of “confident braggart.” I think it works.
I try to speak to the audience with confidence and authority, but the only audience present is Shelley, Caitlin, the photographer, and a couple of cleaning ladies who are clearly judging me.
My big technical issue of the day is what to do with my many guitar picks. Sometimes I need them in my pocket, sometimes attached to the guitar, sometimes they need to just go away, and I have to figure out how to make all that happen. I am currently playing “Apple Of My Eye,” “I Go Ape,” and “My Mother’s Eyes” with the guitar turned on, and “Cry For Me,” “Big Girls Don’t Cry,” “Walk Like A Man,” “Dawn,” “Big Man In Town,” and “Beggin” with the guitar turned off. I am completely faking “I Can’t Give You Anything For Love,” “I’m In The Mood For Love,” and “Sherry.” I look forward to shifting those categories a bit in the next month.
After the rehearsal, Shelley says, “Daniel, you were a total ass.” So I think I succeeded. But my hands were still shaking at the beginning.
June 13th, 2009
Time is running out. I begin my morning with an hour of vocal rehearsal with our musical director. I usually try to sing with a fuller sound, but this rehearsal is all about trying to get the sound brighter by putting it forward in my nose. A good vocal blend happens not necessarily when singers have individually terrific voices, but when they have good voices that sound similar. For this reason an oboe and a trumpet will never blend as well as an oboe and a clarinet. Similarly, my brother (who is a firefighter and will be mad at me for putting this in print) sounded amazing harmonizing “The First Noel” in the car with me while we were growing up, even though he is not really a singer. But it sounded good because his voice is similar to mine. The singers in this show have a more forward sound, so I need to have a more forward sound.
Later, when checking in with stage management about where I should be, they suggest I take the night off. Really? Do I look like I need a break or something?
For the first time I have no real obligation here in Toronto. I feel like I know the show as well as I am going to, so I jump on the subway and go down to the waterfront. The waterfront is Toronto’s place of beauty. A mid-city meditation. Away from the trash that has piled up in the city parks, and the bad apartments I have seen up by the theatre, the lake is calm and refreshing. I take a long walk just to relax, vow to get on a boat as soon as possible, and then come back here to my apartment to sit on the couch and cement myself for the night. I Facebook everyone in the cast. It was Cara’s idea to wait until tonight to do this.
“Daniel, you don’t want to seem desperate by friending everyone on Facebook the first day you get to Canada. You don’t even know them yet.”
“But how am I going to get to know them if I don’t friend them on Facebook?”
“Well, you could talk to them.”
“Cara, talking to somebody is just not the same as friending them on Facebook. When I talk to them, they don’t show me their pictures, tell me their status updates, say who they are in a relationship with, or what their political views are…”
Such is our modern world.
June 14th, 2009
There is a lot of excitement at the theatre today because Jeremy will perform as Tommy for the last time. Before it begins, I have an hour of choreography work with Caitlin, although I mostly just run things without much commentary from her. I choose to view her lack of notes as a good sign, a sign that I am exactly where I should be with only two days before opening. (Oh my. Two days before opening. It is getting hard to be cool about all of this. I want to shout, “TWO DAYS! HOLY COW! TWO DAYS UNTIL I GET TO STAR IN THIS FREAKIN’ HOT SHOW!” But instead I have to remain calm and say things like, “I have truly enjoyed this rehearsal process very much, thank you.”)
Later, I go to a costume fitting to see how my pants are shaping up. Not too well, since they continue to take them in. I ask if it would be helpful if I ate more doughnuts.
I go into the theatre to watch Jeremy’s final moments onstage. And what moments they are! He plays the show with the same solid focus as always, but at the curtain call there is a full five-minute standing ovation just for him. Although he works a lot in New York, he is actually Canadian by birth and this is a fitting goodbye. He tears up, and so do some of the other guys up there with him. Girlie men, all of them.
PAUSE FOR COMEDIC EFFECT
Just kidding. I was tearing up, too.
Following the show, we attend a going-away party for Jeremy at a restaurant across the street. Our guitar player, Levon, screens a video for Jeremy in which many, many people say some kind of goodbye. Even I am in the video, my goodbye (scripted by Levon) is something like, “Hey, you’ve been doing this show for two years now. It’s about time you fucking left and let somebody else get a job.” I am getting more used to saying the f-word. Jersey Boys will do that to you. I never used to swear before, but now I swear at least five times a day and am 100% certain that number will be increasing in the coming weeks. (Mom, please ignore this last paragraph.)
One of the stagehands was videotaped telling Jeremy to “teach the new guy how to swing a golf club before you leave.” There is a point in the show where Tommy swings a club and I guess this stagehand thinks I am not doing it well. I have to be honest here and say this really embarrasses me in front of the large group. I know he was acting in good fun, but the awkward silence that follows his line shows me that everyone feels weird about it. And now everyone will be checking out my golf swing on opening night.
Jeff Madden’s wife and kids are here, so I meet them for the first time. Beautiful, all of them. And Grant Tilly invites me into his building near the theatre to look at the bulletin board of vacancy listings. I love this building! I call one of the owners and am able to see an apartment right away. It is a two bedroom apartment on the 37th floor with floor-to-ceiling windows in every room looking all the way down to the lake. Incredible. I want this place. I take pictures and, assuming Cara thinks it’s a good choice (how could she not?) I will put money down on it tomorrow.
And you know what I’m going to do now? I’m going to watch YouTube videos on how to properly swing a nine-iron.
June 15th, 2009
Today is a day off, but a day off before opening night is kind of like a scenic plane ride before skydiving.
I sleep as long as I can force myself to, but the sun streaming in and a pile of nervous energy makes it difficult. I go for a run and get hopelessly lost. Toronto is full of ravines; ravines that are wooded and filled with great paths. The only problem is the paths are not in straight lines and when you come up out of the ravine you can appear in a completely unrecognizable part of the city. My intended half-hour run turns into two hours. (I hope my pants still fit.)
I go to the drugstore and buy lots of Gatorade. Let’s get personal for a second; I’ve been feeling dehydrated during rehearsals and I’m looking for an alternative to slurping tons of water. The quantities of water I feel I need are filling my bladder far too quickly, and there is only one quick chance to use the restroom in the first act (just after “Oh, What A Night”). One pair of pants I wear in the show is not so high-waisted and sits just below my belly button, right on my bladder. My bladder was so full the other day that these pants popped open just as I entered the stage. There is a bit too much subtext happening when Tommy makes an entrance buttoning up his pants…
While at the store, I buy a fun Canada mug for Rachel. Tomorrow will be her first time in a new country.
After cleaning the apartment a little, I go out to buy some small thank-you gifts for the cast and crew. I thought it might be fun to get bottles of sherry at the liquor store, so I buy five cases of them. The clerk asks what on earth I am going to do with five cases of such a random drink, so I tell him my reason for choosing sherry. He is super excited to hear I am a new cast member. He says, “I’m just a big theatre queen, but [he whispers now] I have to tell you that Mamma Mia is my favorite show of that type. No offense.”
None taken.
Upon returning to my apartment, I run through the show in my living room. It gets a little more natural every time, but the thousands of faces out there tomorrow night will probably change that. I’m feeling a little under the weather, actually, but it’s probably just nerves and adrenaline messing with my system. Cara would be a calming presence to me right now. Thank God she arrives tomorrow. I don’t feel right when we’re apart. (As if that isn’t obvious by now.)