The Introspective Belly Ache

I decided to start the year off by looking back and seeing what last year taught me. It’s not so much that I feel I have to reflect on what last year was about because it was a year of recovery and rest from a stressful show the year before. What I really am doing is looking at why a creative idea turned into Hell on earth for a year. In talking to a few of my dance friends it became apparent that it is not that unusual for a great idea and creative sharing to turn into a Sci-Fi flick with a B rating. I mean if I knew in the beginning the experience was going to turn into a B rated flick then I would have written a better script instead of writing as I went along.

As human beings we are a very interesting species especially when it comes to accomplishments and life long goals. I say this only because it is very interesting working with actors and professional dancers who have been in their respective occupations for years. Little did I realize that a whole new group of problems would pop up, appear out of nowhere or manifested before my very eyes. The culprit was the longevity of our performer’s respective occupations. Accumulated experience can only go so far and as we found out as the recipients of this knowledge there was a price to pay everywhere we looked, walked, talked or ate. Case in point; I asked the coordinator from the theater where our show was performed at, to have lunch with us. The day of the lunch date he forgot the correct time and was angry, yelling at me on the phone exclaiming that he didn’t have all day to wait on us. Needless to say I had to calm him down and explain “HE” wrote down the wrong time and he at this point was keeping us waiting. Just so you all know it never got better with this person and I had to restrain myself from wanting to learn Voodoo and curse his sorry b*&t.

One of the performers in our show let us know that she would bring in her fans and would help out as needed. Long story short two rehearsals and various lunch meetings over a year’s time just didn’t cut it. And the worst part was dealing with someone who was constantly telling us what she could bring to the table in regards to experience. It was a case of not being able to walk her talk. She worked the nerves and emotions of the cast and crew to the point that they were indifferent to her comings and goings. In the end we found out that she caused one of our actors to leave the show and her fans obviously made a no show the night of our show. I have finally learned that experience does not the performer make?

Did I mention I was working for under a penny a day or was it I was paying dollars a day to produce the show? I think it was the latter only because my bank account was worse for the wear on this one.

Our first composer started out fantastic but ended up changing his music to suite his own needs. He was handsome, talented and arrogant but who cares about the arrogant part when they are talented and did I say good looking!

I ended up having to tell him his music wasn’t working for us and found out just how arrogant he was. As always in these kind of circumstances people want to jump on your bandwagon and then create their own band. This was evident when he was on stage and decided he needed half the stage for his own band. We were starting to look like his back up dancers performing in the background for “His” show. When I confronted him regarding some problems the core dancers and principal choreographer were having with his music he told me to replace them. I laughed because they were the producers of the show. It became apparent who we had to replace.

Our second composer  unfortunately was immature and inexperienced. He spread rumors that we took the money from the show and pocketed it. Since our show was a fund raiser for a children’s hospital we didn’t find this amusing. But this illicit rumor coming from him was like a sad parody especially since he whined the entire show and threw tantrums it seemed every hour on the hour. In the end he took a good thing and turned it into his own vendetta. So I have to ask, “What is it about composers??”

As the show ended we all felt relieved almost like the feeling of the aftermath of a hurricane. You know you experienced Hell but you survived! About a week after the show was over as I was licking my perspective wounds; I quite by accident happened to come across a review of our show on a community website. The writer had come to the show and shook hands with the performers, patted people on the back and congratulated everyone on what a great show it was. Hum……this was not what I was reading and defiantly not what he wrote in the review. The interesting thing about this review was that he didn’t mention to anybody from the show as far as we could tell that he was going to do this review. I have thought with the comments he made that he had the viewpoint of someone who felt slighted in some way. There were certain key phrases that caught my attention and I believe to this day that he had help in writing it. This is a prime example of getting in the last word…..or at least he or whoever helped him may have thought. I wrote a comment back and a bit of a war started with our fans and loyal friends chiming in their opinions and thoughts. So to be honest I am not sure who got in the last word.

With sharing all of this with you it has become apparent to me that a good sense of humor is essential not just in dance but in life. As time goes by I do find myself laughing at some of the unexpected things that happened in the show. In the end it really is about looking in the mirror and knowing that the image looking back at you is not only someone you like but someone that has your back………..And I know I have my back.

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